Musical Instrument & Equipment Thread

I've recently been getting back in to guitar after a 3 year period of slacking (yes, basically Halo 3...) and my gear freak ways are starting to resurface. luckiesnipes' post reminded me of my desire to make this thread, so here it is.

Post any and all musical equipment you have, pictures are a big plus (google image search is your friend if you don't have a digital camera to hand). Anything from instruments to amps, effects, recording equipment or anything else related to the creation of pretty noises. Remember to wax lyrical to your heart's content, back those pictures up with plenty of text and give us the story to your instrument if there is one, or just tell us about how it plays, what kinds of stuff you use it for and what sort of music you play in general.

Here's my current set up, please excuse the poor quality of my iPhone camera:

Guitars:



Left: My Aria Pro II M-Series in highlighter orange. I can't find much on this guitar around the internet apart from a couple of hits in google image search, but these lead me to believe that the model number is M-650. It was a birthday present from my then girlfriend 4 years ago. Originally she'd gotten me a 360 but it was part of a bad batch or something that red ringed almost immediately, when the replacement did the same we gave up and went to Denmark Street to buy a guitar instead. As soon as we walked in to the shop she saw it on the wall and said 'buy this one!', we only had £210 and this thing was £500, but I tried it out anyways and fell in love with it. I asked if they'd take £210 cash for it there and then (this was a second hand guitar shop much more open to haggling etc.), the shop assistant looked dubious but asked the owner anyway, who was clearly on a draining phone call and just shooed him away with a 'Yeah, fine, whatever'. Score one for me, never selling this thing, I love it too much.

Right: Ibanez RG450, Japanese (FujiGen factory) 1999. I picked this up on eBay for a cool £250 which I was pretty happy with considering I'd been looking at the worse RG350, made in Indonesia, which would have cost £100 more (Japanese guitars >>>>> Indonesian guitars if you're not in to this sort of thing). The neck on this thing is super fast, though I want to change the stock pickups out for something better when I can, and I'm considering changing the bridge when I have the spare cash sometime in the future as this one's known for being one of the worse Floyd Rose-alikes. But overall this guitar is fantastic, when I'm finding a lick a little tricky on my Aria I often try it on this instead, it still surprises me when I then nail it first time on the Ibanez (though to be fair I put 10 gauge strings on my Aria and 9s on this, so that helps in itself with faster stuff).

I've also got a Tanglewood LP copy which was my first guitar, I still prefer it to the Epiphone Standard LP (what I was going to get until I found the Tanglewood) though I barely play it now I have my Aria. Plus I have a cheapo Rockson (I'd never heard of them either and can find nothing about this thing on the internet, it might as well not have a name on it...) Super Strat rip off. It's actually got a really nice, almost convincing quilted maple effect. The wood is cheap and the pickups are pants so it sounds awful, but for some reason the neck is really nice to play. Kinda wasted since you'll never get a good sound out of it, but it's a good guitar for just noodling on whilst sitting around. Plus it was only £120 and came with a pretty good hard case which I can use for other stuff too. Those are back in London, so no pics I'm afraid.

Amp:





I just got this a couple of months ago and I love it, it's a Marshall Class 5, 1x10" valve combo. Best of all, it cost me £300 new and it's made in England, that genuinely shocked me when I found out, similarly priced and even more expensive competitors all being made in the far east. It sounds beautiful, pure valve sound without even a master volume to get in the way, if you want it to start crunching you have to turn it up (though I'm going to get a Vox Satchurator pedal asap since this is a little ... impractical). I used to have an ENGL 100 watt Powerball head:

Spoiler

It was an absolute demon, but I never even gigged once with it, and it was completely unsuited to bedroom use, volume couldnt go above 1/2 (and I don't mean 1/2 way to full volume, I mean half way between 0 and 1...). I loved that thing so much but was far from doing it justice and barely used it at all since it was so unwieldy for anything even close to quiet. Plus it was so expensive that I never recovered enough to buy a cab for it, so I had to run it through a cheap old nameless 2x10" cab that my friend got for free, it just wasn't fair to the thing. I sold it to my friend recently and he's putting it to excellent use, he runs his Ibanez JS2000 through it and it sounds immense. But he came round when I eventually got around to buying the Marshall as a replacement and he seriously wants one. Considering the ENGL is like a £1200 amp, the fact that this still stole his heart with its clean and chunky little tone, and that I genuinely don't consider it a real step down in terms of anything but versatility (though to be fair in this sense it is a monumental step down), is testament to how awesome this little box is for what you pay. When I get my Satchurator I'm gonna sit down and record something or other.


