Bare Knuckle Pickups Forum
Forum Ringside => Guitars, Amps and Effects => Topic started by: AndyR on March 31, 2010, 02:32:09 PM
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EDIT: 13/04/2010
Guitar used exclusively in these songs on me Soundclick:
http://soundclick.com/share?songid=8991870 (http://soundclick.com/share?songid=8991870)
http://soundclick.com/share?songid=9011013 (http://soundclick.com/share?songid=9011013)
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Just for Philly :lol: (I have to say though, seeing as I can probably be counted as one of the "incorrigible-guitar-buyers" on here, I reckon I've done pretty well compared to some others: I made no promises at the start of the year, and I've managed to last almost all the way to the end of March, and even then it's a "budget" guitar... )
Anway, the actual guitar, fairly certain this will be of interest to Fernando, Fourth Feline, Wez, and some others.
One of these: http://www.godinguitars.com/godin5thavenuep.htm (http://www.godinguitars.com/godin5thavenuep.htm). A black one, no pickups.
We discussed them a couple of years back, and I said then I wanted a black one.
Well, I was cruising Denmark St yesterday (did you know Regent Sounds has gone!!???! :o :( All is not lost, I found some of them on the street, in the rain... apparently the cartel behind most of the shops there has let this one go, and the staff have taken it over - will be closed for about 3 weeks they say, but I suspect longer...)
Where was I? Oh yeah, cruising, and I found a bunch of these in Rose Morris at internet prices... Two black, two blonde, one sunburst. I was immediately drawn to one of the natural blondes, it was gorgeous to look at. The look of the black, when faced with all three came a close-ish second.
However, I've never really played an archtop before, and I wasn't entirely sure what I should be looking for. All five sounded different. One of the blondes (not the pretty one) was nice at the bright and springy end of the spectrum, three of the others were also bright but didn't seem, to me, to have much character for what I was playing. And then one of the black ones had a sweet top end and nice mids but loads of well defined bottom as well (compared to the others).
It sounded more like I expected a "jazz" guitar to sound. The others sounded like a flat-top with the bottom end gone.
I went back in today, tried them all again, then got one of the shop guys to play the black one and the blonde one so I could hear them "out front". It had to be the black one - it's louder, mellower and sweeter, but still cuts.
Interestingly the bridge is advertised as graphtec Tusq - but I'm [insert famous jazz guitarist name here] if it's Tusq :lol:.
This one has a rosewood bridge plate, quite definitely, and the compensated bridge sat on the posts appears to be rosewood as well. On the others, the whole shooting-match, plate and bridge, looks like some dark plastic ... Why is this one different? Is that the mystery of the tone solved?? Who knows? Who cares? :lol: Can't find anything about it on the interweb yet (although I did find some chap recommending replacing the entire assembly as an upgrade yesterday).
Anyway, she's cute. VERY good for accoustic blues and takes a slide very well. Does the "guitar chords in a jazz band" sound well enough to make me think it sounds right (you know that "chunk-chunk-chunk-chunka" thing). It's also quite cute for folksy stuff as well. It fact it'll do anything I've thrown at it so far, with a slightly different take than a big old flat-top. By way, it's very responsive to differing styles of attack , it copes with bashing away on chords, like you would a dreadnought, much better than the other ones in the shop did.
Now, let's make a coffee, and have a strum while I wait for the recording equipment to arrive... :D
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A quick interim message Andy, as I dash out out of the house . I REALLY look forward to reading your post at leisure later on. I had often wondered about these ( now quite iconic ) guitars, and to have the narrative told with your perspective will be a gem worth waiting for . :)
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Congrats on the NGD! i'm a godin stockist in canada and found that these are lovely, even if made in wild cherry. it's sounding much better than i expected!
how much do they go for in the UK as a curiosity?
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I knew this was coming.... :lol:
....but surprised at the actual result of this particular "Andy day". Interesting! Not at all my kind of thing, TBH, but nice one anyway! :D
There had been quite a few changes in Denmark St last time I went. Those tossers Rhodes Music have finally disappeared and been replaced by a saxophone shop or something. Do any of the current Tin Pan Alley shops sell stuff like PRS?
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Congrats on the NGD, Andy! They look like very nice guitars. Hope we get to hear some clips once that recording gear arrives! :D
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is denmark st the street with a bunch of specialty music shops one next to the other? i'd love to take a stroll there if i'm to cross the pond to the UK :D
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Keven: I'm not sure what the list price is. I found a range of prices in Denmark St, £389 to £499 (and yes, that's the one - it's not that brilliant actually, but I get by there). On the internet in the UK, I've seen the black ones down to £349 - but seeing as I've played two black ones and only wanted one of them, I was more than happy to pay the extra! My shop was the £389 price, but I got them a spot lower.
