Earlier this year, Fano Guitars announced the Alt de Facto GF6 model, which is inspired by and loosely based on the Fender Starcaster models from the 70s. I finally had a chance to play one for a short period of time and have a few thoughts about it.

One of the things you can’t really tell based on the pictures is the size of the guitar body. I’ve owned a few 335-style guitars, and I’ve always felt the body was too large for me. I would say the GF6 is roughly the same size as a 335, but the offset body makes it much more comfortable to me. While sitting down, the guitar didn’t feel too big, and my right hand and arm were able to rest comfortably on the guitar.

I’m somewhat ambivalent about factory-relic’d guitars and Fano can sometimes go over the top, but the sanded neck on the GF6 felt great. I would describe the neck size as similar to modern Fender C-shaped necks, which I find to be very comfortable. I should note that if you’re really not into relic’d guitars, Fano now has the option to not get the relic job on new guitars. The guitar I played had a light relic job, and I thought it looked pretty good and not as fake as some of the heavily relic’d models that you sometimes see.

The guitar I played had a maple body, which I thought would make it too bright sounding for my taste. However, perhaps due to the larger size of the guitar, it had a nice, sweet tone that had a really nice ringing quality to it. It also had Fralin P90s, which I’m sure added a bit to the ringing quality of the guitar. I think if I were going to spec one out for a custom build, I’d probably lean towards a mahogany body, a maple top, a rosewood fretboard, and the Lollar Imperial humbuckers that Fano offers as an option. However, the P90s sounded great, and I would give those another shot before making my final decision.

Overall, I really liked the Fano Alt de Facto GF6 that I played. It was very comfortable to play, sounded great, and it had a great vibe to it.

Fender has introduced a lot of new guitars this year. One of the more interesting to me is the Fender American Special Jazzmaster. Unlike the traditional vintage-style Jazzmaster, the American Special model does not contain a tremolo bar, nor does it have the rhythm circuitry that most people never used anyway. Additionally, it contains humbucking pickups instead of the traditional Jazzmaster single coils.

I happen to dig it, and with an $899 street price, I think it’s a relatively good bargain for an American-made guitar if you’re not a Jazzmaster traditionalist but you like the offset body shape.

Perhaps it’s heresy to speak about reducing the number of guitars you own on a guitar-focused blog, but this year I’ve been very deliberate about reducing the number of guitars in my collection. While there has been a tinge of regret with selling a few of them, I’ve been happy about my decision to sell them off.

I started the year with 11 guitars, most of which I’ve accumulated over the past five years or so. Each purchase usually began with the idea of adding a new sound to my arsenal. For instance, I wanted a Telecaster to add some variety to my single coil tones. After 8 different Telecasters and two years of trying, I’ve realized I’m just not really a Telecaster guy.

What I was finding happening is that when I decided I wanted a new sound, I spent a lot of time trying to find the perfect guitar. So much time, in fact, that I wasn’t playing much guitar while I was searching for the next one. Repeat this several times over the course of a year, and I started to realize that I really wasn’t even playing much guitar at all. Buying and selling guitars was taking the place of actually playing the guitar.

Furthermore, I was spending more time just playing different guitars to hear them than trying to improve my playing. I’d grab one guitar and start playing for a few minutes. Then, I’d want to hear another guitar and grab that one and play the same riffs and licks that I was playing on the first guitar. Repeat for several more guitars, and I’d really accomplished nothing in my playing session other than hearing what each guitar sounded like.

I’ve sold six of my guitars so far this year, with at least one more on the block to go. I have one guitar that I’ll never sell for sentimental reasons, but the rest must prove to be useful to me in order to stay. That is, if I don’t play one for a while, then it’ll likely be put up for sale. My hope is that this will help me whittle my guitars down to just those guitars that actually inspire me to play.

I’ve realized that having multiple guitars that provide slightly different sounds is less important to me than having fewer guitars which are all comfortable and inspiring to play. If I want different sounds, I can add a few pedals or adjust my attack to alter the tone. And, buying less and playing more is going to help me improve my tone with the guitars I have.

I love guitars and I’m not willing to say that I won’t buy more guitars in the future, but right now I’m very happy with fewer guitars. It’s allowed me to put more focus on my playing than the tools I’m using.

Skydog: The Duane Allman Retrospective is a 7-disc collection of songs spanning Allman’s short, but prolific life. From Amazon’s editorial review of the collection:

Duane Allman was one of the defining musicians of our era, rated second only to Jimi Hendrix in Rolling Stone’s list of rock’s 100 greatest guitarists. A founding member, with his brother Gregg, of the Allman Brothers Band, Duane was also active as a session musician, and as a member of the all-star Derek and the Dominos. This seven CD set, produced by Duane’s daughter Galadrielle Allman and esteemed reissue producer Bill Levenson, shows the full breadth and depth of Duane’s work, from early recordings (with Gregg) in bands such as The Escorts, Allman Joys and Hour Glass; to his studio work with Aretha Franklin, Wilson Pickett, Boz Scaggs, Delaney & Bonnie, Ronnie Hawkins and many others; to a live jam session with the Grateful Dead. The set includes several unreleased performances, many classic Allman Brothers songs, and a collector’s cache of rare singles and long out-of-print album tracks. Also included are a 72 page book with essays by Scott Schindler and Galadrielle Allman, many rare photographs, a replica of Duane’s guitar pick, and a Skydog sticker. Numbered, limited edition of 10,000.

