Reverend has dropped a new suite of electric guitars, with a signature model for Living Colour guitarist Vernon Reid chief among them.

Reid's dazzling family of signatures are augmented by another signature model for Greg Koch, and a four-strong series of flame maple top versions of familiar models.

Dubbed the Totem Series, the Living Colour guitarist's signature collection offers three very distinct finishes – The Totem, The Shaman, and The Talisman – with the collaboration first teased back in April.

They each come equipped with a trio of custom-voiced Railhammer humbucking pickups, a Floyd Rose 1000 floating bridge, and pin-lock tuners.

Those signature 'buckers are crafted for tight lows and fat highs as Reverend and Reid strive for a guitar capable of slicing through rock and funk licks alike.

The solidbody guitars are korina through-and-through, with their bodies and three-piece necks made from the lightweight wood. Those necks have been carved into soft V-profiles and capped with 12" radius ebony fingerboards and a score of vivid inlays across 22 frets.

Other features include a bass contour to tighten up the guitar's low end and create P-90 and single coil-esque tones from its humbuckers. A treble bleed control – present in all Reverend guitars – is also on hand to offer even greater EQ customization.

Its unique array of finishes – said to be thinner than on normal guitars to help with reverberation – was initially created by AI. Prompts took inspiration from psychologist Carl Jung's Collective Unconscious Theory, author Joseph Campbell's book, The Hero's Journey, and artwork by Jean-Michel Basquiat and Romare Beardon. Reverend’s in-house designer, Joe Naylor, then gave them his personal touch.

“While visually stunning, these instruments are also refined tools of the trade,” says Reverend. “The recipe of korina, ebony, and Railhammer pickups, coupled with the sheer metallic mass of the Floyd Rose, serves up a tone best described as punchy. The Reverend Vernon Reid Signature Totem Series guitars are genuinely collectible art pieces that sound and play as amazing as they look.”

The Reverend Vernon Reid Signature Series is available now, with guitars priced at $1,999.

Greg Koch is no stranger to Reverend signatures, having previously served up two T-type models, including one stocked with P-90 pickups and a Bigsby vibrato for an atypical Telecaster design.

This time, he's turned his attention to a Strat-alike with the Greg Koch Signature Gristle ST.

Described as a “resonant and responsive reimagined classic infused with Greg Koch’s unique vision,” there's a hidden chamber beneath its Carbonita-esque pickguard to add greater punch to its tonal grit. Three single-coil Fishman pickups and a Wilkinson VS100N tremolo offer premium appointments, with the former said to “boast extra clarity and treble shimmer” and a hum-free operation.

Koch has deviated from an all-korina construction by pairing the guitar's korina body with a roasted maple neck and fretboard, which too has 22 frets.

Elsewhere, it offers three control knobs, for Volume, Blend, and Tone, a five-way switch, and pin-lock tuners.

Priced at $1,799, it comes in a trifecta of colorways: Three-Tone Burst, Avocado Burst, and Blucifier.

Last but not least is Reverend’s new Flame Maple series, which comprises four different solidbody electrics.

Those classy flame maple tops cap korina bodies for “a striking fusion of elegance and performance,” offering new takes on the company's Charger, Roundhouse, Sensei, and Kingbolt models.

They all come with Railhammer pickups, ebony fretboards, and gold hardware, with the Kingbolt RA standing out with its Floyd Rose tremolo. That is perhaps a nod to the Totem Series and a hint that more Floyd Rose-equipped Reverends will be coming soon.

No price has been mentioned as of yet for any of these models.

Head to Reverend to learn more about its new guitars.

For the scrappy American-alternative upstart it once was, Reverend Guitars has grown to be an impressive performer in a market crowded with bigger and longer-established names, and part of that success is found in its compiling of an extensive artist roster. The Chris Freeman Signature is the latest model to join that team, and as with so many before, it brings a host of features designed to appeal to players well beyond the fan base of the Hot Mulligan guitarist.

Reverend Guitars was launched in 1997 when Joe Naylor combined his studies of industrial design, lutherie school, and vintage guitar repair experience into a viable guitar-making business in a garage at the back of a Detroit bicycle shop.

His early designs were notable for their clear nod to early Danelectro guitars, using semihollow bodies made with wood-based phenolic-resin tops and backs, which were attached to wide mahogany center blocks. Naylor also put a lot more thought and attention into the design and build process, and was granted a patent for his design of the Reverend High Resonance Body.

Over the coming years, the business evolved: Offshore manufacturing was introduced in 2006, and in 2010 Ken and Penny Haas purchased the company and took over management, while Naylor stayed on for R&D. This was followed by a move to Toledo, Ohio. Over the ensuing years, the core Reverend designs evolved away from the Danelectro-inspired template and into something closer to the guitar we have here this issue.

The Chris Freeman Signature springs from the blueprint for the Double Agent OG. It has an offset-waist body shape with a rounded upper horn and a sharply truncated lower cutaway, and is finished in your choice of Turquoise Sparkle or Powder Yellow.

The body is made from solid korina, a tonewood somewhat akin to mahogany, but with its own characteristic upper-midrange bite. To this, Freeman has spec’d a bolt-on neck and separate fingerboard – both made from roasted maple – an upside-down headstock with Reverend Pin-Lock tuners, an inspiringly mixed pair of pickups, and a few other surprises, all brought together in a collaboration that he clearly enjoyed.

“The process for putting the guitar together with Reverend was really easygoing for both parties,” the guitarist tells Guitar Player. “We’ve been like family for years, and I text Ken [Haas] pretty often. Before they asked if I’d be interested in doing a signature model, I’d already been playing the pickup configuration we used for it for a couple of years after swapping out the humbucker in the Double Agent OG for the Nuevo 90. I did that because the first Reverend I played was the Buckshot and I was missing the single-coil in the bridge.

“The finishes were exciting to see in the mock-ups they sent over, but seeing the colors in person blew me away. I like the Turquoise Sparkle more than I thought I could. I was surprised by how big the sparkle is!”

In addition to the bridge-position Nuevo 90 – a pickup that blends Reverend’s original Railhammer design with elements of a humbucker-sized P90 in a noise-canceling single-coil design – the neck position carries the maker’s 9A5, a more traditional vintage-voiced P90 soapbar pickup. It’s a pairing that Freeman evolved toward through years of hard touring, rather than merely by chance.

“I was being steered toward this setup for a couple years,” he explains. “I loved the single-coil in the bridge position of my first Reverend, the Buckshot, but I use the neck pickup or both pickups often for Hot Mulligan’s cleaner emo sounds and wanted to spring for a P90 in the neck.

“I played the Double Agent for a while, but I missed how the single-coil sounded versus the humbucker. But sometimes we play on really noisy stages, so I decided to go with the Nuevo 90 in the bridge to bring back some of that single-coil sound and reduce hum. And ever since then, it’s been great. I don’t know if any of the other models have that pickup configuration.”

What pulls them together is a creative and unusual control section that marries traditional master volume and tone controls and a three-way switch on the lower-treble bout with Reverend’s Bass Contour control on the upper-bass bout, as well as two types of kill switches – a momentary push button and a latching toggle – on the cutaway horn. The latter are useful accessories in Freeman’s distinctive playing, but even the way in which it was all mounted resulted from the artist’s input.

“The rear-mounted controls are really the only thing I think some players might not think about at first glance,” Freeman says.

“I’m a road dog, playing over 100 shows a year. I kept sweating into the controls during our longer sets or during outdoor summer festivals. Sometimes by the end of the set my guitars just sounded underwater and would stop working until they dried out the next day. They never felt the same; all the sweat was getting into that front control plate. As a result, we put the plate on the back so it can keep up with me on the road and not lose sound.”

The Chris Freeman Signature feels great in the hand, with a familiarly comfortable Reverend neck carve and smoothly dressed frets, but that interesting twist in the control layout allows you to easily access fun alternative sounds. Testing it through a Fender Deluxe Reverb combo, a 65amps London head and 2x12 cab, and a Fractal FM9 modeler into headphones, I quickly found it an inspiring instrument that sent me in some unexpected directions.

Reverend’s take on the P90 in the neck position offers few surprises, but it delivers a very capable performance for clean tones that are rich and warm, with just a little grit to thicken the brew, as well as the throaty growl in overdriven settings that has won so many soapbar fans over the years.

This was my first encounter with the Nuevo 90, however, and I dug it immediately. Blending slug-pole clarity and blade-pole beef between the plain and wound strings, respectively, it somehow still sounds like all six strings are firing through the same pickup, and delivers a great marriage of clarity and depth in the process.

Take note that this position is not intended only for emo fans, I found it was fantastic for meaty twang and girthy chime alike, and when applying some gain, Reverend’s clever Bass Contour circuit dialed it between Tele and PAF-like tones, all noise-canceling for worry-free lead work.

These two outwardly different pickups also played great together in the middle position, issuing a rounded, slightly scooped voice with a lot of sparkle that worked well for a range of rhythm needs. Ultimately, the guitar felt entirely at home in everything from indie to alt-rock to shoegaze, but it also applied itself effortlessly to alt-country, blues, punk, and some heavier rock riffing.

I’ve appreciated Reverend’s ability to deliver big-league performance at semi-pro prices for many years – heck, even a couple of decades now – but the Chris Freeman Signature model offers up some hefty surprises nonetheless, and earns an Editors’ Pick Award in the process.

