Guitar MX Blog » Gear

Eddie Van Halen Creates Perfect Guitar

Guitar MX Admin — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 05:28:40 +0000

After 35 years of tinkering with guitars, and creating his famous “Frankenstein” guitar (Which let’s face it, is a piece of crap), Eddie Van Halen has designed an indestructible guitar called the EVH Wolfgang guitar. The guitar has the highest quality features, including stainless steel frets, double-potted custom-wound pickups, five-piece binding on the matching body and headstock, custom-made signature tuning machines and Floyd Rose bridge, and on and on.

For the last two years, Eddie had been road-testing the guitar on the Van Halen reunion tour. The new model, marketed by Fender, was fully revealed at the recent Winter NAMM show, and will be available for sale at around $3,000.

Here’s a video excerpt from a Guitar World interview with Eddie about the new EVH Wolfgang guitar.

You can find out more about the guitar here.

10 Inexpensive Gift Ideas for Guitar Players

Guitar MX Admin — Sun, 14 Dec 2008 22:19:35 +0000

Christmas is coming up, and you may have a guitar player on your list that you need to buy a gift for. Here’s a list of 10 inexpensive gift ideas. These gift ideas are all priced between $20-$50, yet are things that almost any guitar player would like. It doesn’t matter if they’re a beginning or advanced player, there’s likely something here that they would enjoy.

Rogue Starter Acoustic Guitar

The Rogue Starter Acoustic Guitar is an amazing deal for a small-bodied guitar. The smaller profile is very playable for kids, has nice tone, and can be yours for chump change. It has a maple neck and rosewood fretboard and comes set up with Martin strings.

Price: $39.99, Click for More Info

JamPlay Gift Card

What better way to introduce a relative or friend to JamPlay.com than our 1 Month Membership. The gift recipient will receive the JamPlay Gift Card along with a personalized letter welcoming them to our service. Membership will last the individual a full 30 days of uninterrupted service.

Price: $19.95, Click for More Info

Vox amPlug AC30 Headphone Amp

The Vox amPlug AC30 is a headphone amp that can help you to create the perfect practice session. The tiny amPlug plugs directly into your guitar-then just plug in your headphones and relish some great Vox tone.

Price: $39.99, Click for More Info

Farley’s StagePlayer Guitar Stand Stool

The Farley’s StagePlayer Guitar Stand Stool offers you practical and useful features for many situations. For working musicians, the StagePlayer stool will serve as a seat during those marathon gigs. Between sets, simply put your guitar in the handy, padded cradle for safekeeping. The StagePlayer stand is ideal for home use too; it’s a place to sit and play or just to display your guitar.

Price: $33.99, Click for More Info

Guitar Secrets Revealed Charter Membership

This is one of the most popular guitar instructional sites on the Internet. The site has a large collection of audio and video guitar lessons for beginners. Also included are 5 Super Bonuses valued at $88.00, but are absolutely free with lifetime access.

Price: $27.00, Click for More Info

Road Runner Acoustic Guitar Gig Bag

Made of padded 600D nylon, the Road Runner Acoustic Guitar Gig Bag will keep your axe safe from bumps and scratches. It features two carrying handles, a zippered external pocket, and and shoulder straps.

Price: $29.99, Click for More Info

Gift Certificate to SheetMusicPlus.com

Give someone special an almost endless choice of great guitar sheet music! Choose among email and postal delivery gift certificates in 7 different denominations.

Price: $10.00-$50.00, Click for More Info

Marshall MS-2 Mini Amp

You can take Marshall tone and vibe with you with the Marshall MS-2 Mini Amp. Classic Marshall grille cloth; crunchy distortion; and plenty of volume for good, clean fun. Controls for overdrive, tone, and volume. Powered by one 9V battery. The Marshall MS-2 Mini Amp includes belt clip and headphone jack. 5-3/4″ high.

Price: $44.99, Click for More Info

Rock House Learn Rock Guitar Beginner, Intermediate, and Advanced Package

All 3 levels of this popular rock guitar DVD learning system in one money-saving package. This Rock House Video Lesson DVD package will take through all the learning stages to help you become a competent and proficient guitarist!

Price: $39.99, Click for More Info

Korg pitchjack Guitar Tuner

The pitchjack plugs directly into a guitar or bass instrument jack and offers the features most sought after by gigging musicians including a flat tuning mode that enables a player to tune an instrument up to seven semitones below standard pitch and the ability to accurately tune seven-string guitars and six-string basses.

Price: $19.99, Click for More Info

Win a Billy-Bo Jupiter Thunderbird Guitar

Guitar MX Admin — Thu, 30 Oct 2008 03:56:56 +0000

This week, Musicians Friend is giving away a Gretsch G6199 Billy-Bo Jupiter Thunderbird Electric Guitar valued at $3725 to one lucky winner. The Billy-Bo is a modern version of the Jupiter Thunderbird designed in 1959 by Bo Diddley, and further customized by Billy Gibbons.

To enter the contest, just sign up for Musicians Friends’ free weekly newsletter and you’ll be automatically entered. The contest runs through Tuesday, November 4, 2008.

Click here to sign up for the newsletter and enter the contest.

Good luck!

Best Buy Takes on Guitar Center

Guitar MX Admin — Sun, 05 Oct 2008 02:45:02 +0000

I was recently visiting my local Best Buy store, and noticed the grand opening of their musical instrument section, selling among other things, guitars, amplifiers and effects. Actually, it wasn’t a section, but a whole store within a store, resembling a Guitar Center location.

