Episode 14: High Gain Doc, Travel Nightmares & New Gear Days

We are laughing. We're back to laughing.

Are we laughing?

I mean, I think we're laughing. Okay.

Aren't we laughing? You know what? We can go ahead and laugh. It's okay to laugh sometimes.

That's not very funny.

No. Sorry. What a bummer of the start of an episode of a podcast. I'm just kidding, guys. How you doing? Welcome to another episode of the Riffs, Beards, and Gear podcast. I'm your host, Fluff. I'm your pal Mike. And it's been a minute. We've been very, very busy. You've been gone, mister, which we will talk about here shortly.

Um, lots of goings-ons. I'm back with the beard again. You are back with the beard again.

People who are mad about me not having a beard on the Riffs, Beards and Gear channel.

Which is weird because like I think anybody should be allowed to have any facial hair they want. Or lack of. I except for except for certain 1930s men's styles. Um how are you gonna like grow it out again to the homeless mic?

No, it's just homeless mics.

Well you have individual looks. You have mad men mic, you have the clean, yeah, like the sharp dressed man mic, you have can I can you spare a quarter mic? Right. You have um, you know, do you want paper or plastic mic? A couple other I can I can keep going. Because before it got really like you let that thing.

Pretty substantial. It was very substantial.

I ne that was the biggest my beard ever got. I've never had a bigger beard than that.

Okay, I was gonna say I've never seen you with with with it that long.

I mean, it's fall. It is fall. It's time to hibernate. It's time to grow a beard in Seattle.

Sure. It's it's kind of people don't like other people to talk about it, but um there is a kind of a mandatory thing you have to do in the Northwest.

You grow a beard, you wear flannel, you wear some kind of boots, whether it's those slip-on Australian things that I wear, or whatever they're called.

Or Doc Martin's.

Or docks. Yeah. I celebrate all of them.

So do I.

What is the other one? What is the other company that uh they they have stores kind of like vans that are and they're always in the strip malls and they're really expensive. What are those boots? I used to have a pair.

Not buckle. Um outdoors.

No, they're nice. They're like $400 boots.

Oh, I don't know. I don't shop in those places.

There's a mall down south of you, just a south of you, near Olympia, whenever those big strip mall areas. Oh, uh, you know, what uh the name escapes me.

I know exactly what you're talking about. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

This is this is why I should have afternoon coffee. Yeah, absolutely. Or an energy drink.

Afternoon coffee sounds great right now. Um I want to talk about history of High Game that has come out. So uh in case you guys don't know or haven't seen uh Mike and I have been working on I call it a documentary. I call it a docuseries. It's a three-part documentary. Mini doc. Mini doc. That's appropriate.

Um that we made in conjun in conjunction with our friends over at Sweetwater. And we worked on it for I mean, I wrote it and you worked on it for a long time, a honing it.

Long time honing it in.

Yeah, so when you write one of these things, it's difficult because you have to you kind of have to decide what goes and what stays, and you have to set boundaries for yourself. So uh I want to talk a little bit about that. Otherwise, it would be six hours long. Of course. So you have to leave some stuff out that's not relevant to the story you're trying to tell.

But Sweetwater was basically like come over here and and and let's let's do that big swing idea. Right. Screw it. Uh, anyone else you want to come play? And we were like, Jared James Nichols. Yeah. And he was like, Yeah, cool, I'll do it, man. Hell yeah, I'll drive right up. He drove right up and did it.

And I think he was kind of shocked at like what we asked him or what we asked of him, because it wasn't a ton, but I was just like, listen, man, I just want you to show up and rip guitar. And he was like, That's it? Okay. I I do that every day. Yeah. Right. Do you want me to can I lift can I lift patterns over my head?

Will you do it on this strat? Will you do it on this pink Jackson? Dude. Yes. Like all those things were fun.

Those were that was so much fun. Uh, I saw a couple of comments going, well, technically fuzz isn't gain or something, or so.

And that's my friend Adam at satellite had some things to say about it.

