When Joel wrote me and told me that he just spoke to a rep at G&L Guitars
and was getting a free bass sent to him in the mail as part of a sponsorship
agreement, my jaw dropped and two questions came to mind. First one
was, “How the fuck did he do that?” And the second one was, “How good are
these basses, that they are giving one to a member of a band that just got
revived after a 14 year hiatus, that not a whole lot of people know about?” As I
was pondering these questions, Joel fired off another email asking me if I wanted
in on the deal. My answer was of course, “Si!” Those two questions faded
quickly (but came back later) once Joel put in touch with the rep. Before I knew it
I was on the G&L website looking at the Tribute series (import series) guitars and
spotted the ASAT Classic Bluesboy semi-hollow in clear orange. I went with this
model because I didn’t have a semi-hollow guitar, didn’t have a guitar with this
pickup configuration, and I always liked that color orange on a guitar.
The guitar was delivered to my apartment on my birthday, which was awesome!
My wife (Celia) and I giggled with excitement, when I opened the box. She was
even impressed with just the overall appearance of the guitar. It was shiny, slick
and very orange. Leading up to this moment I was skeptical about G&L Guitars.
And that only came from the fact that my mind, like many other musicians,
was branded with the Fender Guitar Company as being one of the two best
guitar companies in the world (Gibson being the other). I own an import Fender
Telecaster, but I had never played a G&L guitar before. Well, that’s not true. I
played one in a pawnshop in Bristol, TN that was so banged up, that I just hung it
back on the wall. For those of you who are new to G&L, Leo Fender (the founder
of Fender) put the L in G&L. For all that history, go to www.gandlguitars.com.
So back to the open box on my birthday-I picked up the guitar, tuned it and
played around with it unplugged and was amazed at the quality and feel of the
guitar right out of the box.
After working as a guitar tech at Russo Music in Asbury Park, NJ for the last
year, I can tell you that not every import line guitar plays that well right out of
the box. Every guitar ever, from a $3,000 guitar to a $300 guitar needs a little
adjustment…some more than others. The G&L Tribute series are constructed in
Indonesia in the Cort Guitar factory. Cort Guitars are cheaply made instruments
based on Gibson and Fender designs and sold at beginner guitar prices. Hell
they even make a Gene Simmons bass. To be fair to Cort, I haven’t played one
of their instruments since browsing Caruso’s Music in Brookhaven off of 352
with my old guitar teacher. So I don’t know what they are doing in Indonesia to
make this G&L Tribute series play the way they do, but something really great
is happening. As I understand it, the G&L guitars and basses are constructed
in Indonesia, and then shipped to Fullerton, CA where they are wired with
electronics and receive final inspection.
Ok so let’s get technical and geeky about the instruments.
Joel’s bass is made from Basswood, which is a really light wood in weight
and color. Basswood (bass pronounced like the fish, not the instrument) is an
alternative to alder which is another light wood that Leo Fender used in Fender
Basses and which is still being used. Because it is not as dense as alder and
maple, instruments made from basswood tend to be mid-rangier. It is wired with
active pickups and gets pretty loud. There are more knobs to dial in different
tones then I would ever know what to do with, but that also makes the bass pretty
versatile sound wise. The bass’s neck came nice and straight and the action set
up pretty low. Especially up on the higher frets where Joel plays a lot of great
melodic bass lines.
My orange guitar is made from swamp ash in the Telecaster body shape. It’s
a semi-hollow guitar, which means that the body is 1/3 solid and 2/3’s hollow.
The side with the f-hole and the side with the knobs are hollow, and the center
(where the strings are) is solid. You might be wondering where swamp ash
comes from. It’s not from any swamp, anywhere. Swamp ash is another name
for black ash, which is a weird name that some one came up with for ash that
was not suited for furniture manufactures. The only hint of swamp in this type of
ash comes from the fact that some ash trees that happen to grow near more wet
environments (in the northeast and Canada) soak up more moisture which in turn
makes for bigger capillaries (think veins) in the wood. When these trees are cut,
milled and dried, the bigger capillaries prevent the cellular structure (or meat) of
the wood from becoming dense, making for lighter more resonant wood. Let’s
think about it like Mac 'n’ cheese. If you melt a block or bag (shredded) of cheese
and let it cool, you’ll end up with the cheese taking on the shape of the pot.
Same cheese, different shape. If you take that same cheese and chop/spread
it over a dish of macaroni, and bake in a preheated oven at 350 degrees for 30
minutes and allow 1 hour to cool, that cheese will be way less dense because it
had all these hollow shapes to melt and recongeal around. That’s how swamp
ash is made. While we’re making shit up, can we call it gator ash since it really
has nothing to do with a swamp?
In the end, these G&L Tribute import guitars play just as good as any Fender
import (made in Mexico) guitar. Leo Fender is the man behind both companies
and they are both holding up his standards for building and sound. I’m psyched
to have this guitar! In fact, this guitar is a factory-modded version of Leo’s final
word on the traditional single-cutaway bolt-on guitar. It’s going to be a great live
guitar and I can’t wait to get back in the studio with this one.
Thanks again to G&L Guitars for the instruments. See you all in Florida!