This looks like an incredible collection for Duane Allman fans. It’s amazing how much great music Allman put out in such a relatively short period of time.

Kevin Wagg, the owner of Ampendage Industries, contacted me several weeks ago to let me know about his line of amp stands. I’ve long thought about getting an amp stand, but I never really liked the ones that I saw in guitar stores. As a result, I’ve never really used one. Kevin was kind enough to send me a review unit, and I’m really impressed with what he’s building.

Ampendage offers three different models, two of which are solid hardwood and one is made of 3/4″ density MDF. As you can see below, the solid wood models look fantastic. The picture below shows the Teak model, which looks really nice in my music room; a Maple model is also available. The MDF stand has a black finish.

One of the nice things about amp stands is that they angle the speaker more towards your ear, which can be nice if you’re on a stage and want a more direct sound from your amp. I, however, don’t gig, but wanted a way to decouple the speaker from the floor. The angle of the stand pushes the sound right at my head, so I get a clearer picture of my tone.

Kevin advertises a small footprint with these stands, and I can agree. With a width of 14″ and a height of 12″, the amp stand stays out of the way enough to make it usable even in relatively small spaces. Yet, it’s also big enough to handle not only a 12″ combo, but my Mesa TA-15 lunchbox head/12″ cab configuration. I wouldn’t put a large head/cab configuration on the stand, but if you have a small one like the Mesa TA-15, I think a stand like this would work fine.

One downside of the Ampendage stands is that they don’t fold up like other stands. Kevin includes a built-in handle to make it easier to lug around. However, since the stand doesn’t fold up, carrying around the stand can be a bit of a hassle if you’ve got a bunch of other gear to carry.

The stand seems pretty durable, but I can’t attest to how gig-worthy it is. The pieces connect together well and are held together with some solid screws, so I would be surprised if it couldn’t stand up to most types of gigs.

If you’re looking for an amp stand, I think Ampendage is worth a look. Starting at $59.95 and going up to $89.95 for the solid wood models, they aren’t the cheapest stands around, but they are some of the nicest looking ones I’ve seen and seem to be solidly built.

I missed this introduction during the NAMM show in January, but Fano Guitars have created a new model called the GF6. You might notice that this model bears more than a slight resemblance to Fender’s Starcaster model from the 70s. In fact, the GF6 name is an homage to the designer of the Starcaster, Gene Fields. I really dig the look of this model, and it has a few features that set it apart from many of the semi-hollow body guitars on the market. Instead of the maple laminate construction of models like the ES-335, the GF6 features all solid-wood construction with a variety of wood options (alder, maple, mahogany, korina, and swamp ash). The back and sides are a carved out solid block of wood fitted with a carved solid top. Pickup options are P90s, humbuckers, or filtertrons. Additionally, one of the things that makes the GF6 so interesting to me is that it has a 25.5″ scale length unlike many of the Gibson-inspired semi-hollow guitars.

I haven’t played a Fano guitar before, but I’ve heard a lot of good things about them. They are handmade by a small team as part of the Premier Builders Guild in California. I’m not sure about the 7.25″-9.5″ compound radius, so I’m looking forward to playing one of these. They are just now shipping to dealers, so they are not very widely available yet. If you’ve played on of these or another Fano guitar before, I’d enjoy hearing your thoughts about it.

I’ve watched this B.B. King video live from Sing Sing Prison numerous times, and it gets me every time. It has elements of everything that has made B.B. so great for so long: his charisma, his singing, and his guitar playing. It has everything in about five and a half minutes.

I’m still catching up on news from NAMM this year. One bit of news I was glad to see is about Guild building electric guitars again. One of the most interesting “new” models is a reissue of the M-75 Aristocrat:

Guild’s compact and lightweight M-75 Aristocrat™ model expertly evokes its predecessor of the early 1950s, with a gracefully sculpted single-cutaway hollow body specifically designed to produce the resonance of a larger instrument. Other premium features include a comfortable and rock-solid three-piece neck and the tonal magnificence of dual single-coil pickups. Features include a 13.5″ x 2″ hollow body, laminated spruce top, laminated mahogany back and sides, three-piece mahogany/maple/mahogany neck, 24.75″ scale length, rosewood fingerboard with 9.45″ radius and 22 “vintage tall” frets, pearloid block inlays, dual single-coil pickups, three-way pickup toggle switch, two volume and two tone controls, Adjusto-Matic™ bridge, Guild “harp” tailpiece, Grover® Sta-Tite™ tuning machines and gold-plated hardware. Available in Antique Burst finish.

I’m looking forward to checking these out when they hit stores.

I wish I could have been in the audience to see this: Billy Gibbons, Dusty Hill, Joe Bonamassa, and Derek Trucks paying homage to Freddie King and playing “Going Down” at King’s introduction into the Rock ‘n Roll Hall of Fame:

(via The Guitar Buzz)

Perhaps the cutest new products at NAMM were the Fuzz Face mini models introduced by Dunlop. These are pedalboard friendly versions of the traditional Fuzz Face style pedal. They look just look like the original model, but shrunk down. There are three mini models, a Hendrix model, a Germanium model, and a Silicon model. At a street price of $99, these will likely sell like hotcakes.

Premier Guitar met up with Dunlop during NAMM to get a demo of these pedals as well as a few more new products: