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10 Reasons Why High Quality Audio Cassette Tapes Can Sound Muddy or Dull

In some cases, an audio cassette is expected to sound dull, muddy or woolly. Some tapes were manufactured to a very low budget, with an un...

Plywood Fender Squier vs Top Line Vintage Gibson

THE CONTENDERS A vintage Gibson ES-355 . A lavish, high-spend product, made in 1972, and sitting at the top end of Gibson’s range of thi...

The Seductress and The Clonewheel VXH - Free Tonewheel Organ VST Plugin Downloads

Planet Botch VST tonewheel/clonewheel emulators are a bit like buses. You wait eight years and then three come along at once. Yes, hot on ...

Mexican Fender / Squier Strats: The Mid 1990s Boom

The aesthetically-pleasing Fender Contemporary Stratocaster, introduced in 1994, sat at the epicentre of Mexico’s bid to capture the Japane...

Why PAID Software is More Likely Than Free Software to Treat You as “The Product”

A Photoshop installation CD, back at the dawn of the century when it was possible to own a copy, and the main distribution means was the hi...

Total Recall - The History of Total Accuracy Guitar Tuition

Even the promotional giveaway audio cassettes from Total Accuracy came with a high quality chrome tape formulation. This 1993 promo feature...

The Birth of Squier Affinity

Daphne Blue was one of three finishes available on the first Squier Affinity Teles to hit the UK market – the other two being Black, and wh...

Electric Guitar String History's Long Lost Secret to Wicked Tone

Spending too much money on your electric guitar(s)? Going through pickups like there’s no tomorrow and finding you still can’t nail the p...

Buried Reggae Treasures: The Torpedo Record Label

The Internet is heavily driven by populist themes. So if your interests have often strayed outside the mainstream, you may have struggled ...

When and Why Fender Commercialised the Guitar Relic

You don't have to browse far down Fender's Twitter timeline before you're met with a tweet proudly showing off some brand new ...

The Full Story of the Squier MIJ 'Hank Marvin' Signature Stratocaster

"Don't touch it Mr Di Bergi... And don't point... No, don't even look at it!..." You may be surprised, given my sham...

The 1992 Fender Aged Parts '62 Stratocaster Reissue

Fender Japan's 1992 Aged Parts '62 Strat reissue in Sonic Blue. It also came in Sunburst, Black, Vintage White , Candy Apply Red, a...

The Confusing History of Fender's Olympic White Finish

If there's one element of the Fender company's history that can be described as romantic, it must surely be the brand's variet...

The Fender Broadcaster and Guitar History's Greatest Myth

The Fender Broadcaster may have been a beautiful blonde bombshell, but for decades it sat at the centre of guitar history's greatest my...

Under the Scratchplate: Late 1960s Gibson Melody Maker

Yesterday, I was discussing tight manufacturing budgets on low-priced 1970s guitars . Today I want to stay with that theme, but delve even...

Retrospective: Early 1980s Maya 8097 "Telecaster" Copy

In some ways, the 1980s ruined the Fender copy market . In the 1970s, even the sub-£100 guitars were made in Japan. And working on their o...

Why Does a Fender Esquire Have a Pickup Selector Switch?

The wonderfully simple single-pickup Fender Esquire, in its early 1950s format with butterscotch blonde finish. Why did this one-pickup gui...

The Fender Telecaster in the Late 1960s

The late 1960s period was a fascinating one for Fender, and particularly the Telecaster. Heavy rock was emerging from the blues boom and t...

Clonewheel VXK Download: Free VST Plugin for Early 1980s Organ Sounds

The Clonewheel VXK. Unbeatable simulation of that early 1980s analogue clonewheel sound. If you remember seeing a live Squeeze performance...

The 1980s DiMarzio DIY Strat

Neon Pink Cellophane was one of the standard finishes for DiMarzio Strat bodies and necks in 1987. The Shock Wave pickup set and active jac...
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