Three Little Things

Like many guitar players, I drool over guitar porn: the music store catalogs I receive in the mail. I like to see the latest guitars and gadgets, and I think about the killer rig I could assemble if I only had $5,000-10,000 to spare. To be honest, though, I really have everything I need. (Okay, maybe I'm still looking for just the right nylon string guitar.) As a straight ahead jazz player, I'm a fan of a clean guitar sound, so I don't need a huge pedal board or a Marshall stack.

As much as I enjoy looking at all the shiny equipment, it turns out that there are three small, simple items that make life a lot easier: string locks, an amp with a built in tuner, and a Peak music stand.

My Godin XTSA came with string locks, which makes it much easier to change strings. You just loosen the cap, thread a string through and pull it tight, tighten the cap, and tune. Simple!

I use a Roland 80XL for gigs. Its little brother, the 40XL, sits at home as a practice amp. Both of these amps offer up a great clean sound and have some nice built-in effects. Other than the tone, the best feature is the built in tuner. It's quite accurate. You just hit the tuner button, which is in the center left of the controls, and tune up. As an added bonus, the tuner automatically mutes the amp, so no one else has to listen to you tune…very handy when you're a church musician and you want to check the tuning during the sermon. I used to use a digital tuner pedal, the Boss TU2, which works quite well, but when your amp has a built-in tuner, you have one less piece of equipment to pack.

Finally, my favorite piece of equipment: the Peak music stand. It's made of highly durable plastic, folds in on itself, and fits nicely into a bag that ships with the stand. It's about $30, and it is light and solid. It's nearly as light as a cheap wire stand, and nearly as durable as a heavy metal stand. I've turned a number of my musician friends onto this stand. I've lost track of the number of times I've taken this stand out, only to hear another musician or audience member comment on it. You can click here for a video demo.

All three of these items or features are small things, but they've made a big difference by simplifying my gigging life.

Cube-80XL Review

A couple weeks ago I blogged about an old friend unexpectedly buying me an amp to return a favor from many years ago. This is a review of that amp, the Roland Cube-80XL. This is not an exhaustive review. The way I use the Cube80 is influenced by my style of play, so there are some features I don't use. If you want to learn everything about this amp, you can check out the Roland website.


The 80XL replaces my Cube-60, which is a terrific amp. I've used the Cube-60 for jazz and with my original group InTown Band, which blends several styles (rock, jazz, blues, reggae, soul, gospel, and whatever else we decide to throw into the mix). I still love the 60. In fact, I'm using it for a current pit gig, leaving it in the theater for the duration of the run while simultaneously using the 80XL for other shows.

I absolutely love the Cube-80XL. The best thing about it is that it just plain sounds great, and for the small to medium venues I play, I have all the volume I'll ever need. It has three channels: JC Clean, Lead, and Solo. The clean channel is modeled after the JC120 (Jazz Chorus 120). The lead channel has an impressive array of amp models. The clean and lead channels each have their own volume control. The solo channel allows you to save settings from both the clean and lead channels, including onboard effects. I've messed around with the various amp models from the lead channel, and they're fun, but with my style of play, the clean channel is all I use.

It has some nice effects on it, including chorus, flanger, phaser, and heavy octave. I especially like the chorus effect. I usually use a chorus pedal, but the onboard chorus sounds great and will do in a pinch. The heavy octave is fun. With this effect on, the amp simultaneously generates an octave below whatever note(s) you're playing. This is no substitute for being able to play octaves the real way, a la Wes Montgomery, but it's fun to turn on the effect and play fast runs in octaves.

You have a choice of spring or plate reverb. I don't use a lot of reverb, but I do like to add a touch of plate reverb. Although the delay effect is nice to have, I prefer to use a delay pedal for more control over the delay effect.

The 80XL has an aux in, allowing me to amplify an MP3 player. This is handy for background gigs where I need to provide music while I'm taking a break. I simply plug in my iPhone, call up one of my playlists, and I've got recorded background music while I saunter over to the buffet table.

You can use foot pedals (not included) to switch all these effects on and off, and you can also use a pedal to switch back and forth between clean and lead channels. The onboard tuner is handy, too.