Reverend Chris Freeman Signature – Specifications

CONTACT Reverend Guitars

PRICE $1,439 street

NUT Boneite (synthetic bone), 1 11/16” wide

NECK Roasted maple

FRETBOARD Roasted maple, 25.5” scale,
12” radius

FRETS 22 medium-jumbo

TUNERS Reverend Pin-Lock

BODY Solid korina

BRIDGE Tune-o-matic with stoptail

PICKUPS Reverend Nuevo 90 bridge, 9A5 neck

CONTROLS Master volume and tone, Bass Contour, three-way switch, momentary and latching kill switches

FACTORY STRINGS D’Addario .010–.046

WEIGHT 7.8 lbs

BUILT IN Korea

Thanks in part to an elevated design ethos and consistent quality control, the reputation of Reverend Guitars seemed not to suffer in the least when production moved offshore back in 2006, and the willingness of notable artists to keep endorsing creative signature models further attests to that achievement.

Both Pete Anderson and Rick Vito already have multiple Reverend guitars in their names, so the release of their new respective Eastsider Custom and Soul Agent models tells us they must still be pleased with founder Joe Naylor’s design stable in Toledo, Ohio, and manufacturing at Mirr Music Ltd. in Korea.

Taking extended riffs on existing models, each of these new artist electric guitars is rife with Reverend’s familiar originality, while they offer specs and features that should appeal to players well outside each artist’s fan base. And although they share some of the same tonewood choices, they’re about as different as they could be, other than similarly representing the maker’s creative take on retro-modern design.

PETE ANDERSON EASTSIDER CUSTOM

Although Reverend’s first Signature model for Pete Anderson was the semi-hollow ES-style PA-1 – a design more central to his latter-day adventures in soulful blues and gutsy instrumentals – the original Eastsider T that followed stuck closer to the Esquire the guitarist had often used to inject his Bakersfield-infused twang into several early hits from new-country artist Dwight Yoakam.

Although part of the name and at least the basic lines have been retained in the Eastsider Custom, the design has morphed into something very different indeed. Eschewing the standard Fender scale length for a Gibson-leaning 24 ¾ inches, the Eastsider Custom further consolidates that influence with a glued-in neck that’s 1 11/16 inches wide at the nut.

Taking it further away from the Fullerton template, the double-bound body is made from chambered korina, and the neck is solid three-piece korina with an unbound ebony fretboard. Overall, the look is neatly custom indeed: The aged white binding elegantly frames a rich satin cherry finish on the body’s top and back that reveals the korina’s finely speckled grain, while the black three-ply pickguard, ebony fretboard and black headstock face contrast it all beautifully.

The guitar’s in-house pickup complement arguably takes it even further out of Telecaster/ Esquire territory, although Reverend strives to retain some meaty T-style twang here. in the neck position is an HA5 humbucker wound with 42-AWG wire to around 7.5k ohms, and carrying an Alnico V bar magnet. In the bridge position, the Telebucker dual-rail humbucker is wound with finer 44-AWG wire to around 14k ohms and loaded with a ceramic magnet.

They’re wired to a three-way switch with master volume and tone controls, with a treble-bleed network on the former and a push-pull on the latter to throw the pickups out of phase.

Hardware follows the “modern-T” standard pretty closely, with a bridge base secured to the body by screws at both the rear edge and the front corners, and loaded with six individually adjustable block saddles, fed by through-body stringing loaded into ferrules in the back. Reverend’s Pin Lock locking tuners populate the other end, and access to the dual-action truss rod is via the headstock.

In the hand, the Eastsider Custom feels solid and confident. Its medium-C neck profile presents a comfortably rounded shape that most players should find easy to work with, and when strummed unplugged the guitar delivers a rich, balanced tone, with decent acoustic volume. The 22 medium frets are well polished and smoothly crowned; there’s a little snag at a few of the fret ends, but some of that sprouting will likely settle in with warmer, more humid weather. Overall, build quality is great, as are the finish and setup.

Tested through a tweed Deluxe-style 1x12 combo, a 65amps London tube amp head with 2x12 cab, and a Quad Cortex modeler into studio monitors and headphones, the Eastsider Custom presented elements of the F-to-G hybrid we might expect, along with elements of its own design that make it something different, and a lot of fun.

Korina is often talked about as a lighter cousin to mahogany, but it also packs its own upper-midrange zing, that often rings through in both clean and overdriven settings and helps a guitar like this cut through the mix. In bright guitars it can sometimes be strident, but the Eastsider Custom has a warmth and girth at its foundation that play this to its advantage, enhancing complexity and bite.

Given the dual humbuckers, clean tones often benefit from rolling down the guitar’s volume control slightly, but they’re still meaty and muscular when you get there, implying roadhouse blues and garage rock more than country twang.

The Eastsider Custom particularly excels when paired with some overdrive, though, and proved a gristly rocker through Plexi-like settings. And while I often find out-of-phase settings pointless in my own playing (I’d have thought coil-splitting might be more useful here), even that option added some scooped, funky chime that gave the dirt a little more character. Cool stuff.

Specifications

• NUT: Boneite synthetic, 1 11/16” wide
• NECK: Korina, medium-C profile
• FRETBOARD: Ebony, 24 ¾” scale, 10”-14” compound radius
• FRETS: 22 medium
• TUNERS: Reverend Pin Lock
• BODY: Chambered korina
• BRIDGE: Modern T-style with six block saddles
• PICKUPS: Reverend H5A humbucker neck, Telebucker dual-rail bridge
• CONTROLS: Master volume and tone, three-way switch, phase switch on tone control
• FACTORY STRINGS: D’Addario .010-.046
• WEIGHT: 7.4 lbs
• BUILT: Korea

RICK VITO SOUL AGENT

Reverend’s association with Rick Vito began with a signature model during the pre-import/semi-hollow/phenolic-laminate era. The new Rick Vito Soul Agent model riffs on that, but uses traditional tonewoods. 

It also employs Reverend’s longstanding Double Agent as its springboard, changing up several appointments and cosmetic details in a guitar intended to capture both the style and sonic preferences of the first-call six-stringer, who has worked with Fleetwood Mac, Jackson Browne, Bob Seger, John Mayall and a host of others.

As far as the maker has come, it’s sometimes easy to forget that Reverend launched its guitar designs on semi-hollow/chambered bodies à la the Danelectro models of the 1950s and ’60s.

The Soul Agent recaptures a bit of that DNA in its build. The offset-waist, asymmetrical double-cutaway body is made of heavily chambered korina with a solid spruce top, coupled to a solid, roasted-maple neck with six-screw attachment. Its medium-oval profile is just a tad shallower in depth than the Eastsider Custom’s “C,” and this one is stretched to the Agent platform’s usual 25 ½-inch scale length. It carries an ebony fingerboard with 22 frets of the same medium gauge, with an extension over the body to enable the final fret, a width of 1 11/16 inches across the nut, and a 12-inch radius.

Specs aside, the cosmetics are likely to grab many a potential player’s eye. Available in Midnight Black (as reviewed) or Oceanside Green, the body sports a broad checked black-and-white binding around the top, black three-ply pickguard, black cupcake knobs and a matching black headstock.

Further Vito-certified styling includes the stenciled black pointers on the bridge pickup’s cover, although this is a different unit than the Dual-Pro pickup on the first Vito Signature model that debuted the look. That one was a wide, single-coil based roughly on the pickups on the Supro Dual Tone guitar of the late ’50s, whereas the Soul Agent’s bridge pickup is a standard Reverend HA5 humbucker. It’s a hotter wind than the HA5 neck pickup in the Eastsider Custom, cranked to around 13k ohms using 43-AWG wire and powered by an Alnico V magnet. The neck pickup is Reverend’s 9A5 single-coil, a P-90-based unit wound with 42-AWG wire to around 7.5k ohms, and loaded with an Alnico V magnet.

These are wired to a three-way toggle selector, along with master volume and tone controls that hide a couple of tricks: Push-pull switching on the former unleashes a Twang mode that revoices both pickups for a brighter, tighter response, and popping up the latter throws the pickups out of phase.

Hardware includes a Bigsby-licensed B-50 vibrato with roller-saddle bridge, Pin Lock locking tuners, and a three-string retainer for the G, B and high E, along with headstock-end access to the dual-action truss rod.

As with most Reverends I’ve tested, the Soul Agent exhibits quality craftsmanship and a confident setup, and this guitar rings with an airy, acoustic chime when played unplugged that hints strongly at its spruce top and chambered body. The Bigsby requires some acrobatics to access the selector switch, but it’s something you’d likely get used to.

Tested through the same rigs, the Rick Vito Soul Agent proved similarly fat, warm and rich at its core, but with a lithe, wiry personality all its own, and a boatload of sonic variations thanks to the double push-pull switching (yielding eight unique tones in all). 

With both controls down, the cleans are almost always a hair grainy, a trait many players throughout the broad swathe of alternative styles will really dig. Its cleanest cleans are had with the Twang switch engaged, which delivers appealing chime and jangle reminiscent of Gretsch as much as Fender, and which adds tasty sting and articulation to overdriven settings.