Best Buy has been rolling out these musical instrument stores in 85 of its locations throughout the US. When the rollout is complete, Best Buy will be the second-largest instrument seller in the country based on locations

Best Buy has been selling musical equipment from their web site for a while. Although their online store doesn’t carry any guitars from big name manufactures like Gibson or Fender, these brands are sold at the local store, and they were very well priced.

Will Best Buy be able to take away business from Guitar Center and “mom and pop” music stores? In addition to competitive prices, Best Buy also plans to offer instructional classes, including guitar lessons. They could take a significant bite out Guitar Centers customer base.

Click here to see a list of Best Buy Musical Instrument stores that are opening soon.

Fender Custom Shop Creates Harley Davidson Strat

Guitar MX Admin — Sun, 31 Aug 2008 00:57:27 +0000

In commemoration of Harley Davidson’s 105th Anniversary, the Fender Custom Shop has created three cool Strat guitars that have features that honor the designs of the Harley Davidson motorcycle.

Those features include black cherry pinstriping, a combination of black-chrome and black-nickel hardware, a black polycarbonate Harley-Davidson neck inlay, a jack plate engraved with the Harley-Davidson bar and shield logo, a serialized neck plate and perforated alloy pickguards and back plates.

One of the three guitars is being made available to the public through an online auction, with the proceeds going to the Muscular Dystrophy Association (MDA). The auction runs through September 4, 2008. The second guitar will be donated to the Harley-Davidson Museum in Milwaukee, WI and the third guitar will find a home in the Fender Museum in Corona, CA.

To bid on the first guitar, visit the Harley Davidson MDA auction site here. Find out more about these guitars by clicking here.

Ibanez Releases 20th Anniversary Joe Satriani Guitars

Guitar MX Admin — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 03:11:39 +0000

It’s hard to believe, but it was 20 years ago that Joe Satriani’s “Surfing With The Alien” album was released. It was also 20 years ago that Satch began his relationship with Ibanez guitars. In commemoration of the 20th anniversary, Ibanez has released two limited edition guitars, one for each anniversary.

The two models are called the JS20TH and the JS20S. The JS20TH (shown on the right) is the rarest of the models, with only 150 being made available in the US. It features a 3D Silver Surfer graphic, DiMarzio PAF Pro and Fred pickups and the original Edge locking tremolo. The list price for this model is $7,999.99.

The other model, the JS20S has a standard Silver Surfer graphic, IBZ Axis pickups and the Edge III tremolo. List price for this model is $1733.32.

You can find out more about these limited edition guitars here.

World’s Largest Pedal Board

Guitar MX Admin — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 04:41:20 +0000

At a kickoff party for Summer NAMM earlier this week, the folks at the Gear Trap blog built the worlds largest pedal board, consisting of 142 guitar pedals. Here’s a video of the behemoth.

Summer NAMM begins Friday, June 20 2008 in Nashville, TN.

The Stripped-Down Guitar

Guitar MX Admin — Fri, 30 May 2008 04:55:11 +0000

Modern Guitars Magazine has an article about the Gittler Guitar, which is a stripped down guitar made from stainless steel. The guitar has thirty-one stainless steel tubular frets and six tubes that form the base. There are six pickups inside the tubes, one for each string.

The guitar was created by Allan Gittler (1928 – 2003), who handmade 60 of these guitars in the late 70’s and early 80’s. It’s the only musical instrument displayed at the Museum of Modern Art.

Here is a video of The Gittler in action.

You can find out more about this guitar here.

Halo Custom Guitars Moving to Texas Sale

Guitar MX Admin — Sat, 17 May 2008 05:31:25 +0000

Halo Custom Guitars, Inc. was first featured on Guitar MX here. They create high quality, custom made guitars with very unique designs that have been popular with metal guitarists. Halo Guitars in the process of relocating to Houston, Texas, and are clearing out their California warehouse, and offering some incredible deals on their guitars.

For example, their unique GVK Hand-Carved Six-String Guitar, seen to the right, is priced at just $499.99. That’s half off the regular price. They also have other guitars on sale, including the Octavia six-string bass for just $249.99. These supplies are limited. If interested, you need to contact a member of the Halo Guitar sales team at 408-873-8606 or by email at sales@haloguitars.com.

You can see some of the other unique designs by Halo Guitars here.

Gibson To Release Custom Inspired By Slash Les Paul Standard Guitar

Guitar MX Admin — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 21:40:19 +0000

On April 1, 2008, Gibson will be releasing the Limited Edition ‘Gibson Custom Inspired By Slash Les Paul Standard VOS’ guitar. The guitar is a replica of the one Slash took on tour in 1988.

The guitar is a Gibson Les Paul Standard with original specs that has been refinished to give it a vintage look. The guitar has a carved maple top, one-piece mahogany back, and a rosewood fingerboard with the “Slash-Profile”. Both neck and bridge pickups are Seymour Duncan™ Alnico Pro-II humbuckers.

Here’s a promo video of the guitar.

The guitar is only available by special order. As expected, they are not cheap. Gibson lists the price at $5,880, but the Guitar Center web site lists them at $10,000.

Gibson is also giving away one of these guitars. To enter the contest, you need to create an original video and post it on YouTube explaining why you deserve the guitar. Click here to enter.

You can find out more abut this guitar here.