Philly: Yeah, Rhodes went a while back - the staff are in Rockers. Maccari's have opened up a new branch in the street as well as their little place down the road. They've got a lot of Gibson stuff, which was the only other stuff that was exciting me this time, but well out of my price bracket - except maybe a Firebird faded - that looked quite cute, but it's not really a shape I'm interested in. I'm not sure I have seen any PRS this week - but on the other hand I wasn't looking that close :lol:. There were what I call "PRS-types" knocking about, but whether they were PRS or not I don't know.
IronBeast - yep there might well be clips, I've still got a week and a half off. But they will probably be on my Boss MBR palmtop. It's bigger brother has just arrived and, even though I already understand the Boss approach, it's got a LOT more knobs!!
Fourth Feline - I was actually thinking of you in the shop, I could have done with some input, I'd have still made my own decision, but someone who has some idea of what these guitars "should" sound like might have been helpful... in the end I decided (based on some of the stuff I read on the web yesterday and today) to go for the tone that most spoke to me.
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i always love the look of black archtops :)
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Ha, I literally just stopped playing mine then logged onto the forum to find this (actually have the kingpin model in black, with a p90 in the neck) and strung with DR zebras (half phosphor bronze half nickel) use it for a sort of dirty/trashy blues sound. Surprisingly versatile though, I love the character it seems to have.
They were 349 for the acoustic, 499 for the single pickup and after I bought mine the two pickup version came out for 799.
Bridge on mine was graphtech for sure, dunno why yours isn't.
What I was really impressed with though when I sat down expecting to play an acoustic became a dream, it feels closer to a solid-body electric and your not met by overtight strings even when your using relatively heavy ones.
Would make some clips myself, but lent my mics to a mate who is away on holiday for a couple of weeks.
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Co0ngrats Andy. I was playing a Godin at the weekend in my mate's studio but it was a steel strung Multiac ( I think).Great guitar.
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Well done, looks lovely and you sound like a happy man :)
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Fernando didn't pop in yet, so :
pics or it never happened :wink:
Oh, and congrats of course - looks like a pretty cool piece of wood 8)
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Fernando didn't pop in yet, so :
pics or it never happened :wink:
Oh, and congrats of course - looks like a pretty cool piece of wood 8)
Just a tad late, but hey, he's right :P
Nice that you're liking it Andy, there is a chance to you record something with it to I have an idea about it? keep on the doubts about this one
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You got a pic off the godin site... what more could you need? :wink: (you seen one, you seen them all... :lol:).
Pics are unlikely to happen in the near future, I'm a bit camera illiterate. I don't even own one, and I'm not sure where Mrs R's is at the moment.
Clips though, will be a nother matter. I started fiddling with recording it with the palmtop MBR last night - using the inbuilt mic, so I reckon I can do a better job. However, I can make it sound like anything, so I'm not too sure how much it will help you! :lol:
Right at the moment I'm learning my new BR1600, and when I get as far as plugging a mic in later today, recording this beast might be the first thing that happens. How far "getting a recording out as an mp3 and then getting on to a computer" might be down the learning path, I don't know yet! :lol: (it all depends how often I stop to fiddle with the guitar instead, or come on here, I suppose...)
I have to say, I like this guitar even more this morning. Like Deadstar says, it does feel like you're playing an electric. For me, I don't think that's so much to do with the physical feel, it feels much like my flat-top action-wise, if anything the strings are a little harder. I think it's all to do with the tone and how it responds to pick/finger attack - you can play rock riffs etc and it sounds like a good approximation. Do that on my flat-top and it just sounds like some pillock playing AC/DC riffs (or whatever) on an accoustic guitar. On this one, it is accoustic, yes, but it sounds and feels "rock and roll".
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Pffft I don't care to what you say, you own me some pics :P :lol:
Ah, about the clip I'd more interest in how it really sounds without much equalizing, etc... the real sound...
Nice to hear the rock 'n roll factor :D
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PICS! PICS! :lol:
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I love the things. In fact if thomann hadn't been out of stock of the black Kingpins last summer when I had archtop fever I'd be playing one now (but an El Rey popped up before they re-stocked).