Into a cranked amp or overdrive pedal, both pickups rock out with bountiful girth and grit in standard mode, with an edge of bite and clarity through even high-gain settings that proved impressive for a humbucker and a P-90, never collapsing into mush, as many will do.

The wood choices, scale length and pickup complement worked beautifully together to create voicings that were original, yet capable of tackling just about anything.

Specifications

• NUT: Boneite synthetic, 1 11/16” wide
• NECK: Roasted maple, medium-oval profile
• FRETBOARD: Ebony, 25 ½” scale, 12” radius
• FRETS: 22 medium
• TUNERS: Reverend Pin Lock
• BODY: Chambered korina with solid spruce top
• BRIDGE: Roller-saddle bridge with licensed Bigsby B-50 vibrato
• PICKUPS: Reverend 9A5 P-90 neck, H5A humbucker bridge
• CONTROLS: Master volume and tone, three-way switch, Twang switch on volume, phase switch on tone control
• FACTORY STRINGS: D’Addario .010-.046
• WEIGHT: 7.8 lbs
• BUILT: Korea

THE VERDICT

Both new Reverend Signature models reveal thoughtful design efforts that result in trenchant and original performances. Build quality is great on both, as we’ve come to expect, and each brings something arguably unique to an otherwise crowded field.

Either is worth laying your hands on, depending on your needs, but the Rick Vito Soul Agent earns an Editors’ Pick Award in this instance for its sheer effortless versatility.

Visit Reverend Guitars for more information.

The name Crosscut might suggest a blues guitar due to its connection with a signature tune by the late, great Albert King, but although this new Reverend solidbody isn’t pitched as such, it is one of the most versatile solidbody guitars with two humbuckers that I’ve tested in quite some time.

Things start out with a single-cut korina body that has contours on the top and back, and a roasted-maple neck that attaches with six bolts for increased stability.

Carved in a medium oval shape, the neck has the feel of a late-’60s Gibson profile and is topped with a 25 ½-inch scale rosewood fingerboard carrying 22 medium-jumbo frets.

They’re well attended and given a light polish, and all the way to the Bonite nut, everything presented here yields a hitch-free and inviting playing experience.

Continuing up the headstock we find a triple-string-tree that helps eliminate G-string buzz at the nut, along with a set of chrome-plated Reverend Pin-Lock machines that help keep the tuning stable and make string changing a little easier because you simply loosen a knob on the back of the tuner to release it from the winding post.

At the south end, the strings load into steel ferrules on the back of the body and are guided across six block-style adjustable saddles on a chromed mounting plate that doubles as a surround for the rear pickup.

The Railhammer Cleancut humbuckers are designed to deliver P-90-style punch and presence, but without the hum. 

Featuring oversized pole pieces on the plain strings that are offset by a rail for the wound strings, it’s a formula that affords the Crosscut more jangle than P-90s would provide, yet can still sound round and buttery when given some gain from pedals or amps.

The bass contour control is the bomb here because you can turn it clockwise for a heftier tone with a bit more output, or roll it the opposite way for a slimmer, more single-coil sound.

It’s a hip feature because it allows you to quickly get the response needed for rhythm and lead sounds while still having full use of the tone control to steer things in a brighter or darker direction.

In fact, the tone control is more effective because there’s no muddying of the frequencies or loss of definition when rolling it down to get brown sounds – with or without distortion – and it’s the combination of the two controls that makes it possible.

Topping it off, the guitar has a treble-bleed circuit, so there’s no loss of clarity when the volume is turned down.

With the Crosscut plugged into a ’60s Fender Vibro-Champ and a Fender Deluxe Reverb, with a selection of distortion pedals, the guitar delivered sounds that worked great for everything from a live video session to a jazz/world-music gig – where its rich, clear neck pickup tones through the Deluxe were well suited – to a show with a seven-piece doing funk, soul and rock.

On a gig with an Americana band using a mix of acoustic and electric guitars, the Crosscut’s ability to cop fat, twangy Telecaster-style tones made it a cool alternative to S- and T-style instruments (including a Reverend Gristlemaster) that I brought along for comparison.

An inspiring guitar that plays great and has impressive tone-sculpting ability for something with entirely passive electronics, the Crosscut is a slick looker too, with the Metallic Red Burst finish (see specs for other colors) white binding and three-ply pearloid pickguard.

The unique vibe and consistent quality that Reverend builds into all of its guitars is on full display here, making the Crosscut an easy mark for an Editors’ Pick Award.

Specifications

• NUT: Bonite, 1.69” wide (43mm)
• NECK: Roasted maple, bolt on
• FRETBOARD: Rosewood, 25 1/2” scale, 12” radius (roasted maple also available)
• FRETS: 22 medium jumbo .110” wide x .050” high
• TUNERS: Reverend Pin-Lock
• BODY: Korina
• BRIDGE: Hardtail with thru-body stringing
• PICKUPS: Reverend Railhammer Cleancut with chrome covers
• CONTROLS: Volume, tone, Bass Contour, three-way switch
• FACTORY STRINGS: .010–.046
• WEIGHT: 8.42 lbs (tested)
• EXTRAS: Pure Tone Technologies output jack. Available in Metallic Red Burst, Oceanside Green, Natural and Italian Purple. Optional two-tone teardrop case
• BUILT: Korea

Visit Reverend for more information.     

Phew! That quarter of a century went by in the blink of an eye. In the course of it, Reverend grew from a small Michigan company making guitars on a modernized Danelectro template to an Ohio-based outfit offshoring a comprehensive catalog of instrument designs that suit a range of needs and playing styles. 

The original Six Gun HPP was released a couple of years ago to lend a new pickup configuration to one of the company’s longstanding body styles. Now it’s doing honors as one of two electric guitars (including the Sensei Jr) and a bass (the Decision P) graced with special Limited Edition 25th Anniversary cosmetics to celebrate this milestone. 

The Six Gun is Reverend founder Joe Naylor’s own take on the offset-waist asymmetrical double-cutaway solidbody, reflecting a marriage of sumptuous curves and edgy angles in its familiar, yet original profile. 

It has a body of solid Korina, with comfort contours at the forearm and ribcage positions, plus subtle access contouring at the back of the cutaways around the neck joint. 

To celebrate the silver anniversary, it’s dressed in a Metallic Silver Freeze finish, with white binding around the body’s top, a brushed-aluminum pickguard, and a pearl XXV inlay at the 12th fret. The fingerboard itself is upgraded from the standard rosewood or roasted maple to ebony. All told, it’s a superbly classy look and an apt statement of the company’s pride in reaching this milestone.

As ever, it’s a 25 ½–scale, bolt-neck build with a roasted maple neck, which, on our example, displays a lovely grain with some subtle flame across its back. It’s carved to what Reverend calls a “medium oval” profile – pretty much a comfortably rounded medium C, by most standards. 

As we’ve come to expect from Reverend, the entire thing is replete with clever design touches that increase performance and usability without screaming for attention.

Access to the dual-action truss rod is via an open channel at the headstock end, and the headstock carries Reverend’s Pin-Lock tuners and a nifty offset triple string tree that increases tension across the nut for all three unwound strings. 

The vibrato bridge is Wilkinson’s WVS50 IIK, a modern two-point design with individually adjustable saddles, a push-in arm, and a good reputation for return-to-pitch stability. It has an easy action and more than enough drop for serious dive bombing, with some up-bend also available. 

A fingerboard extension allows 22 medium-jumbo frets, which are all flawlessly dressed and polished, aiding a guitar that plays extremely confidently right out of the two-tone, teardrop-shaped case. To my eye, one oddity amid the otherwise plush esthetics is the use of off-white plastic dots for the rest of the fingerboard’s position markers, when pearl dots matching the silvery pearl 12th-fret inlay might have been a more elegant option. Dealer’s choice, I guess. 

The HPP pickup selection that gives the guitar part of its name includes a Reverend HA5 bridge humbucker plus two 9A5 P-90s in the middle and neck position, wired to a five-way switch that should deliver some Strat-on-steroids voicings. 

The Alnico V humbucker is a hottish affair, wound to around 13.32k ohms using 43-AWG wire. The P-90s are more vintage-leaning, wound with more traditional 42-AWG wire to around 7.65k ohms each and also boasting Alnico V magnets. In addition to the master volume and tone, the electronics include Reverend’s handy Bass Contour control, which I’ve always found extremely effective at tweaking pickups across the dark-to-bright/thick-to-thin voicing spectrum. 

I tested the 25th Anniversary Six Gun HPP through a Friedman Mini Dirty Shirley and 2x12 cab, a tweed Deluxe-style 1x12 combo, and a Neural DSP Quad Cortex modeler into my studio monitors, and in all scenarios found it a great performer. 

One of the more immediate stand-out impressions is the model’s impressive versatility. Between the pickup configuration and the simple but extremely effective control complement, there are a lot of bold and original tones available, as well as plenty of sculptability for crafting familiar sounds that stand in well for the timeless classics.

Through it all, the Korina-maple-ebony wood combination works toward a solid, yet articulate response, with tight lows, balanced mids, and some extra harmonic sparkle in the highs. 

The power is there in abundance via the hot-leaning humbucker, so sizzling rock leads and power-chord crunch are second nature to this thing. But dialing down the volume control just slightly and winding the contour fully counterclockwise lets the humbucker do a much better single-coil impersonation than almost any coil-splitting options I can recall. 