Well, there were other comments too that I got. Um, but particularly I did see, you know, fuzz isn't gain. Well, yeah, absolutely it's not. But they didn't know that in the context of the times, right? Everything was in context of the in the 60s, all you all they knew and all that was really widely kind of understood from the player's point of view was if I turn it up, it sounds the same as when I put on this fuzz pedal to some extent.

And it was the history of high gain.

Yeah, and I thought a lot I saw a lot of people like that's not considered high gain. I don't know what makes the authority like my point was I should have called it history of rock guitar sounds or something. Or the history of distortion or yeah, or history, yeah, history of not clean that doesn't have the same ring as history of high gain.

Right. Much like, I mean, by the time this comes out, episode three will have come out, but I know I'm gonna get comments about the overdrive, the you know, level all the way up, gain all the way down on a Maxon or a tube screamer into an already gained out amp. Of course, there was people doing that prior to Machine Heads Burn My Eyes.

Was it documented scientifically before that? No.

Wasn't that the way that uh most of the 80s LA guitarists were getting their lead sound?

Nope. What did Warren? Well, most of them, the difference is that most of them didn't have the gain all the way down and the level up. Oh they were having like boost a little gain. Yeah, like Zach Wilde had everything all the way up on his SD1. The one thing I did find after we shot that though, when I got into my, you know, I've been on it like a rat kick, Warren D Martini and Robin Crosby.

Um, Warren D Martini is the first and earliest documented that I can find from a reliable source in an interview that he gave um at the time in 1984 for his solos in uh for uh Wanted Man or For the first Rat Record. Round and Round All of the lead tones were a Fender SD one with the gain all the way down, level all the way up into a fender champ.

Into a fender champ. Yeah. That was the first documented case of gain all the way down, level all the way up. Does that mean he was the first to ever do it? Absolutely not. I'm sure people were doing it in the 70s too. But for the sake of a video, when you're trying to present this thing, yes, it had a resurgence officially in the late 90s, early 2000s with the tube screamer and all the metal core bands suddenly started doing it and ended up finding that genre, which is why I waited to include it in the late 90s.

It all boils down to how much story can you tell in nine minutes.

And it's really difficult to boil it down to any amount. Um, for example, yes, fuzz pedals were around in 19, you know, the fuzz tone was around in 1964. That was so far from widely available, it was only available in the best music stores that someone like Keith Richards would have. Or, I found out afterwards, the fuzz tone was chosen because it was advertised as sounding like a trumpet.

Right. And it was the keyboardist who went into the store and grabbed the pedal because it roughly the wedge shape was roughly the shape of a horn. The the Right. That's a fact. Now, did I have could I really truncate that into the context of the story? No. So I just left it out.

Did I ever talk about that weird Vox effect that I had? It was the same thing. It was made for horn players. It actually came with a trumpet mouthpiece that had a microphone in it. Yeah. And what is this? It was basically an a fuzz octave splitter. Oh, yeah. And you would play, you know, you were supposed to play your trumpet into it, and the the microphone cable that came off of the mouthpiece was a quarter inch, so I plugged a guitar into it, and it sounded sick.

And, you know, you plug this thing in, and there was like trombone, tuba, you know, like different octaves and whatever. It was pretty wild. But that was what they were going for back then. They were trying to emulate horn section because popular music had horns.

Yes, it did. I would love to do another series of just pedals because the the pedal thing is so fascinating. I would love to get like Josh Scott to come and do it with us again at Sweetwater or something like that, because it's really interesting because you see petals kind of come from there, you know.

You ever see those Dan Armstrong modular square things you just plugged right into your guitar and then it had a jack? Oh, yeah, or the electroharmonics LPB1 squeeze, orange squeeze, electroharmonics LPB1. They were still trying to figure all this shit out at the time. Right. Yeah, okay, I'm gonna plug this box into my into my guitar, and then the cable's gonna come out of that.

