CATEGORIES

Getting Started With…Chords For Solos

Ditch scale shapes and use chord tones for a creative approach to your first guitar solos

Caribou

Dan Snaith returns with Suddenly, the first Caribou album in five years. Si Truss meets him in his North London studio to talk bespoke synths, his resistance to gear fetishism and the importance of combining home life and music

THE SECRETS OF ANALOGUE WARMTH

Vintage desks and outboard are celebrated for their ability to ‘glue’ a mix and impart ‘warmth’. But what do these vague terms really mean, and how can we recreate the effect?

Wajatta

Unlikely electronic duo Reggie Watts and John Tejada deliver more urban dance kinetics on their second album, Don’t Let Get You Down. Danny Turner discovers how they’ve become more than the sum of their parts

Universal Audio Apollo x4 £1,500

Universal Audio’s Apollo range of interfaces gains a new member. Jono Buchanan looks for signs of sibling rivalry

The Presets Apocalypso

Modular Recordings, 2008

The Emperor Machine

Former Bizarre Inc hit maker Andy Meecham, aka The Emperor Machine, chats to Danny Turner about the mindboggling arsenal of gear behind his latest album Music Not Safari

PreSonus E8XT £422 per pair

An update for this very popular PreSonus monitor range has landed. Jon Musgrave finds out what’s new

Niklas Paschburg

“The Polyend Perc is my ‘robot arm’. It brought me new live possibilities”

John Mayer

This month Phil Short checks out the bluesy side of a super-successful songwriter, singer, popstar, and bona fide guitar legend.

Lia Mice

Which Memories Will Make It? Optimo Music, 2018

Using the tritone

Got your accidentals covered? John Wheatcroft sorts out your flat 5ths from your raised 4ths, as he looks at ways to apply the tritone interval in jazz.

Arturia MicroLab £69

Compact keyboard controllers can feel like a compromise. What does Jon Musgrave make of Arturia’s latest offering?

The Stone Roses

In the first of this new series focusing on ’80s and ’90s Britrock, Simon Barnard goes mad for it with some true Manchester legends.

SIXTY SECONDS with...

A minute’s all it takes to find out what makes a great guitarist tick. Before he jumped into his limo for the airport we grabbed a quick chat with acoustic blues master, Keb’ Mo’.

Rocco Zifarelli Video Masterclass pt6

As we come to the end of our exclusive six-part video feature, guitar wizard Rocco unleashes the Melodic Minor scale for our final track entitled The Return Of Johnny F, with Jon Bishop as your guide.

Rival Sons

Martin Cooper checks out a modern day but classic rock flavoured Californian band and their guitarist Scott Holiday.

J S Bach Violin Sonata 2, Andante

This issue Bridget Mermikides arranges and transcribes a delightful piece, originally written for four strings by one of music’s irrefutable geniuses.

Fingerstyle blues

Joseph Alexander of Fundamental Changes continues his bluesy fingerpicking series with a look at combining alternating bass and melody.

David Gilmour Full style study

Jon Bishop looks at the rhythm and lead styles of this great prog, rock and blues guitarist. David is one of the UK’s most influential and best-loved guitar players, and this feature aims to unlock his secrets.

The Reinvention Of Gary Clark Jr.

How the modern blues trailblazer has defied convention and broken the mould in order to find himself, pushing the genre in new directions along the way…

ALIVE & KICKING

Peter Frampton’s diagnosis with a degenerative disease means May’s UK tour is likely to be his last. The guitar icon looks back at the triumphs and knocks of his career, into the eyes of his illness, and onto the music still to come…

Bursting With Pride

As the new Gibson Slash Collection is unveiled at this year’s NAMM show, we grab a moment away from the crowds with the man himself to chat about his latest collaboration with Gibson…

GIBSON ES-330s

We take an in-depth look at the background development and evolution of Gibson’s ES-330 models with George Gruhn, co-author of vintage guitar bible Gruhn’s Guide to Vintage Guitars and proprietor of Gruhn Guitars in Nashville, Tennessee…

Mods & Rockers

The Stray Cat struts in once again with a litter of killer new signature guitars to sink your claws into. Just don’t expect them to bat like 50s throwbacks...

ED WYNNE

We touch down on planet Earth with the captain of Ozric Tentacles’ space rock craft, Ed Wynne, following the release of his debut solo album, last year’s Shimmer Into Nature

Lose Your Illusion

Hot on the heels of its reimagined ’59 and ’60 Les Paul reissues come four new LP models built to the specs of the Guns N’ Roses legend

Roaring Forties

One of the oldest ‘classic’ pickup designs makes a return to the Guild range. But is everything quite what it seems?

RICHARD SMITH

We caught up with the nylon-string maestro during one of his all-too-rare visits to the UK for a lively conversation about all things acoustic and a very special video masterclass…

Slim Pickin'

Two contrasting models from Takamine’s new Thinline range tell tales of superb player comfort and excellent onstage performance. Let’s see how they measure up…