Via the same process, the P-90s convert from fat to thin single-coils, while retaining plenty of richness and character. Sure, these tweaks might not sway you from your prized pre-CBS Stratocaster, but the 25th Anniversary Six Gun HPP has a good take on most general renditions of the breed, and certainly with enough confidence to pull off your David Gilmour–, Mark Knopfler–, and SRV-inspired voicings in front of a sweaty club crowd on a Saturday night. 

The guitar plays superbly well in every regard, and any real weaknesses are difficult to ferret out, especially considering what it delivers at this price point. If anything, I think I would personally enjoy the 25th Anniversary Six Gun HPP with a vintage PAF–style humbucker in the bridge position, allowing a little more sweetness there in full-girth mode. But that’s a matter of taste, and with the contour control to dial back the higher-gain humbucker’s thickness, Reverend likely calculated that it gives that position some extra gusto. 

Truly, though, if I were limited to a budget just slightly north of $1k and needed one solid guitar to tackle a wide range of sounds and styles, this would likely be a top contender for the job. The Reverend 25th Anniversary Six Gun HPP deserves an Editor’s Pick Award for that achievement. 

Specifications

CONTACT: reverendguitars.com
PRICE: $1,199 street
NUT: Synthetic bone, 1.692” wide
NECK: Maple, medium oval profile
FRETBOARD: Ebony, 25.5” scale, 12” radius
FRETS: 22 medium-jumbo
TUNERS: Reverend Pin-Lock
BODY: Solid Korina
BRIDGE: Wilkinson WVS50 IIK vibrato
PICKUPS: Reverend HA5 humbucker in the bridge position and 9A5 P-90s neck and middle
CONTROLS: Master volume and tone, contour, five-way switch
FACTORY STRINGS: D’Addario .010–.046
WEIGHT: 8.1 lbs
BUILT: Korea

Reverend has unveiled the Z-One, the third electric guitar it's designed with Smashing Pumpkins frontman Billy Corgan.

Inspired by the Pumpkins' heavier material, the Z-One boasts a chambered alder body with a deep cutaway for easy upper-fret access, (as opposed the original Corgan signature Reverend's korina build) and a roasted maple neck and fretboard with 22 frets.

Sounds on the guitar come by way of a pair of Railhammer Z-One pickups – each of which boast custom artwork etched into their covers – tailored to have a "fat" midrange and a smooth top end.

These are controlled by volume, tone, and Bass Contour controls, along with a three-way pickup selector.

As for hardware, there's a Boneite nut, and – just as can be found on Corgan's other Reverend signatures – Reverend pin-lock tuners and a hardtail, string-thru body bridge.

The Reverend Billy Corgan Z-One guitar is available now – in Metallic Silver Freeze and Midnight Black finishes – for $1,799. A two-toned Teardrop case is available separately.

For more info on the guitar, point your browser on over to reverendguitars.com.

Reeves Gabrels has a long list of credits that includes stints with Tin Machine, David Bowie and, since 2012, the Cure.

The Dirtbike Royale is his latest Reverend Guitars signature model. It joins the clan as the only non-vibrato guitar among a group that includes the Dirtbike, Signature and Signature RG-SUS – all equipped with Wilkinson WVS50 IIK vibratos – and the semi-hollow Spacehawk, which has a Bigsby B-50 with a roller bridge.

Dressed in cool Feline Gray or Royale Red, and decked out with full binding, the Dirtbike Royale is a sleek guitar with an offset double-cutaway korina body, and a set, three-piece korina neck that carries a 24 ¾–inch scale (12-inch radius) ebony fretboard.

The neck’s medium oval shape has just the right amount of girth for a very comfortable grip, and the medium-jumbo frets are polished and evenly crowned. 

The nut is also very smooth on the ends and perfectly notched to route the strings to the pin-lock tuners without requiring a string tree.

The action on our review guitar was low and free of buzzing, and the intonation was tuneful throughout the span of the neck. This setneck design has a nice rounded heel for your hand to push up against, and the deep cutaways allow full and easy access to the high frets.

The Dirtbike Royale differs from the original model in two ways: It has a Wilkinson GTB wraparound tailpiece with an adjustable B-string saddle, which helps steer it in a Les Paul Junior direction, and to further the LP leanings it has P-90-style pickups, specifically a MojoTone Hot Quiet Coil P-90 Soapbar in the bridge and a MojoTone Regular Quiet Coil P-90 Soapbar in the neck.

It’s a combination that delivers the performance Gabrels has long sought.

“I wanted something that would bark when I wanted it to and also be low noise,” the guitarist says. “I had a band called Modern Farmer when the first Mesa/Boogie Dual Rectifier heads came out. I had a ’56 Gibson Les Paul Junior and a ’59 Les Paul Special, and my whole thing was, ‘The volume control is the noise gate!’  So the idea of having a good hum-canceling P-90 is something I’ve been trying to do for 25 years.

“These MojoTone pickups are stock, too. Sometimes you want to have a signature model pickup, and then you realize you’re just going to have them make the thing they’re already making. On the bridge pickup, with the bass full up, you get a cocked-wah sound, but not so much that you can’t use a cocked wah with it!”

The tones that the Dirtbike Royale dishes out range from very clear with a touch of twanginess to rich, mids-forward growl when you unleash the beast.

MojoTone’s patent-applied-for Quiet-Coil P-90 is a hum-canceling design that features low-gauss Alnico magnets to provide vintage tone without the noise. They’re an excellent match for this guitar, which delivers supremely cool clean and overdriven tones that have great dynamic sensitivity and clean up beautifully when the guitar volume is turned down.

Played though Fender Deluxe Reverb and Victoria Double Deluxe 2x12 tube amps, the Dirtbike Royale easily covered territory that ranged from James Brown funk to Chris Stapleton-style alt-country dirt to ’70s/’80s hard-rock grind.

The fact that Gabrels deploys this electric guitar onstage for all the textures that Cure tunes require is a testament to the DBR’s versatility.

The volume control preserves highs when rolled back, and the tone control is well voiced and can be run super low if needed, without muddying the sound. The bass contour control is highly effective too, as it allows you to get stringy single-coil tones at low settings and beefy, humbucker-like sounds when you turn it up.

It’s an extremely effective control that lets you very easily dial-in the guitar to your liking. Setting it about three-quarters up sounded great with our test amps, but there’s plenty of range to adjust for any rig you’re playing through.

The Dirtbike Royale is well crafted, lightweight and tuneful, and one of the best realizations of a modern P-90 axe currently available.

We’re giving it an Editors’ Pick Award and suggest you give one a spin.

Specifications:

• NUT: Bonite, 1.692” wide
• NECK: Three-piece korina. Medium Oval shape
• FRETBOARD: Ebony, 24.75” scale, 12” radius
• FRETS: 22 medium jumbo
• TUNERS: Reverend Pin-Lock 
• BODY: Korina
• BRIDGE: Wilkinson GTB wraparound
• PICKUPS: MojoTone Hot Quiet Coil P-90 Soapbar (bridge) and Regular Quiet Coil P-90 Soapbar (neck)
• CONTROLS: Volume, tone, bass contour. Three-way selector
• FACTORY STRINGS: D’Addario .009-.046
• WEIGHT: 7.5 lbs (as tested)
• EXTRAS: Available in Feline Gray and Royale Red
• BUILT: Korea

The Reverend Reeves Gabrels Dirtbike Royale is available here.

Despite the ongoing pandemic 2021 was a fabulous year for gear. With many exciting and innovative products appearing over the last 12 months we guitar players have been spoilt for choice. 

Here are some of the top picks from team GP…

Gibson Custom Shop Murphy Lab Les Paul, ES-335 and ES-355 Guitars

A revitalized Gibson introduced its Murphy Lab extension of the Custom Shop early in 2021, and that thrillingly accurate backward glance proved one of the more exciting new developments from a big-name maker in quite some time.

Tom Murphy has long been recognized as a leading practitioner of the art of aging Gibson guitars, and if someone had told us the 1959 Les Paul Heavy Aged, 1959 ES-355 Light Aged, and 1961 ES-335 Ultra-Light Aged we were sent for testing were rare under-the-bed vintage finds we wouldn’t have thought twice.

And not only did they look great, but Custom Shop build quality ensure they also played superbly and sounded authentic. Stellar stuff. DH

Orange Acoustic Pedal

This is an ideal preamp and flexible D.I. for acoustic guitar rockers after an amp-like tone. It simply makes any acoustic-electric guitar sound bigger and bolder without having to fuss with a bunch of complicated controls.

The main event is the very sculptable midrange along with the requisite bass and treble controls. Tweak them a bit for different applications or instruments, but most players can probably pretty much set ’em and forget ’em.

I was miffed about no mute or bypass button at first but needed a mutable tuner in line anyway. Once the ample-sounding Orange Acoustic Pedal tone colors the signal chain, going without it sounds black and white. JL

Reverend Gristle 90

Guitarist Greg Koch went off-road when creating a follow-up to his signature Tele-centric Gristlemaste, and the result is the Gristle 90, a mashup of Fender and Gibson attributes that features a korina body that’s chambered under the pickguard and has a Firebird-style raised center section, and a three-piece korina set-neck topped with a 24 3/4-inch scale, 22-fret ebony fingerboard.

Steering things further into Gibson territory, the Gristle 90 has a Bigsby vibrato and a Tune-o-matic bridge, and it sports a pair of P-90 pickups – specifically, Fishman Fluence Gristle 90s, which were voiced by Koch and crew for this guitar. They feed volume and tone controls – the latter with a push-pull switch for a Peter Green-type out-of-phase sound – along with a pushbutton midrange boost and a three-way selector.

The Gristle 90 is a great playing and superb sounding guitar that combines classic and cutting-edge technologies to create a T-styler like no other. AT

Mesa Badlander

Derived from a long line of high-gain Mesa Rectifier amplifiers, this EL34-powered two-channel 100-watt head (also available in combo, rack-mount and 50-watt versions) delivers an astounding range of tones courtesy of Mesa’s 3 Mode Channel Cloning system that provides independent switching of the Clean, Crunch and Crush modes on each channel, each of which offers different gain and voicing options.

Dialing in righteous clean and overdriven tones is facilitated by the independent gain, master and EQ controls, and there’s a front-panel switch to select 100-, 50- or 20-watt operation (all class A/B), a tube-buffered series FX loop, a trio of speaker jacks and a bias switch to configure the amp for EL34 or 6L6 power tubes.

The features are extensive, but one of the most significant is the Cab Clone IR, a cab-simulator/reactive load with eight Mesa miked-cabinet IRs that can also be loaded with IRs of your choice. It adds up to a magnificently well-endowed amp that’s also an amazing deal. AT

Epiphone USA Casino

This updated and revitalized USA Casino – the first built in the U.S. since 1971 – absolutely nails what makes the iconic hollow-body Casino great: from big, bold British jangle and punch to sexy, syrupy P-90 jazz guitar and blues guitar tones.

The solid mahogany, 22-fret, rounded-C neck is topped with an Indian rosewood fingerboard, and with its three-ply maple/poplar/maple top, Gibson ABR-1 Tune-o-matic bridge and thinline trapeze tailpiece, it’s a contoured classic in either Royal Tan or Vintage Sunburst nitro finishes.

While it may cost a pretty penny compared to the Asia-made Epiphone Casinos of even a few years ago, the USA Casino is worth the investment, bringing the model back to the premium U.S.-made dream machine it was always meant to be. JVR

Boss OC-5 Octave

The OC-5 builds on the legacy of the OC-2, introduced 40 years ago, with a spot-on re-creation of the original monophonic pedal as well as a Poly mode that delivers the OC-3’s chord-loving goodness.

It ups the ante with a +1 octave control that adds definition and chime to guitar lines, and a -2 octave that in Poly mode becomes a range control for the -1 octave, allowing you to place the sub on just the root of the chord or over all the notes being played.

Boss’s latest tracking technology delivers lightning-fast, glitch-free performance, producing a natural sound and feel even on bends and vibrato. Better still, its suboctave sounds more natural than that of its predecessors. CS

Eventide Micropitch Delay

The MicroPitch Delay is a stereo delay with controls to independently adjust pitch for the left and right channels, as well as pitch-modulation capabilities courtesy of an LFO, and an envelope that responds dynamically to your playing.

The little red box is awesome for delay, chorus and doubling effects, but that is just the tip of this iceberg. The secondary mod parameter lets you choose from three types of pitch modulation: via LFO, via envelope to raise pitch, and via envelope to lower pitch. These last two methods are great for creating dynamically responsive pitch shifts.

It’s also terrific for creating syrupy chorus and ascending and descending delays via picking dynamics. I found that, at its core, the MicroPitch Delay is a fantastic “always-on” sonic enhancer in my signal chain. CS

Fender American Professional Jazzmaster II

If you’re like us, you’ve wanted a Jazzmaster for years. What held you back was those notoriously wonky vibrato tailpieces and the humpy 7.5-inch neck radius. Well, the American Professional II is for you, with a redesigned Panorama tremolo system that gives you all the bending room of a Strat, updated V-Mod II pickups, and – finally! – a more comfortable rounded-C neck shape, with a modern 9.5-inch neck radius. Hallelujah!

The V-Mod II single-coil pickups kick indie ass, too: clear, punchy and articulate, with a coil-tap option for a beefier sound out of that previously thin bridge pup in most Jazzers. With the American Professional II, Fender has given us all the Jazzmaster’s cool character, with absolutely zero trade-offs. JVR

Epiphone “Inspired by Gibson” Hummingbird

Comparable in nearly every detail to its much-pricier U.S.-made Gibson counterpart, the new made-in-China Epiphone Hummingbird features that classic square-shouldered dreadnought shape, a solid Sitka Spruce top, solid-mahogany back and sides, Indian Laurel reverse-belly bridge with bone saddle, tortoise shell pickguard with Hummingbird and floral graphics, a glued-in, tapered dovetail neck joint, quarter-sawn spruce bracing, ivory-and-black six- and four-ply binding and an Aged Gloss finish.

Specs aside, it just plays and sounds great, with a 24.72-inch-scale mahogany neck with rounded-C profile, a 12-inch radius, and a lovely Indian laurel fingerboard. Finally, a Hummingbird for the rest of us. JVR

ESP MH-1000 Deluxe Evertune

An Editors’ Pick Award mysteriously went missing from this review when it appeared in the November 2021 issue, but the MH-1000 Deluxe Evertune certainly earned one.

This beautifully made guitar offers righteous playability thanks to its three-piece set-thru maple neck with a thin U shape and a 25.5-inch-scale Macassar ebony fingerboard carrying 24 mirror-polished, stainless-steel frets. The guitar swings a pair of active EMG pickups – a 60T W-R in the neck position and an 81 in the bridge slot – and the tone knob pulls for split-coil action.

As the name denotes, this version of the MH-1000 Deluxe features an Evertune bridge that provides rock-solid tuning stability and unprecedented intonation accuracy, and can be easily adjusted for the desired string-bending response. The Evertune is a game changer and the MH-1000 Deluxe an ideal platform to showcase its abilities. AT

Orange Terror Stamp

Perfect for mounting on a pedalboard, this potent little amplifier is a hybrid design that uses a 12AX7 tube in the preamp driving a 20-watt solid-state power section. A single foot-switch toggles between volume 1 and volume 2 controls, and there’s a Shape knob for EQ-ing sounds and a master gain control. The speaker output can handle 8- and 16-ohm loads, and there’s an FX loop and a cab-simulated output for recording, headphones or feeding a FOH mixer.

The Terror Stamp has a wide gain range and its British-flavored distortion is killer for everything from blues guitar to hard rock. It’s a great pedal to keep in the gig-bag in case your main amp goes down, or as a full-time amplifier for players who want to reduce the amount of gear they carry to the gig. AT

Neural DSP Quad Cortex Floor Modeler

When it comes to the industry-leading amp modelers, guitarists have stopped debating whether they sound like the real thing and just started using them. In doing so, many have developed strong loyalties to their DSP delivery unit of choice, which led to some ruffled feathers and muddied waters when plug-in designer Neural DSP unveiled this Quad Cortex floor unit.

Boasting an extremely intuitive interface with touch screen and combination rotary-knob-foot-switch gizmos and the ability to capture and reproduce any amp, drive pedal or cab you throw at it, the main takeaway is that the Quad Cortex simply sounds astoundingly good, immediately establishing it as a serious contender for anything out there. DH

Origin Effects RevivalDrive Compact

When you notice that your pals have the same new overdrive pedal on their boards, you know something is up. With its amp-like circuit design and chewy, touch-responsive sag and bloom, the original RevivalDrive caused a massive stir a few years back, but it’s a big pedal. The RevivalDrive Compact packs that same spongy saturation into a fly-rig-approved form factor, and does it sound good.

Is it the “tube amp-style signal path with Class A preamp”? Or maybe the “long-tail pair phase inverter” or the “reactive overdrive design”? It’s those things, plus EQ options for single-coil or double-coil pickups and a wet/dry control so you can blend your amp’s preamp gain with the RevivalDrive’s tailored gain structure.

Put away your ideas about what an overdrive pedal sounds like, and pull out your wallet. JVR

EarthQuaker Devices Astral Destiny Reverb

EarthQuaker’s line of out-of-this-world ambience pedals grew this year with Astral Destiny, a mind-blowing box that serves up eight types of ambience with and some without octave effects. These huge-sounding reverbs include chorus modulation that makes them sound ethereal or haunting, shimmer effects for upper and lower octaves, and high and low octave effects.

All this, plus a regenerating tail for creating reverbs of extended length at pitch or fifth above, as well as upward and downward pitch bending. Astral Destiny is a welcome new tone enhancer and an inspiring effect for guitarists who seek uncommon reverbs. CS

K-Line Springfield

Just when you concluded that everyone and his or her second cousin is making reproduction S-style, bolt-neck, 25.5-inch-scale guitars, along comes one to remind you how magical this 67-year-old recipe can still be when cooked up very, very well.

Chris Kroenlein’s Springfield model wowed us for its superb playability, authentically played-in feel, resonant and lightweight woods, lusciously aged nitro Lake Placid Blue finish (non-aged available), and trenchant tones.

From the archetypally Stratty mix of bright, glassy, snappy, and quacky, to muscular, rich, and multi-dimensional, it’s the compelling and inspiring performer many players believe they’ll find only in a vintage example costing much, much more. DH

L.R. Baggs Voiceprint Acoustic D.I.

Released in fall 2020 with a significant firmware update in 2021, the Voiceprint D.I. is one of the most innovative products released during the pandemic era. Using Impulse Response signal processing and harnessing the power of an iPhone or Apple Watch via the AcousticLive app, Voiceprint conjures a custom filter designed to augment/replace the pickup signal based on a quick demo performance, essentially creating the best version of your favorite instrument for amplification.

That “Voiceprint” then lives in the pedal and can be further sculpted using the app to adjust EQ or volume, reduce feedback or vary the blend. Store up to 99 Voiceprints for an entire acoustic guitar arsenal. JL

Fender Acoustic Junior GO

This little bugger sounds surprisingly toneful and does pretty much anything a troubadour might imagine. The GO’s got a bevy of effects including a built-in looper, plus Bluetooth connectivity that comes in handy for pumping backing tracks or simply rocking out to tunes sent over from a phone.

Dual guitar/vocal channels with identical setups are easy to understand and operate. A perfectly portable compact brown box housing a powerful rechargeable lithium-ion battery is the GO’s coup de grace.

Robust enough to turn any patch of nature into a stage, it was even the main amplifier for all of the acoustic instruments and even some of the electric ones at our Burning Man camp! JL

Epiphone Alex Lifeson Les Paul Standard Access

Here’s an all-around axe if there ever was one, and it’s attainable to practically anyone serious about acquiring a total tone machine. First, it’s a gorgeous, utterly playable and ergonomically excellent Les Paul with push/pull coil-tap capability on both humbuckers. Second, it’s got a piezo pickup in the Floyd Rose-style, whammy-friendly locking Graph Tech Ghost Tremolo Bridge, and that signal can either be separated via a second output jack, or summed with the magnetic signal in the primary output.

Remarkably, Epiphone and Lifeson realized this dream machine for under a grand. AT

Matchless Laurel Canyon Reverb 1x12

California amp maker Matchless has been at the forefront of the boutique scene since 1989, but the Laurel Canyon and its sibling Coldwater Canyon are the first production models it has released with 6V6 output tubes – to which we say it’s about time!

Announced prior to this past year but put on hold review-wise due to pandemic-related constraints, the Laurel Canyon quickly proved that the high-quality, point-to-point Matchless formula applies equally well to American-voiced designs, while also establishing a new 20-watt club combo to beat.

 From lush blooming chime, to biting mid-rich twang to snarling lead tones, all with outstanding reverb slathered over, it’s impressively versatile and a real joy to play. DH

Way Huge Atreides Analog Weirding Module

Atreides is a stellar reimagination of the short-lived but influential 1980 Electro-Harmonix Mini Synthesizer that Eddie Van Halen used to great effect on Fair Warning tracks like “Sunday Afternoon in the Park” and “One Foot Out the Door.”

A guitar synth, envelope filter, fuzz circuit, phaser, and sub-octave device all in one, pimped out with seven satisfying sliders for sensitivity, brightness, phaser rate, and more, it’s sure to help evoke the hallucinogenic “spice” that brings visions and messianic dreams to its Dune namesake, Paul Atreides. JVR

Carr Super Bee

Dressed in natty two-tone covering and designed to deliver three different flavors of blackface-Fender tone, the Super Bee has a rotary Sting switch that selects “64” (based on Steve Carr’s personal ’64 Deluxe Reverb), “68” (a classic Super Reverb) and “72” (a blackface circuit modded for extra overdrive).

Powering this point-to-point wired amp is a pair of 6BM8 tubes that combine a high-gain triode and a power pentode in one glass package. The pair produce 10 watts, which can be throttled down to two watts via the attenuator switch or all the way down to a whisper with the attenuator knob. Two 12AX7s and a 12AT7 handle the EQ (treble, bass, middle) and drive/recovery duties for the lush and enveloping reverb.

The Super Bee offers a cool selection of sounds that range from rich Deluxe Reverb flavors to midrange-forward Super Reverb clean and overdriven tones to gnarly distortion from the 72 setting that’s so dynamic and touch responsive you could play an entire gig on this mode alone. AT

Taylor Grand Theater 811E & K21E

Depending on your perspective, these are either two of the best little big guitars or big little guitars of 2021. Taylor notched out a nice niche between a short scale travel-sized axe and a full scale small-bodied instrument, then made it super playable by lowering the string tension for a remarkably relaxed feel that’s perfect for the beach, the boat or the back porch. C-Class cantilevered bracing helps the Grand Theater’s tone belie its diminutive box, and onboard ES2 electronics make it truly gig-worthy. JL

Damian Probett SG-Teor Guitar

With a diverse background in carpentry and joinery, aircraft tool making and the building of engines for racing motorcycles, London-based luthier Damian Probett shouldn’t have much trouble pulling off a meticulously well-crafted electric guitar – and he most definitely did not on evidence of the SG-Teor that graced GP’s New & Cool pages early in 2021.

Partly inspired by a “what if?” wish list from American guitarist Matte Henderson, Probett captured the spirit and overall sound of a vintage SG in a single-cutaway design that improved balance, eliminated neck-dive and “rubber neck” tuning-wobble issues, and enhanced sonic stability and sustain in the process. The result is a stunning performance tool that’s all the more versatile thanks to stealthy split-coil pickup switching. DH

Coming on the heels of the bolt-neck Greg Koch Gristlemaster, Reverend’s new Gristle 90 is an entirely different animal, courtesy of its Fishman P-90 pickups, Bigsby B-50 tailpiece, and korina set-neck with a 24.75-inch scale, all of which were elements Koch requested for his new signature model. 

As he says, “I play different on a Gibson-scale guitar, and that was a big part of why we came up with it. I wanted an instrument that allowed me to have the ergonomics of a T-style guitar with some of the sonic and playability attributes of a Gibson. So I wanted a set neck, a shorter scale, and a pair of P-90 pickups that really did the job with no noise.”

A sharp looker with its Venetian Gold finish (also available in Bradford Beach Blue and Midnight Black), our review sample Gristle 90 features a great-feeling neck that has a medium-oval shape and cream-colored binding that extends around the black-faced headstock. 

The ebony ’board wears 22 polished jumbo frets and is fitted with a synthetic Boneite nut for smooth string travel out to the Reverend Pin-Lock tuners. Note that the headstock angle on this model negates the need for a string tree. Playability is excellent, and the guitar intonated sweetly along the fretboard.

The bending feel is softer than that of the original 25.5-inch scale Gristlemaster, so the Gristle 90 feels more like a Les Paul in Tele clothing. It’s a satisfying guitar under the fingers and very dynamically responsive whether playing with or without a pick. The Bigsby certainly adds its own sonic qualities, and the “soft tension” spring invites using it a lot to add expression and vibe to parts.

“Reverend does Bigsbys the way nobody else does, because they work right,” Koch says. 

“You can do warbles and the whole nine yards, and it stays in tune. Plus, I just like the sound of a Bigsby. There’s definitely a top-loader thing going on that I think is cool. So that was my reason for putting one on this guitar, although I had to remind myself what a nightmare they are to re-string. I’ve been telling people that, in order to evolve as human beings, you have to know how to change strings on a Bigsby!”

The Fishman Gristle 90 pickups were specially designed for this guitar, and the electronics include a three-way selector, volume and tone controls (the latter with a push-pull phase switch), and a pushbutton midrange boost.

“I’ve always liked the sound of P-90s, but I’ve never had many guitars with them, because they’re noisy as hell,” Koch explains. 

“So instead of doing a humbucker version of a Gristlemaster, I wanted a P-90 pickup, but P-90s done right. I wanted all the things I loved about P-90s: that glassy but thick neck-pickup sound, and that weird kind of quacky thing that the bridge pickup does while still sounding girthsome, with a little cut to it.

“Then I also wanted to have that Peter Green–style out-of-phase sound. It’s like both pickups are out of phase, but the neck pickup is turned down a little bit volume-wise, which gives it a thicker, more useable tone.”

Using Fishman Fluence technology to create a noiseless P-90 that sounded the way Koch wanted took some development time, but the end result is a pickup that balances clarity and fatness in just the right proportions.

Played though a Fender Deluxe Reverb and a Victoria Double Deluxe 2x12 combo, the Gristle 90 delivered all the crispness and gutsy snarl you want from a good P-90, along with a cool boosted-mids option when you push the button that’s located between the volume and tone knobs (both of which have a white dot on top for easy reference).

The tone with the boost activated is the bomb for lead playing in both clean and overdriven modes, and I tended to leave it on full time because it thickens the response and gives every pickup setting a little extra presence and punch.

Pulling the tone knob up to put the pickups out of phase also yields a very useable sound that is definitely more chimey and funky but doesn’t eviscerate the low end. The electronics are powered by an internal li-po battery that’s rechargeable via a port on the jack plate, which also contains a battery-status LED.

I’ve used a Gristlemaster for several years and battery life has never been an issue, even though it’s only occasionally recharged The Gristle 90 is an impressive guitar that combines Gibson and Fender attributes and sounds so cool and organic, it’s easy to forget it uses pickup technology that’s radically different from any standard coil-and-magnet designs.

Greg Koch’s input and Reverend’s outstanding quality and consistency have coalesced to create a guitar that walks the line between old-school and cutting-edge in a super compelling way. Well done!

Specifications

• PRICE: $1,799 street
• NUT WIDTH: 43mm, Bonite
• NECK: Korina 3-piece set
• FRETBOARD: Ebony, 24.75” scale, 12” radius
• FRETS: 22 ( 0.118” wide x 0.057” high)
• TUNERS: Reverend Pin-Lock
• BODY: Korina with chamber under the pickguard for enhanced resonance
• BRIDGE: Tune-o-matic bridge and Bigsby tailpiece
• PICKUPS: Two Fishman P-90s
• CONTROLS: Volume, tone (with push-pull phase switch), three-way selector, push-button midrange boost
• FACTORY STRINGS: D’Addario .010–.046
• WEIGHT: 8.28 lbs (as tested)
• BUILT: Korea
• CONTACT: Reverend Guitars

Reverend is re-releasing its Flatroc electric guitar, with some new tweaks and upgrades for 2021.

Though it's mostly a dead ringer for its predecessor visually, the new Flatroc's sounds come by way of a pair of upgraded, hot-rodded Retroblast mini-humbucker pickups, which aim for a healthy mid-range thwack with beautifully chimey highs, and solid string-to-string definition.

The Flatroc also now sports a Bigsby B50 tremolo with a Soft Touch spring, which is said to give the Bigsby a looser, more broken-in feeling.

Elsewhere, more typical Reverend specs abound, with a korina body, Bonetite nut, locking tuners, dual-action truss rod, and Bass Contour control on the guitar's upper bout all coming standard.

The Reverend Flatroc is available now – in Transparent White, Rock Orange, and Metallic Emerald finishes – for $1,439.

For more info on the Flatroc, stop by reverendguitars.com.

We were always very forward-thinking about the music we made together,” Reeves Gabrels says of his 10-year creative partnership with David Bowie. Beginning in 1989 with metallic hard-rock band Tin Machine, their alliance continued into the ’90s, when Gabrels co-produced a number of Bowie’s solo albums.

“Our whole thing was very much rooted in being in the moment. There wasn’t a lot of looking back going on between us.” Even so, Bowie told Gabrels he’d like to return to the studio and redo some songs from his 1987 album, Never Let Me Down. “The record seemed to gnaw at David a bit,” Gabrels recalls. “He’d had such a big hit with ‘Let’s Dance,’ and I think he felt obliged to follow up that success on Tonight and Never Let Me Down, but I think he did so half-heartedly. He told me that he’d kind of checked out mentally during the recording of Never Let Me Down, and he wanted a chance to take a mulligan. He would always say, ‘I just know there’s some good songs on it. I wouldn’t mind redoing some of them.’”

Gabrels knew what he meant. When he first heard the album, before working with Bowie, he and his “smart-ass musician friends” compared notes on the record. “We were like, ‘Gee, it’s 1987, but this seems a little 1985,’” he says. “It was very synthy, a little too Duran Duran-ish, if you will. But when I saw David perform tracks from the album on the [1987] Glass Spider tour, the music came off more muscular live than on record. It had grit to it. So I could see where he was coming from about revisiting those songs. It just wasn’t something I thought I should be a part of, and I always shot it down.”

Much to his surprise, and delight, Gabrels later took part in reworking not just a few songs from Never Let Me Down but the entire album. Titled Never Let Me Down 2018, the disc is part of the elaborately packaged box set David Bowie: Loving the Alien (1983–1988), the fourth in a series of retrospectives spanning the singer’s career from 1969 forward.

Guided by producer/engineer Mario McNulty, who had collaborated with Bowie in 2008 on a remix of the album track “Time Will Crawl,” Gabrels joined guitarist David Torn, drummer Sterling Campbell and bassist Tim Lefebvre – all selected by Bowie, in notes written before his passing in January 2016 – to breathe new life into the tracks that had plagued the singer over the years.

Recorded at Electric Lady Studios in New York City, the resulting album is a punchier, far more guitar-heavy affair than its synth-laden original. Gabrels feels that Bowie would approve. “We absolutely tried to respect David’s wishes with this new version of the album,” he says. “What’s kind of funny is, we sort of went into this process with a veil of secrecy about what we were up to. I think the label people believed we were doing more of a remix than a whole re-imaging of the album, and we totally blew their minds when they heard it. David would be pleased by that, I think.”

So how did this project come about, and what led to you finally saying yes?

According to everyone involved in the Bowie estate trust, when David knew that he was dying, he left a five-year plan behind of what he wanted done with his music. From what I understand from Mario, he wrote out instructions to remake this record, and there was a list of musicians that he wanted. All of the people are post-1987 musicians. They’re the next gen.

Mario explained this to me. We met at Dean & DeLuca and talked for five hours about it. At first, I still felt like it wasn’t my place to get involved with stuff I hadn’t been a part of. Now, there is some precedent for this: The first thing I did with David was a remake of “Look Back in Anger,” but that wasn’t supposed to appear on a record, though it has subsequently appeared on [the 1991 reissue of] Lodger. My rearrangement of it was for a dance company presentation that David did.

So when this idea was presented to me, my reaction was, ‘Ah, this is rich! This is David’s final practical joke on me for all the times I said no. He knows I’m not going to say no to a dead man.’” [laughs] But then Mario played me the remix of “Time Will Crawl,” and I saw what the approach was – stripping it back, recording brand-new guitars, bass and real drums, and then getting rid of everything except what David played. So I came around and said, “I’m in.”

How did you and David Torn divvy up your guitar duties? You two had never worked together before, right?

No. We tried to recognize each other’s strengths and not get into any overlap. Torn was more the “clouds of frozen remorse” guy, whereas I was the “bull in the China shop, foot on the monitor” kind of guy. We did a lot of stuff independently, but there was one day we both recorded together at Electric Lady. We improvised textures simultaneously, trying to wrap ourselves around each other. I think I did more of a metallic kind of groove, and Torn did a sort of reverbed, tape-manipulated texture.

Did you keep any of the original guitar tracks by Carlos Alomar and Peter Frampton?

On "Zeroes" we kept Peter’s sitar, because to me that part was so ingrained in the song. If I had played it, I would have done something pretty much the same. And Carlos played a gated rhythm part on “Never Let Me Down” that just moved the song in the same way that Johnny Marr’s part on [the Smiths’] “How Soon Is Now?” does for that song, so it made sense to keep it. We weren’t trying to be cruel or destroy the original document, but this was David’s wish, so that absolved us from any guilt we might have had.

The synths are de-emphasized on “Day-In Day-Out,” but there are some parts that sound like keyboards – although they could be electric guitars.

Yeah, I know what you mean. We didn’t really keep any of the original synth stuff from the album. A lot of those textures are guitar-played or stuff that Mario did after the fact. The part you’re talking about – it sounds like a baritone sax or a synth – that’s actually an Alexander Syntax Error pedal. That just came to me, and it sounded right. You see, I didn’t listen to the original album before I went in the studio; I wanted to treat the whole thing like a demo. I didn’t want to be too married to what had been done before, because then I’d just try to re-create new versions of what had been done.

How did you approach “New York’s in Love”?

That one was interesting. Peter Frampton’s playing on the track had a certain pentatonic blues foundation. Now, I love Frampton. His live album with Humble Pie is one of my all-time favorites. But when I listened to what he did with the song, it got me thinking about how New York isn’t really about the blues anymore. It’s more multicultural, and there’s a definite Asian and Middle Eastern thing going on. You walk down the street on a Saturday night, and you see this new wave of immigrants, and you hear sirens going by.

I wanted to reflect that change with what I did. I wanted police sirens to come out of the guitar. I told Mario, “Put up that song and let me see what happens.” I figured out where the harmony was, and I just stretched it. I soloed through the whole song and tried different things, and I reacted to what was going on. When the song ended, Mario looked at me and said, “Well, that one’s done then.” [laughs]

Bowie’s big acoustic guitar sound that was featured on the remix of “Time Will Crawl” is still way up in this new version.

That was David’s thing at the time – an Ovation Adamas through a [Scholz] Rockman into a Fender Twin. You notice how gloriously ratty the acoustic is, which is exactly the same tone you hear on the first Tin Machine record. That was his sound for that album, which also points to the fact that, in lots of ways, it was a transitional record.

You added quite a lot of guitar to “Zeroes.” Toward the end, it’s a veritable guitar symphony.

Yeah, I built that up in the end. That song kind of took me by surprise. It was the first track that I worked on at Electric Lady. Mario and I listened to it, and we figured out what sounded really good and what could be different. The first thing we did was strengthen the acoustic guitar. We miked up my Breedlove acoustic, and I got the headphones on, and I realized that I had the same separation in my head that I used to have with David. His guitar would be in one ear, and my guitar would be in the other.

We used to cut acoustic guitars together like that. Often he’d play 12-string, and we would sit facing each other – two mics, headphones on. David felt things on the one and three, and I kind of sat more in the two and four, so we had a little push-pull thing going on. He would move his shoulders a certain way. He would look at me, but it was like he wasn’t there – he was somewhere else. He would cross his legs and one of his feet would bounce. I would take cues from his body language.

