Gear

I get a lot of questions from people asking about my guitar rig, wanting to know what I use and why. You’re welcome to drop me a line with any questions, and I’d be happy to answer. I hope you find this helpful.

Guitars:

2000 Fender American Standard Stratocaster – My first guitar. I loved it. Then I hated it. Now I love it again. Strats are such beautiful sounding instruments, and completely unique. Helped me define my sound.

2004 Fender ’72 Telecaster Deluxe Reissue – Made me realize I could go all-Fender, and be perfectly happy. The wide range hum bucker pickups

1976 Fender Telecaster – Belonged to one of my good friends Q, it’s now dubbed my TeleQster (get it?). I’ve loved this guitar since the first time he let me play it, and so happy he chose to sell it to me.

1963 Fender Jaguar – I honestly have no idea how I snagged this. Was looking for a reissue, and had a guy offer it up at a silly low price. It may be a “surf” guitar by trade, but it’s got these unique tones that fit perfectly into what I play.

Board (Pedaltrain Pro):

• This1smyne Mini Buffer (mounted underneath board) – Dan Burgess is a great, great guy, and he makes some wonderful products. This $30 box will completely change how your guitar sounds. Seriously, if you don’t have one, buy it.
• Diamond Compressor – If you don’t own a compressor, get one. My rig went from sounding pretty decent to sounding amazing, and all I did was turned this box on.
• Electro-Harmonix MicroPOG – My “cheater” box. Instead of holding octaves, I just switch this puppy on. Also do ambient swells with it engaged. Chorus of angels and all that. Had JHS Pedals do their Quadra Pog mod to it, as well as an extra pot for the “normal” octave.
• Skreddy Lunar Module – Always had a passion for Pink Floyd sounds. This nails it.
• This1smyne “The Pearl” – Arguably the best overdrive stomp box on the market today. Tweakable, with a full range of tonal options, this pedal just sings. I still can’t turn it on without smiling a little inside.
• Ibanez TS9 – I’ve had a couple of Tubescreamer clones in the past, but I decided to just go with the real thing. And man, what a solid decision that was. No other pedal sounds like it, even the clones that try and copy its sound. One of my favorites.
• Paul Cochrane Timmy – One of my favorites. Clean boost, transparent gain, gritty distortion, this box has it all.
• Ernie Ball Volume – Because swells are much easier when you can use a foot too.
• BOSS TU-2 Tuner – I may have perfect pitch, but silent tuning is nice every once in a while.
• Strymon El Capistan – Possibly more than what I need for a dedicated “spacey tape” delay, but holy crap does it sound good. Finally traded up to get it, and it’s not going anywhere.
• Strymon Timeline – My mind is constantly boggled by the sheer power of this pedal. I’ve barely made it through 10% of the possible settings this box has to offer. Can’t wait to write songs based on some of these funky delays.
• BOSS RV-5 Digital Reverb – There’s really no better modulated delay on the market, in my opinion.
• Strymon blueSky Reverberator – Wanna get “how did you do that?” looks from people? Use this pedal. While its modulation isn’t quite as good as the RV-5, the infinite plate and the shimmer settings make this thing sparkle.
• Boomerang III Phrase Sampler – I like to play ambient stuff on occasion, and I really like being able to record things and play over the top of them. The Boomerang is The Grail™ when it comes to looping. So much potential in this thing that I’ve yet to unlock.
• This1smyne bypass strip – Everything runs into this strip, and I toggle each individual pedal on or off as needed. Keeps my tone as pure as possible from guitar to amp.
• This1smyne 1-to-2 output box (mounted underneath board) – Simple box that allows me to run out to multiple amps.
• Powered by a single Cioks DC10 mounted underneath the board.

Amps:

• 2010 Vox AC30C2 – My favorite amp, except for its weight. I really need to get a case for it so I’ve got wheels. Such a beautiful-sounding amp. I wanna replace one of the Greenbacks with a V30 and see how that changes things, but I’m scared of screwing it up.
• 2008 Fender Limited Hot Rod Deluxe – Traded my old Marshall solid state for this baby. The tweed is just icing on the cake. Slowly becoming my go-to amp.
• Mic’d by a Shure SM57 and a Sennheiser e609.

Other gear:

• M-Audio Axiom 25 – A great little weighted MIDI controller for doing some simple pad sounds.

Other gear:

• Recording interface: M-Audio Fast Track Pro – A nice, simple little interface that lets me mic up both of my amps and record them simultaneously.
• Cables: Mogami Gold 25′ – Best sounding cables I’ve ever used. Hate plugging in with anything else. Lifetime warranty, but unlike other manufacturers, they don’t have as many to fix. They make them right the first time.
• Picks: Dunlop Tortex Jazz H1, H2, and H3 picks, and Gravity Picks 1.5mm Razer picks – I’ve always loved the feel of the Tortex picks, and I really dig the brightness Gravity Picks bring to my sound too. Really just depends on what I’m playing and which pick I grab first.
• Strings: D’Addario EXL110 – Yet to find anything else that sounds as good as these do. I have 10s on every guitar except the TeleQster, which will get 11s.