Well, that's not really practical, so let's put it in a pedal form on the floor, and the form factor wasn't even hashed out yet. But what you see is basically as soon as they come up with the pedal form, then it's the gate just the flood, the floodgates just open.

Didn't a range master sit on top of the amp?

That was in episode two. I did make sure to say that was not a pedal, although that is pretty much the first widely used boost because yes, it was a trouble booster, but boosting the trouble frequencies effectively acted as an overdrive in front of those old amps. Well interesting stuff.

There's a yeah, it's a dense mystery you can go down a rabbit hole.

Right. And I did researching and writing that thing.

Well, and hopefully what the series will do is someone will pick up on one aspect that that is touched on and go down that rabbit hole. Exactly.

Well, yeah, that and also like I wanted people to know where all this shit came from because we didn't wake up and go, I think I'm gonna I'm gonna re I'm gonna create an overdrive pedal uh and put it in front of uh well, let's let's invent a Marshall 800. Like everything was an evolution of itself.

Right, of course.

And it's cool to kind of know that, like, oh, this super high game universal audio anti pedal, well, it gets it has its roots in uh a fucking carjack falling through a speaker in 1951 at Sun Studios, which is funny. That's crazy to me. Right. Like, I love that stuff.

Oh, how funny and so you were on tour? So you were joking. The day that the series episode one debuted, I was in Memphis at Sun Studio.

Just happened to be.

In the room where that song was tracked. That is so funny. I got to go in the control room, which is a kind of a backstage sort of extra benefit. Um, because I had a uh a friend, uh, my friend Aaron lives there in Memphis, and his buddy gave us the tour. And love to go there. We hung out afterwards. You can you can rent, you can rent that room in the studio still, yeah?

Okay.

Um it's wild just to be in that room. How much yeah, it is. So much history has gone down there.

Yeah.

It is intense.

I would love to know. I mean, I would be the guy asking all sorts of nerdy technical stuff like is this the original console that was in here? No. I didn't think so. Of course, they've probably upgraded stuff.

Uh they have gone back and gotten a bunch of era period correct. Yeah, period correct stuff, which uh, you know, still operates but is in varying, you know, it's that old stuff requires a lot of maintenance. So I think it's a double overtime job to be the studio manager there.

Sure. I imagine so. Also imagine the heat that kicks out of that control room from tubes and stuff.

Looking out of the control room uh window onto the tracking room, the hair on my arms the whole time I was in there was standing on end. It was just like, oh my god, so much history has been made here. Elvis, Johnny Cash, Jerry Lee Luz.

Yeah. I mean, to start, Little Richard.

Uh I mean who wrote uh shoes?

Um Was it little Richard?

No. Uh this is why I need coffee.

Anyway. I mean, everybody in the 50s was recording at Sun, basically.

A lot of folks.

A lot of folks recorded there.

So you know, shout out to Sweetwater for letting us do what we wanted to do. Um I got to edit the whole thing as I wanted to do. I got to do all the graphics that I wanted to do.

And you taught yourself a bunch of new skills to make that happen too.

Yeah, I learned After Effects in the span of two weeks in order to execute the little animation stuff. I had no idea how to do that when I pitched it to them.

It's really cool.

Not thinking they would go, sure, let's do that. I was like, oh shit. Now I gotta learn how to do it. No, no one from Sweetwater listens to the or watches this podcast, so I can say that out loud. But I wrote a check that my ass probably couldn't cash, and I was like, oh God. So on the flight home, I'm like watching tutorials on like how to do stuff.

I'm like, okay, here we go. But uh yeah, bless you two for teaching me new skills.

That was my first visit to Sweetwater, also.

What did you think overall?

It is a wild place. I like you had described it, and I had heard other people describe it. It is uh an oasis in An oasis is an appropriate term. It is an oasis. Um There's not a lot out there. If you were five miles over on another road, just cruising, there'd be you would have no idea that a place like that you could drive right past it, yeah.