Anyway, at Electric Lady, I played the track with my eyes closed, and I would see him. But then when the track was done, I opened my eyes and he wasn’t there. [sighs] I was glad that I was in the live room all by myself. I had about 30 seconds to wipe the tears away before anybody came in. [pauses] It wasn’t always like that. Most of the time, it was like when we were working together, meaning he wasn’t always in the studio. He would say things like, “I’ll see you Friday. You know what to do.”

What was your guitar and gear setup for the sessions?

I have three signature models with Reverend, so I brought what I consider to be my “desert island” guitar, the Spacehawk. It works so well in most any situation but particularly when I’m playing at high volumes. I also had my original RG model, which has a Sustainiac in it, and a Trussart Steelcaster. During the sessions, I bought an R7 Les Paul, which ended up on “Beat of Your Drum.” So it was those four electrics and the Breedlove acoustic.

I’m always hesitant to discuss non-tube amps, but I really like the Yamaha THR100H [modeling amp], and I’ve found that I can use it in a number of ways. And it weighs about 10 pounds, which is always handy. I ran one side of it like it was a Fender Deluxe, and the other side like it was a Hiwatt.

My effects chain was basically what I use live with my band, the Imaginary Friends: an Ibanez Weeping Demon Wah, a Source Audio Multiwave Distortion, a modified Boss GE-7 EQ, an MXR Phase 90, an SIB Varidrive, a Line 6 M9, and then a Barefoot Pale Green Compressor and a Meris Ottobit Jr. pedal. Oh, and there was also the Alexander Syntax Error and a Korg Kaoss Pad. That’s it for pedals on the floor, but I also used the Line 6 Helix for recording direct.

You mentioned cutting acoustic guitars with David before. Nobody really talks about him as a guitarist. What kind of player was he?

David never identified himself as a guitarist, but he was quite good. For him, the guitar was a tool. I always liked for him to track an acoustic rhythm part, because he had a certain feel and a lope to his playing. When you see old pictures of him as David Jones the folk singer, or when he did “Space Oddity,” he was a 12-string guy. He’s one of the few people I ever knew who could tune a 12-string. [laughs]

Barre chords weren’t his thing. When you think about the chord voicings on “Space Oddity,” where he’s playing a sliding E form but he’s letting the open E and B strings ring out, that’s a byproduct of discomfort with playing barre chords. But it became a stylistic thing that worked for him.

David always picked such distinctive guitarists to work with. Did he ever tell you what he liked about your playing and why he chose you?

This is interesting. I met David during his Glass Spider tour. My ex-wife, Sara, was doing press for the tour, so I hung around backstage a lot and talked to him. He didn’t even know I played guitar, and I never told him. He just thought that I knew a lot about music and art. But Sara gave him a tape of my band, and he listened to it. So one day I’m at home and he called me. I thought it was a practical joke, and I said, “All right, who the fuck is this?” And he goes, “It’s David. Sara gave me the tape, and you sound like the guy I’ve been looking for. Why didn’t you tell me you play guitar?”

So I flew to Switzerland and went right to the studio with him. The first thing we did was work on the remake of “Look Back in Anger.” He said, “I need you to do stuff on the beginning and end, and then play guitar through the song.” And I said, “Well, what are you thinking?” And he goes, “This should be like German gothic cathedrals.” And I said, “All right…”

So I guess that was my audition with him. I went to stay at his house in Switzerland. I ended up being there for a month, but I remember at the end of the first week, I said, “Why am I here?” Because it wasn’t really clear what we were doing. And he laughed and said, “Basically, I need somebody that can do a combination of Beck, Hendrix, Belew and Fripp, with a little Stevie Ray Vaughan and Albert King thrown in. Then, when I’m not singing, you take the ball and do something with it, and when you hand the ball back to me, it might not even be the same ball.”

And you were like, “I can do that.”

More or less. [laughs] That was the start of it.

Buy David Bowie: Loving the Alien (1983–1988) here.

Reverend has teamed up with guitar ace Greg Koch to create the new Greg Koch Gristle 90 guitar.

Koch's second signature Reverend – following the Greg Koch Gristlemaster – the Gristle 90 features a chambered korina body, three-piece korina neck, and an ebony fingerboard with a 12-inch radius.

Instead of the Gristlemaster's Tele-style pickup layout though, the Gristle 90 features a pair of Fishman P-90s, controlled by volume and tone barrel knobs, a Fishman midrange boost, and three-way selector and push-pull phase switches.

Other features on the guitar include a boneite nut, Reverend Pin-Lock tuners, a dual-action truss rod that's accessible via the guitar's headstock, and a Bigsby B50 tremolo system with a roller bridge.

The Reverend Greg Koch Gristle 90 guitar is available now – in Venetian Gold, Bradford Beach Blue, and Midnight Black finishes – for $2,159. It comes less than a week after Reverend's announcement of its Crosscut and Crosscut W guitars.

For more info on the guitar, stop by reverendguitars.com.

Reverend has unveiled its new Crosscut and Crosscut W electric guitars.

Both guitars feature korina bodies, roasted maple necks, pin-lock tuners, dual-action truss rods, boneite nuts, and initialed and serial-numbered headstocks.

Sounds on both models come by way of a pair of custom hybrid Railhammer Cleancut pickups, which aim to pack the punch of P90s, while staying a bit leaner and hum-free overall.

The difference in the guitars' names stems from the their bridges – the Crosscut features a string-through-body hardtail bridge, while the Crosscut W sports a Wilkinson tremolo system.

The Crosscut is available in Natural, Italian Purple, and Oceanside Green finishes, while the Crosscut W is offered in Metallic Red Burst, Midnight Black, and Chronic Blue finishes.

The Reverend Crosscut and Crosscut W guitars are available now, though no price for the guitars has been revealed as of press time.

For more info on the guitars, stop by reverendguitars.com.

Reverend has unveiled its new Six Gun HPP electric guitar.

The Six Gun HPP is highlighted by its unique pickup combination, a bridge humbucker plus a pair of P-90s. Reverend says that the humbucker produces tougher, more aggressive sounds while the P-90s err toward cleaner tones. With the guitar's five-way switch, players can mix and match between the three as they please. A bass-contour control knob, for further tweaking, comes aboard the guitar as well.

Offered in four finishes, the Six Gun HPP features either a Pau Ferro fingerboard (with the Coffee Burst and Chronic Blue finishes) or a roasted maple fingerboard (with the Avocado Burst and Midnight Black finishes).  

Like its Reverend brethren, the guitar also boasts a korina body and roasted maple neck. 

Other familiar Reverend features include the guitar's Wilkinson WVS50 IIK tremolo, Pin-Lock tuners, Boneite nut, and dual action truss rod.

The Reverend Six Gun HPP is available now. UK retailers have listed the model at £879, (~$1,200), though we'll update this story when we hear of the model's official U.S. price.

For more info on the guitar, stop by reverendguitars.com.

Reverend Guitars has teamed up with session veteran Gil Parris for a new signature guitar, the Gil Parris GPS.

The guitar – Reverend's first-ever Strat-style model – is built with a Korina body, Medium Oval neck profile, a heat-treated roasted maple neck with a 25.5" scale, and a friction-reducing Bonetite nut.

Sounds on the guitar come by way of a trio of Fishman Fluence Single Width pickups. These offer two separate voicings – "vintage sweetness and clarity" or a "more muscular overwound punch" – via a push-pull toggle on the bridge tone knob.

Other features on the guitar include Reverend's pin-lock tuners and a Wilkinson WVS50K tremolo. 

The Reverend Gil Parris GPS guitar is available now – in a Midnight Black finish – for $1,919.

For more info on the guitar, stop by reverendguitars.com.

Reverend has unveiled its new Pete Anderson Signature PA-1 RB guitar.

The company's latest collaboration with the veteran session guitarist is a hollowbody highlighted by a pair of Reverend's new Retroblast mini-humbuckers. It's built with laminated maple back and sides, a laminated spruce top, a medium oval three-piece korina neck and a 22-fret blackwood tek fingerboard.

A Bigsby B-70 with a Roller bridge, “R” embossed knobs, a back sprayed and logoed pickguard, and a 15th fret neck/body joint also come standard, in addition to Reverend’s Uni-Brace, which aims to eliminate typical hollowbody feedback issues while increasing durability, clarity and sustain.

Of course, like all of its Reverend brethren, the guitar also includes a Boneite nut and locking tuners, Reverend’s Bass Contour Control and a dual-action truss rod.

The Reverend Pete Anderson Signature PA-1 RB guitar is available now - in Satin Emerald Green and Satin Mulberry Mist finishes - for $1,799.

For more info on the guitar, head on over to reverendguitars.com.

Reverend has debuted its new Ron Asheton Signature Jetstream 390 guitar.

The new guitar - modeled after the Jetstream 390 the hugely influential guitar legend rocked with The Stooges during their mid-oughts reunion - features a korina body, a medium oval roasted maple neck and a 22-fret pau ferro fingerboard.

A trio of Reverend 9A5 P-90-style pickups and a Wilkinson WVS50 IIK tremolo also come standard, in addition to a lightning bolt trio decal on the upper horn. 

Like all of its Reverend brethren, the guitar also features a Boneite nut and locking tuners, the company's Bass Contour Control and a dual-action truss rod.

The Reverend Ron Asheton Signature Jetstream 390 is available now - in Asheton's favorite Rock Orange finish - for $1,329.

For more info on the guitar, stop by reverendguitars.com.