I came across this demo video that someone recorded at NAMM this year. The Fender rep goes through all the functionality of the Stratocaster VG guitar pretty quick.

Essentially what we have here is a standard American Strat that also has digital modeling hardware built in. It runs off of 4 AA batteries. The guy in the video says “if you get the high voltage ones that you put in digital cameras it will last about 10 hours.”

Anyway, check out the video.

Video found via Zillinois

I am going to go on a bit of a rant right now and just toss this out there. Can someone please tell me what the appeal of a replica guitar is? Ok, so signature guitars are one thing. You want to sound as close to your guitar idol as humanly possible, so you buy all of their gear including their brand new INSERT GUITAR MANUFACTURER HERE Signature guitar. But I just don’t get where guitar makers are finding a market for all of these replica guitars complete with every scuff, stain, and scratch of the original.

The first one I saw was ESP’s James Hetfield Truckster. It comes complete with the same wear marks that are found on James’ original. Ok… sort of a cool idea, I’ll dig it. Then I came across Dean’s Dimebag Darrell Dean from Hell ML replica. Again… ok, even though I have issues with Dean taking advantage of Dime’s now legend status to sell guitars after his untimely death (RIP Dime).

Then the big announcement at NAMM was Eddie Van Halen worked out a deal with Fender to produce a limited number of exact replicas of his Frankenstrat guitar. Now… I don’t think I need to point out the obvious, but I will anyway. The original wasn’t even a Fender. In fact it said Charvel right on the headstock. So is fender going to go as far as to find the same original parts that went into making the original Frankenstrat? I really don’t think so. Never the less, they will sell for thousands of dollars.

Even as I write this I came across this Gibson Custom Limited Run Zakk Wylde Bullseye Aged Les Paul. Again, who wants to pay $7,999USD for scuffed up replica?

Gibson has released their second Guitar of the Week and man is it stunning. Gibson announced the Les Paul Classic Antique at this years NAMM Gibson has been making it for years. Look at the amazing finish on this guitar. Gibson calls it Fireburst and I think it is just freaking amazing.

Like I said the guitar is a run of the mill Classic Antique complete with ‘57 humbuckers, ’60s slim taper profile, rosewood fingerboard, and antique binding. The Les Paul is no different from others keeping the 3-way pickup toggle switch and volume/tone controls in their standard positions.

Obviously we can’t expect Gibson to be putting out a totally unique Custom each week, but I hope we get to see some more variations from their standard product lineup in the future. Again though, I am all about this finish. I think it’s stunning.

I am not really sure what to think about this guys technique. I think the first half is very noisy and it doesn’t really sound that great for what he is doing. However, in the second half he does some really amazing acoustic tapping and then does some kind of slapping as well. I would be willing to bet that he has some experience playing a bass guitar.

Half good half bad. If he had have done the stuff from the second half all the way through I would have been much more impressed. Interesting technique though, and I am amazed with the amount of volume he was able to get with no pick.

Ok, so here is an exercise I use to improve my alternate picking speed as well as my left and right hand coordination. I picked up this little exercise from John Petrucci’s instructional video Rock Discipline and just modified it a little bit to my liking. It is a chromatic pattern, but a little bit more interesting than the standard 4 note, 4 fret up and down pattern. The following should be played using alternate picking, or up/down/up/down.
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Jackson has just unveiled a new signature guitar for Mark Morton of Lamb of God. If you head over to jacksonguitars.com right now you’ll see their little showcase. The guitar is a customized version of the Swee-Tone Jazz’r that Mark himself helped design.

Jackson has lost a few artists to ESP over the last few years… well basically since they were bought by Fender. This shows some artists still have faith in the Jackson brand. The guitar, which Mark Morton helped design really is run of the mill though. If you look on Jackson’s site, all of the unique features are in the aesthetics. You’ll see though that it has all of the standard metal guitar features including Seymour Duncan pickups, jumbo frets, and neck-through-body design.

Set aside the amazing finish and unique body design. The thing that stands out at me is both the bridge and neck position have the same pickup. To be hones the first thing I would do after buying this guitar would be swap out one of the pickups with a different Seymour Duncan to increase the range of sound. On the other hand, this IS a signature guitar… if you are going to buy it my guess is you are trying replicate Morton’s sound. Either that or you are like me and are having strong sexual feelings towards the guitar due to it’s stunning finish.

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Cary from Electric Guitar Review has just announced a new guitar forum that he is hosting called Tube Freaks. Cary says the forum is geared towards vintage guitar and equipment enthusiasts but stresses that all guitar and music lovers are welcome.

The great thing about getting into a forum early is you can take part in developing it. Cary has a thread right now in the feedback section asking members for category suggestions. I think this shows he is really interested in making it an open community for guitar enthusiasts. I have already signed up and have made my mark on the show us your gear thread. By the way, another good thing about getting on a forum early is you get first dibs on the user names.

The forum is just getting off it’s feet now, going by the quality and popularity of his weblog I’m sure in no time it will be a busy site.