Aside from the terrific sound quality from the clean channel, my favorite feature is the onboard looper, which allows you to loop 80 seconds of music. You can start recording a phrase by pressing a foot pedal, and you can overdub. The only thing I don't like about the looper is that you can't turn the loop off with the foot pedal (or possibly I have the wrong kind of pedal). This makes it impractical for live performance, but that doesn't matter, since I already own an RC-50 looper. It does come in handy for practicing at home. For example, I can loop some chords ad nauseum while I practice a new lick. I originally intended to only use the Cube 80 for performances and recording while using the Cube 60 as a back-up, but I've found the onboard looper to be so handy that the new amp has become a useful practice tool.

The Roland Cube-80XL is a terrific amp. Between this amp and my old Cube-60, I don't see myself needing another amp for a long time to come.

A Mild Case of G.A.S.

Many guitarists have a bad case of G.A.S. – Guitar Acquisition Syndrome, sometimes known as Gear Acquisition Syndrome. If you want to rock out, you'll want an electric guitar, and many jazz guitarists (like me) like to play archtop guitars. For classical music, you'll need a classical nylon string guitar, and you'll need an acoustic guitar for folk music. And then there are the many, many cool guitar toys! Effects pedals, amps, and much more. Like many guitarists, I regularly look at guitar porn…catalogs from Sam Ash, Guitar Center, Sweetwater, and other music stores. I eagerly thumb through each catalog to see what's new, and I dog ear each page that has something I might "need."

My G.A.S. is relatively mild. I've never been a big gear nut, and I don't automatically buy every new thing that comes out – mostly because money is in short supply. If I suddenly found myself with a lot of money, I suspect my G.A.S. would worsen.

The rest of this blog is dedicated to the gear I use most often.

Guitars: From left to right, my three guitars are a Heritage 170CM, a Heritage 575, and a Godin Nylon SA.

The red Heritage 170 on the left is my newest and oldest guitar. I bought it less than a year ago at Earthshaking Music, so it's the newest guitar in the family, but the guitar is 25 years old. I can get a wide variety of sounds from this instrument, and it's perfect for the eclectic soul fusion of InTown Band. This little guitar is ridiculously easy to play.

The Heritage 575 in the middle is my main axe. It's beautiful to look at, and it's even more beautiful to hear. This jazz box has an incredibly sweet sound, and it's easy to play. I play this guitar with On the Cool Side, as a soloist, and as a rhythm guitar when I sub with the Atlanta Swing Orchestra and the Sentimental Journey Orchestra.

The Godin on the right is an electric nylon string guitar. Although it's electric, it has a very convincing classical sound. I often use the Godin for solo and duo settings. I just love the sound of finger style jazz arrangements played on a nylon string guitar. One really cool thing about this guitar is that it can be plugged into a synthesizer, which gives me access to a whole world of sounds, including strings, winds, and exotic instruments from all over the world.

Since I play all electric guitars, I need amps. My two main amps are the Roland Cube 60 and the Roland AC-90.

I use the Cube 60 for the two Heritage guitars. Although you can use the Cube 60's lead channel to get a variety of sounds, I only use this amp for the clean sound. (A clean sound in guitar-speak means the sound you get without any effects added.) It's absolutely perfect for jazz guitar, and it has reverb built right in. With the Heritage 575 (my jazz guitar), this may be the only amp I'll ever need.

The AC-90 is designed for acoustic guitars. This is what I use with the Godin nylon string, and it sounds pretty decent with the Heritage jazz box, too. The AC-90 has built in reverb, and it also has a separate input for a second instrument or a microphone. Most guitar amps sound terrible if you sing through them, but you can get a surprisingly good vocal sound out of the AC-90.

I don't have a wide array of effects pedals, but I use a few. When I play with InTown Band, I use the Boss ME-50 multi-effects pedal. I use the small pedal on the left to add distortion. I use the small pedal in the middle if I want to add a tremolo sound, and the small pedal on the right is for a delay effect (an echo effect). I use the big pedal on the right for a wah-wah sound.

And finally, we have a Boss chorus pedal and a tuner pedal. I love this little blue chorus pedal. If I get the settings just right, I can create a transparent, glassy tone that sounds great with many of InTown Band's mellower songs. The Boss TU-2 tuner is always in my gear bag. First of all, it's an excellent tuner, but it has side benefit. When you step on the pedal to turn it on, it mutes the guitar sound, so the audience doesn't have to listen to you tune. This comes in handy when I play in church at NWUUC. If a string goes out of tune during the service, I can quietly retune without bothering the congregation.

That's about it. Compared to your average folk guitarist, I suppose I have a lot of gear, but this is nothing compared to what many rock guitarists might use. I like to keep my rig simple, and aside from InTown Band's music, the only effect I use regularly is a touch of reverb.