GEAR

First and foremost, I am a gear head. I love guitars, amps and effects units, especially pedals. I sell some stuff, but I hold on to alot of my stuff and the "collection" grows and grows! Gear wise, as times change, so do gear preferences. Through the 80's I played a 1979 25th anniversary Fender Strat (still have it!) through a changing array of FX pedals into a 100 watt non master volume Marshall head and an early 70's Marshall 4X12 with 25 watt Celestion speakers.

As the late 80's and 90's came about, so did my obsession with rack gear (some of which is for sale). At my most extreme point, I was playing a rig with 20 spaces of rack gear, three (3) 100 watt heads, 6 Marshall 4X12 cabs, and about 5 pedals thrown in! That was about 1994-95. From 1990 to 1994 I also played mostly Charvel strats, and I still have 3 of them. Since then, the gear has lessened in extremity and I feel my tone has improved for it, although it's harder to make my guitar sound like a spaceship being abducted by alien life forms while being 50,000 leagues under the sea.

In 1994 I found my 1992 Fender Floyd Rose American Strat, and since then it's been 99% Fender again. True story: That strat had actually been run over by a car after falling off of the back of the E.U. Wurlitzer van on the way to the Framingham store. (The case was totaled). When they got it at the store, it only had two areas of extremely minor wear. They thought it would never survive the trauma, expecting the neck to warp, or ??? Over ten years later, that guitar still kicks ass, and can hold up to just about anything anybody can put it through! I've tried. Try that with a Gibson! (just kidding!). In addition to my family of strats, For acoustic instruments, I have an Alvarez electric acoustic a mahogany Guild D15 (actually my brothers, on permanent loan) and an Ovation 12 string acoustic guitar, and a Fender Squier bass (for demos).

Amp wise, Marshall has always ruled supreme, although I have/had amps by other companies, Marshall exemplifies THE tone of hard rock guitar. Gear gurus will spend eternity saying how they're not the same, blah, blah, blah... bullshit! They freaking rock! My DSL100 is an amazing amp. My other favorite amps include an early issue Laney GH100L that I bought at E.U. Wurlitzer's back in 1994. On it's own or combined with a Marshall, the amp has great crunchy, defined gain. Paul Gilbert has endorsed this model since it came out. I also have a 40 watt Fender Hot Rod Deluxe. It's the limited edition lacquered tweed finish with the factory installed Jensen P12N speaker. It's a very cool amp. Finally the sleeper amp in my collection is a sweet little Peavey Classic 30 tube 1X12, 30 watt combo. It's perfect for jamming and recording, practices and small gigs. It's got a very Fender like vibe, and just sounds amazing in a non back breaking package.

My current "big" rig is typically one of several strats, some of which have been modded with Floyd Rose trems and either a Dimarzio bridge humbucker or a Fast track II "single" coil. I also like Dimarzio HS2 pickups for single coils (neck and middle). The guitar runs through my pedal board and then into either my DSL100 (Mullard 12ax7's & Svetlana EL34's) with two (2) 4X12's- one 1972 with 25 watt Celestions, and one JCM800 with 65 watt Celestions. For a smaller and/or stereo setup, the Marshall gets swapped out for a Peavey Classic 30 and a Fender Hot Rod Deluxe Tweed, both amps are 1X12.