The biggest, most anticipated and unrivalled guitar event of the year, the London Guitar Show launches on the 11th June at ExCeL London.  It features four days of seminars and clinics, master classes and other activities including a careers fair, guest speakers, instrument demos and workshops. Featured in the world class lineup is the Master [...]

I popped into an Apple store on the weekend and was intrigued to see a MacBook Pro setup, connected to a guitar with a built in USB interface.  I unsuccessfully tried to get it working in-store with GarageBand, but to satisfy my curiosity, I Googled it and found that it was none other than the [...]

The Octavius Squeezer Analog Bass Synth Pedal, from Godlyke Distribution, has been announced and will be available starting mid-summer 2008.  The bass effects pedal features a true analog reconfigurable signal path technology, true bypass switching and digital switching system between the 96 user-editable presets.   Octavius Squeezer includes a dedicated filter circuit bred in our [...]

Canada’s current affairs magazine, Maclean’s, poses the question – in the eyes of today’s bands and pop music, is the guitar solo effectively dead?  A number of so-called rock musicians and guitarists are alleging that if you play one in a rock song right now, it’s almost laughable and taboo – very different to the [...]

I often ask myself – if there was ever a fire in my house (touch wood), what would I take?  My usual answer would always be: a file containing important documents in one hand, and my emotional side would say irreplaceable photo albums in the other hand.  Ok, maybe a few hands, with the number of albums [...]

I’m always on the lookout for new music to inspire my guitar playing.  It’s also nice to hear something fresh now and again, but how do you sort out the wheat from the chaff – especially when services such as iTunes puts millions of songs at your fingertips? Enter StumbleAudio, a streaming service designed to help [...]

As reported by Modern Guitars Magazine, Gibson Guitar will announce six new additions to the Gibson Custom line of “Inspired By” guitars, honouring Steve Jones, Mick Jones, Alex Lifeson, lee Ritenour, Johnny Winter and Joe Bonamassa.  The lineup of custom reissues includes: Mick Jones Les Paul Custom Alex Lifeson ES-355 Steve Jones Les Paul Custom [...]

Only one guitar has the infamous claim of being the first guitar burnt onstage by legend Jimi Hendrix.  The 1965 Fender Stratocaster was doused with lighter fuel and set alight during a performance at London’s Finsbury Astoria in March 1967 – and Hendrix himself was rushed to hospital with minor burns to his hands.  It [...]

We’ve featured the paid version of Riffworks from Sonoma WireWorks previously, and they’ve just announced a free version of their Riffworks guitar recording and collaboration software.  One of the benefits of Riffworks T4 is that it: allows up to four musicians to collaborate on a song and chat simultaneously. Loop-based recording allows collaboration without latency [...]

Apparently, if you’re an acoustic or classical guitarist and you rest your arm on top of the body of your instrument, you “lose between 15 and 20 percent of the power and projection of the top of the guitar“.  This is where guitar armrests come in, and they have the added benefit of making your [...]