And you know, just be oblivious. Let's talk. It's so high tech in there. There's I mean, they have the racquetball court, obviously we did the reverb thing in there, um to you know, the state-of-the-art studios in there. Yes. Video uh video splaces, video uh studios, a massive area where all of their agents are working, all the representatives.

What did you think of the quality of their coffee?

Oh, the coffee was pretty good.

Most of my most of my friends think the coffee is like uh like uh the resider guys are are just like every time we stop there we have to get a coffee. Oh, the coffee's so good there. I mean, I'm a coffee dick.

Yeah, you are so it was good. I'll I mean I'll drink cowboy coffee out of a skunk's asshole if if that's what's available. Sure. But also I have you know, I'm a snotty brat about coffee.

Can we talk about how wonderful of a journey it was getting to Sweetwater? So some time has passed since this happened, but I forgot about what fun that was. Let me paint a picture for the listener and viewer at home.

Dig if you will a picture.

Dig if you will a picture. So hey, Mike, let's go to Sweetwater and we're gonna bring my father along with us. Yeah. So it's the three stooges. Team. Yep, we are on a plane, we're going, and we're we're having a great time. We're having a great time. And we're getting closer and closer. So we we're flying into Chicago with a connecting flight, then from Chicago to Fort Wayne is the current plan.

Pilot comes on the overhead. Pilot comes on the overhead, and he's like, hey, listen, Chicago's having really severe storms right now. We're gonna circle. We're just gonna hang out. We have plenty of fuel, don't worry. So we proceed about we're about 30 minutes outside of Chicago to the west. And I have a screenshot of our of my flighty app.

It's us doing circles outside of fucking Chicago, just banking, banking, and then we would straighten out for a couple minutes, and then we would bank some more. And then it was this for what I think was an hour, hour and a half. It was a long time. Just going in fucking circles. Yeah. And I swear to I was getting so carsick because everyone around me had their windows down, so you couldn't even look out to get some sort of perspective.

And then they were like, all right, you know, if we have to do this for much longer, we're just gonna fly into Minneapolis. Right. And so we immediately were like, oh, is there a flight from Minneapolis to Fort Wayne? There is not. There is not. That's the answer. So do uh we're like like let's rent a car.

And there was no car in Minneapolis.

No car. So we finally he we we finally hear the captain come on and say, we're gonna land in Chicago.

Woo!

Great. Now we had previously a three-hour layover in Chicago before we went to Fort Wayne. Now the flight to Fort Wayne from Chicago is maybe 30 minutes. We we land in Chicago and we are running. Book. We are running like the scene in Home Alone. We are running our asses off to get to our connecting flight because it is on the same terminal strip and it's like 10 gates down.

And we are running, and I'm ahead of Mike and my dad, and I go, wait, wait, wait, and she closes the door and then does this. Sorry.

Not even my first time this happening in Chicago.

As we're running up, they close the goddamn door and they said, sorry, door doesn't open back up. And I and I know that from my Boeing background and stuff. So I'm like, okay, great. So then we have who I assume is the most helpful employee for uh Horizon. Or no, it was uh it was a connecting fight with um Delta and uh whether it's the Alaska.

No, but the connecting fight.

You're talking about going home right now. On our way there? Oh there was no idea.

We'll get to going home.

Yeah, you're getting you're gonna you're getting our trips confused. Also, spoiler alert, it happened both ways. Yeah. On the way there, we were like, Shaiza, what do we do? We can get a flight.

And then they canceled the connecting. And then we were like get a car. So it gets it gets I mean, that's right. Our flight got delayed twice. Yeah. And then it finally got canceled. Well, they still have our bags, so we're trying to find our bags. So then we tell them, hey, we want our bags back. Right.

Cool. Well, it's up to three hour wait to get your bags.

So we go grab the rental.

So we go and grab a we do get a rental car. I call Sweetwater. Now, bless Sweetwater. They were like, listen, whatever you need to do to get the fuck out of there, do it. And get here. And get here, do it. Well, because you know, because these things cost money, like right now.

Like a rental car. Rental means money.