Listen to this guy on one.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rtDMxZrX7Go
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I love the things. In fact if thomann hadn't been out of stock of the black Kingpins last summer when I had archtop fever I'd be playing one now (but an El Rey popped up before they re-stocked).
Listen to this guy on one.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rtDMxZrX7Go
I love this demo of the aco version.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oZdvScADMqk
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This guy modded his with a floating pickup and it sounds great!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q0qnpi_z6kY&feature=related (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q0qnpi_z6kY&feature=related)
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OK Fernando... I've recorded with it... not exactly a "clip" though :lol:
On me Soundclick:
http://soundclick.com/share?songid=8991870 (http://soundclick.com/share?songid=8991870)
(Same as first post)
It's an absolutely fabulous guitar to record with. It's bright and mellow at the same time, wonderfully musical and melodic, with a lovely tight bottom end...
It also plays whatever style you want - in this case a kind of folksie "Ian Anderson" sort of job. Interestingly, not a single plectrum was used in this recording - this guitar is really encouraging me to ditch them :?
It's really good for playing mellow stuff late at night as well 8)
I'll try and get round to doing something a little clearer (eg just one guitar in a bluesy/jazz mode) over the next little while...
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beautifully crafted song andy, with a voice like that i wouldn't worry too much about the guitar!
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Really nice song Andy - I was thinking of Jethro Tull (and maybe early Genesis) before I noticed you'd mentioned Ian Anderson. :D
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I enjoyed that too-you certainly have a voice there.
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Nice! Very confident and competent.. cool stuff.
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Very very cool! +1 to your voice, really good!!
I like how the guitar sounds on this track, I would only want a little more punch (on this song it would be weird, but for something more blues/rock it would be great)
Congrats :D
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Thanks chaps :D
I think it'll do more "punch" Fernando, it's very responsive to finger/pick attack. You can get a nice "ring" out of chords if you don't slam it too hard. But out of single notes you can get a nice chewy tone if you pick/pluck harder. With a plectrum and damping you can get very percussive with it as well.
Oh, and mic'ing it up - enormous differences on mic placement, you can easily hear it in the cans when you're playing it yourself, usually I have a bit of a struggle over that.
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Cool, if I win the lottery running this weekend I'll surely appear to say hi, drink a tea and play the guitar... no matter that you haven't invited me :lol:
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I'm very impressed with all aspects of that song Andy. Total pro quality.
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Nicely done Andy. I was initially shocked for some reason when I first heard it. Was not expecting vocals. That said good vocals and nice playing. All together sounds very well put together.
Glad your enjoying the guitar.
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Cheers guys.
Although I'm a "blues-rock" guitarist on here, really I was singer-songwriter. So give me a multi-tracker and a decent excuse and there'll be walls of vocals (and guitars) all over it.
I'm working on some other old ones at the moment that will probably feature the archtop, but I'm back to work next week, so it'll get a bit difficult finding the time...
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Well put em on here mate, there's a ready audience.
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Here's another one just recorded:
http://soundclick.com/share?songid=9011013 (http://soundclick.com/share?songid=9011013)
You can hear another aspect of the Godin 5th Avenue on this one. It all got a bit "Private Investigations" on the fade :lol:
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wow! sounds terrific!!!
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Yep, another great track Andy!
The guitar sounds great, as does your voice.
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Here's another one just recorded:
http://soundclick.com/share?songid=9011013 (http://soundclick.com/share?songid=9011013)
You can hear another aspect of the Godin 5th Avenue on this one. It all got a bit "Private Investigations" on the fade :lol:
:harp: 5 stars 8)!Great!And with a simple BossBR ?
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Cheers :D
Ummm... not a simple Boss Micro BR anymore... I still use that for demoing and catching ideas. No, I got the biggest one, a BR1600CD over Easter, that's what these two were done on.
They both could have been done on the handheld MBR - but they would have taken ages and much more pre-planning :lol: (especially the first one with all its vocals).
Some of the others were done entirely on the MBR. If We Should Sing Together, and Sooner or Later took quite a bit of time - it's partly ease of doing lots of multi-tracks that I went to the BR1600.
I do have Cakewalk stuff on my laptop (the earlier recordings was done on those), but I find the BRs easy to use, get in the way of creativity less, encourage me to record more, and I get better results :D
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Very nice, I perfer this one to the other one, they are both good but this one as the edge slightly. Nice guitar work and good vocals.
Keep them coming 8)
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Cheers! :)
We seem to have put the acoustic aside for the moment... and we seem to be writing an Iron Maiden track instead :lol:
Not sure what will come of it, but I'm having fun so far :roll: