Clayton Acetal Crazed Clown Guitar Picks 1 Dozen Medium
$4.99
Condition: New
Clayton Acetal Crazed Clown Guitar Picks 1 Dozen Medium
Clayton Acetal Crazed Clown Guitar Picks 1 Dozen Medium
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SMG Review: EMG’s ST12 Prewired Drop-In Pickguard for Strats
A LITTLE HISTORY
EMG, Inc. is well known throughout the guitar community as a leader in active pickup systems. What you may not know is that the company, which recently celebrated its 35th anniversary, originated as Dirtywork Studios, then Overlend, before settling on its current name, which is short for ‘electro-magnetic generator’. What you may also not realize is despite a strong reputation for active pickups, EMG also offers a variety of passive pickups. Included in these offerings is the ST12, a complete system designed to drop in to your Strat with minimal fuss.
MINIMAL FUSS…
The ST12 comprises two humbucking OC1 (open coil) pickups: bridge and neck. These are pre-wired and built into a choice of white or black pickguard. Controls include a 3-way pickup selector, master volume, and master tone. Installation is easily managed thanks to EMG’s Quick-Connect system.
With no soldering required and the only wiring requiring replacing the stock input jack with the included replacement jack, installation was a breeze. It literally took me longer to unscrew and pull out the old pickguard than to install the ST12.
MAXIMUM IMPACT…
Giving the ST12 a test run, I ran the axe through a Blackheart Little Giant Half Stack. The bridge pickup performed with clarity and leanness without ever sounding too bright or thin. True to the signature Strat sound, aggressive picking came through with punch and there was a quality to it that begged to be shifted into overdrive. Flipping to the neck pickup, the tone filled out with a round and heavy bottom end (for those of you who like that kinda thing…). The character came across more mellow but there was still a bit of that punch. Depending on your perspective, blending the two pickups could be thought of as rolling off the lower frequencies of the neck setting for a more balanced tone or inflating the bridge setting with fullness and a more dynamic frequency range. All in all, the ST12 offers three voices different enough from each other to provide versatility while maintaining familiar qualities that provide a cohesive palette of tones within a single unit. A standout quality at all settings is the clarity and quietness. Hum-free is a beautiful thing.
THE FINAL WRAP
If you’re looking to experiment with different sounds for your Strat and would rather spend more time playing and less time hunched over your work bench with your soldering iron – or worse, paying someone to do it for you – the EMG ST12 is worth a look. Not only can you maintain your stock pickguard as is, it will take you less time and hassle to install the entire unit than replacing a single pickup the old fashioned way.
The sounds are a bit on the generic side, but maintain some classic Fender Strat characteristics. For clean, clear, noise-free output, you can’t do much better than EMG.
Street Price – $189
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SMG Review: T-Rex Engineering’s Twister 2 Chorus/Flanger
T-Rex Engineering is a Danish company that has been providing the guitar community with high quality effects, power supplies, switches, controllers, and more for over a decade. Their recognition as a significant industry player is validated by worldwide sales and a client list that includes Carlos Santana, John Mayer, Mark Tremonti, and Steve Lukather, to name a few. T-Rex originally released a combination stereo chorus and flanger in a single pedal called the Twister. The pedal was well received but rather than settling for ‘good enough’, T-Rex, with the help of user feedback, gave the unit a facelift, updated the hardware and software, and unveiled it as the Twister 2.
THE OUTER SHELL
The pedal’s tone-twisting technology is housed inside a lime green aluminum casing that measures a bit wider than standard stompboxes. A small but rugged switch toggles between Chorus and Flanger with five dials controlling behavior: Depth, Regen, Tone, Rate, and Level. The on/off footswitch is industrial-grade sturdy. A spring-released knob for setting Input Gain is inset into the right side of the pedal. The remaining features include a standard 1/4″ input jack, two 1/4” jacks for mono or stereo output, a 9V DC jack, and 9V battery compartment.
TWISTING TONE
In optimizing the level going into the pedal, I adjusted Input Gain to insure I was getting a rich signal, just shy of distortion. Starting with the pedal in Chorus mode, I set all controls mid way and gently strummed my EMG DG-20 equipped Strat, letting the effected notes ring out and wash over me. The sound was serenely lush, but begged for some good ol’ knob twisting. Adjusting Tone controls higher frequencies, but it felt more like an expansion knob as the sound opened up overall with a clockwise turn. Rate adjusts the speed of the sweep. At the minimum setting, it’s slow and dreamy with a quality that I felt more than noticed consciously. At its max setting, it gets very shimmery, but avoids going overboard and remains usable. Depth controls the intensity of modulation from nearly unaffected to rich and full. Regen is reserved for Flanger mode and as such, offers little in Chorus mode, though I thought I detected a touch of added sparkle when turned up. Switching to Flanger mode, my amp went cosmic with a more pronounced warbly effect. Tone, Rate, and Depth behaved similarly as in Chorus mode, but the result differed as I achieved everything from a more intense chorus-like effect, to a deep, harmonically intensified vibrato, to an eerie rubber band-like journey through space in which notes seemed to interact with each other sympathetically within the pedal itself – trippy! With Regen, I modeled the sound based on how the other controls were set. I was able to dial in a unique range of character from classic flange frequency sweeps to a wacky Slinky effect that responded sensitively to pick dynamics. As if that weren’t enough, the pedal has two outputs for twisting in stereo! Talk about a true sonic soundscape!
THE FINAL WRAP
The greatest quality of the Twister 2 is the way in which its effects are felt, more than heard. I required a little adjustment in my expectations as many chorus and flanger pedals are in your face as an effect, rather than melding into and becoming part of your sound. The pedal will twist your tone into something other than what you put into it – you give up transparency, and I had to turn the Level knob up higher than I would have liked to gain parity in volume between its on and off state, but aside from those exceptions, I was pleased with the fantasy of sounds produced.
STREET PRICE – $279
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Dan Coplan is senior staff writer at SMG. Dan is a Los Angeles based cinematographer and self-admitting guitar junkie. Email: dancoplan@sharemyguitar.com
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HOW TO GET YOUR JAM ON WHILE TRAVELING
HITTIN’ THE ROAD
I recently went out of town for work for a month. My first concern, before wondering about sleeping conditions and food opportunities, was how to keep up with playing, primarily with respect to the new songs I had to learn for my band. I was hauling a lot of gear for my job, so whatever I brought had to be compact, easily transportable, and rugged in order to survive any mishaps. Furthermore, I needed a way to hear my guitar and be able to play along with the songs I needed to learn.
TRAVEL GUITARS
I had two travel guitars prior to this journey. My Baby Taylor is perfect for taking to the park, the beach, or even plunking on at home on the couch. When acoustic is the flavor of choice, it’s compact enough and resides in a nicely padded gig bag that’s ideal for travel, but it didn’t meet my needs for this trip. Though durable for an acoustic, I didn’t want to subject it to being knocked around. I was going to be spending a lot of time in airports and on buses and wanted something that wouldn’t disturb others. Finally, learning the solo to ‘Flirtin’ With Disaster’ just wouldn’t have cut it on any acoustic.
My Aria Sinsonido is super compact and also comes in a nicely padded gig bag. It’s been all over the world with me, proving itself as road-worthy time after time. The headphone output meant I’d be able to play anywhere, anytime, without drawing attention. But it’s a steel string model – not so friendly to high register pitch bends and other electric-style gymnastics.
My neighbor had an electric-style guitar from Traveler Guitars that he really enjoyed so I got in touch with them and told them of my plans. They sent over the very appropriate EG-2: full-scale neck, compact and solid, yet small framed and short in length with the tuners built into the body, and both standard 1/4″ guitar and 1/8″ headphone jacks. Add to that a well padded gig bag with extra pockets and carrying handles and straps. Guitar – check.
PLAY THAT FUNKY MUSIC, WHITE BOY!
My next challenge was figuring out how to play the song list for my band and jam with it at the same time. I had all the songs on my trusty iPod Touch, but had no way of looping sections for practice. I was also figuring out how to listen to the songs while playing along at equal volume. IK Multimedia’s Amplitube app and iRig interface to the rescue! Uploading the songs to the app, I was able to loop sections and adjust playback speed. With the iRig, my guitar interfaced perfectly with the app, allowing me to set playback and guitar levels, dial in killer tones through the amp modeling, and further shape my sound through pedal effects. With the inclusion of the built-in tuner and metronome, I had the perfect all-in-one practice solution on a pocket-sized device. This setup was just what I needed and served me well, but when I was holed up in my hotel room, I wanted to break free of the headphones and extra cabling and rock out in the open (as much as rocking out in a hotel room will allow).
THIS ONE GOES TO 11! (but won’t disturb the neighbors)
I took a quick trip to Guitar Center (they’re everywhere!) and scoped out the micro amps. There was good variety and I tried every one, excitedly settling on a Danelectro HoneyTone. It had the best sound of all the amps, it was perfect in size (easily tossed into a backpack) and power (quiet enough to rock and not get kicked out of the hotel, to loud enough to rock and get kicked out of the hotel), and looked damn cool. Done!
I had my Mac laptop with me. One of my favorite practice tools is software by Roni Music called ‘Amazing Slow Downer’. Similar to Amplitube, it allows looping sections of music and adjusting playback speed, but also includes equalization, mix control, saving loop presets, and more. I initially balked at the $50 price tag, but it has become one of the best purchases I’ve made and I use it on a daily basis.
With the songs playing through my laptop’s speakers, and my EG-2 through the HoneyTone, I wailed to my heart’s content. The laptop, guitar, and micro amp were enough, but incorporating Amplitube into the mix really made for a fun time as I ran the guitar into the iRig, through the app’s amp modeling and pedal effects, and out to the HoneyTone. Now I was cookin’!
GO FORTH INTREPID TRAVELER!
With all the great, innovative, travel-friendly products on the market, there is no longer concern as to how to keep up with your six-string while on the road. With the gear mentioned above, I had everything I needed for full-on practicing and jamming: one small, compact padded gig bag for the guitar, and one laptop bag which easily held my computer, iPod Touch, HoneyTone, cables, picks, guitar magazines…
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Dan Coplan is senior staff writer at SMG. Dan is a Los Angeles based cinematographer and self-admitting guitar junkie. Email: dancoplan@sharemyguitar.com
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