Now you guys, go!

 

^ That looks like a pretty sick setup, but I wants model numbers! I ain't as good at this as I used to be lol.

I'm yearning for an acoustic as well, I sold my last one because it was just too bassy and boomy for my liking even with lighter strings, plus the intonation started to go and it's a ***** to fix on acoustics. I might try out a Telecoustic, apparently they're a nice middle ground for mainly electric players.

 

ANY head that comes with a 4x12" for $300 is pretty good, and Crate amps are decent so that sounds like a good deal to me. Is it valve or tranny?

I used to have an RP50 (didn't everyone at some point? ), can't say I ever really got a great sound of it, but then it died before I stopped being a noob so that could be unfair. I know Digitech have actually made some really decent DFX pedals when they started getting a name for themselves a few years ago, but I never really fell in love with any RP. Though you're right that it'll do everything, and I can see the point about having a massive pedal board of stomp boxes or one, nicely sized multi effects pedal which does it all.

I'm actually pretty simple as far as effects go, once I've gotten my Satchurator I'm probably gonna look in to a decent wah and maybe a nice reverb box. With so few effects I'm definitely sticking to the principle of separates to get the best sound.

 

OK, so I'll admit the Aria is a love it or hate it affair (though if you've got an LP then I think playing this thing would give you some sympathy, the neck is like an LP but just a little slimmer and the fretboard is beautiful, plus the increased body mass gives it a great sound), but what's wrong with my RG? Is it the mirrored pickguard? Cause I know it's a little glam metal but seriously, LED's under the pots (the pic you posted further down)? I hope those are active pups so there's a legitimate reason to have a battery in that thing, coloured lights ftl... But anyway, cat fighting aside:

What, you mean 1954-present? Lol, but yeah, I do kinda know what you mean. LPs were just starting to come back in for budget guitars when I got mine, indie made LPs and Tele's big again I guess. Strats are great though, I'm thinking of getting one at some point since I really want a guitar with single coils, I'm kinda tempted by a tele but I don't think I could live with it unless I found one with a really thin neck or a strat neck.

Can't say I'm really digging the look but I've played some nice Yamaha fat-stratalikes so I can believe it's got a nice character of its own. Though I'm surprised you'd shoot for something like that when your current guitar is an LP. It's fixed bridge and dual humbucker just like an LP, when someone says 'strat' I think of single coils and a trem straight off. True those look like mini humbuckers so you will get a slightly brighter tone than your LP (I can't speak for your guitar/pickups specifically, but in general), but personally I'd still tend towards a more standard strat style model to balance off against the LP and get some really bright sounds you couldn't get elsewhere. But I suppose this depends on what you play, said tones may well be useless to you.

 

I know nothing about decks on the technical side but I love the music they make . Do you have any of your own stuff up on the net?

Cool beans, I just heard that I've finally gotten a job, so next on the cards for me is either the Vox Satchurator pedal, or this:



Oooh a sunburst Strat, original I know...

It's a Fender Classic Player 60s Strat, now it's made in Mexico but don't let that fool you. It's got actual Custom Shop '69 pickups and a Custom Shop vintage 2 point trem, these are some of the highest end US components on a Mexican guitar for under £500. Also check out those aged plastic parts, CS Closet Classic on a budget . Online reviews and comments can't seem to say enough about how well this guitar plays too, apart from sounding like a true Strat due to those sexy pups, I'm currently working on tracking some down in an actual music store so I can go and try out a couple.

 

Your face needs assistance from my fist.

You gonna diss on the strat when you've got a Hendrix sig? Or is this another dig at my beloved Aria?

Noice setup, dude, I was hoping we'd get some multi-instrumentalists in here and some purdy pianos etc. What kinda stuff do you play?