Yeah. So I'm having like, listen, we're gonna, the only cars available are the sedans for you know eighteen hundred dollars for the week. Right. And sweet water, I'm on the horn with sweet water, and they're like, we don't care, whatever it takes, just get here safely and get here on time. Okay, so we rent a car, we go and get something to eat, get some snacks, and then we go and get our bags.

Because we have to leave the airport because we have three hours to kill to get our fucking bags.

But uh, so we wait that we beat the rush for rental cars.

Yes, we did.

We get over there, we got back, and our bags were there. They sure were. So they came a little bit earlier.

They did.

But then what was the drive? The drive was another two and a half hours. It was a long ass drive.

So we drive all the way there. So we drive all the way All the way to Fort Wayne. It's flying. We stop for snacks. I get some look rich. Locator aid. Get some Swedish fish. We finally get in at about 11 o'clock that night because we have to start filming at 9 a.m. the next morning. Yeah. We film. Everything goes off without a hitch.

Shout out to Sweetwater. When we do the whole setup. We do the whole setup. So we're we're tired. Yeah. I'm also jet-legged at this point because three hours doesn't sound like a big difference. It's a pretty big difference when you start filming at what is 6 a.m. your normal local time. But what we end up doing was that first day, we set up the wall.

There's a there's a time lapse on my Instagram. We set up the wall, and then we bang out all the dialogue. Let's talk about that.

Because you hadn't used a teleprompter before, right? No. Uh-uh. And so all of the dialogue that you wrote was written not.

Not to say out loud.

Well, that's the best way I can describe it. Totally. But at the time you were like, well, this, you know, you're writing a story. Yes. There are two different elements, right? They're two different deliveries. And that's right. They translate sort of differently. So we were also in real-time editing.

Well, I was struggling hard, and this guy was like, hang on, let's stop. Let me get in here and let's kind of reword this. So it feels more natural. And I'm I'm trying to do everything myself because I'm so used to doing everything myself. But to your credit, you're like, hang on, let's let's go get a snack, let's take a five, and let's just go through this.

And if something's hard to to say, then we're just gonna stop and rewrite it right there. And then you'll rip it.

If it doesn't flow, it doesn't flow.

So we do that, and that's when things really started cooking. And we rip the whole, all the talking parts that first fucking day. Right. We are insane insane. And set up. We are absolutely insane. Well, I think we were trying to in like it was so tough to seemingly get there. We're just like, let's just do it now.

That was so tough. But it it was rad. It was so rad. It was so tough. And when I'm when I was editing the episodes, I was just like looking at myself, like, dude, go get some sleep.

Also, let's back up for a second. Because and I'm not trying to fucking toot our own horns or or whatever. But you know, those guys have this amazing facility. It's this beautiful studio. You can see it in the video, you can see it well documented on their socials. But we weren't allotted like their video production team.

No. So the part of the part of the reason why we were able to go over there and do that is because we brought our cameras. Right. We brought our cameras, and I was gonna edit. They provided some lights and we set up everything ourselves with with the help of Jason. Learned how to use the teleprompter.

Learned how to use the teleprompter in real time. Downloading the software in real time and going, I don't know how the hell to use this. Let's figure it out. We watched one tutorial. And then we ripped it. That was it. So then because the goal was if we could get that done the first day, then we would have the entire rest of the week to film the different guitar tones and all the things we needed to for the cut shots at the end of each segment.

It was a huge confidence builder for doing mobile stuff from my perspective.

Yeah.

You know.

Yeah. Well, I mean, it was it was cashing that check that our asses wrote. Like, because the whole time, real talk, I was like, oh god, how's this gonna go?

What a cool, like I I I reserve a small place inside of myself to be skeptical of whoever's in first place. Sure. Including the Seahawks, who I love. Sure. Uh and sweetwater, in my mind, is in first place in that in that world. Without question. Like, they're like a Patriots level, uh, you know, uh the aughts and uh and teens, Patriots level, first place.

And uh but I got there, and man, it's easy to love.

Well, and also to their credit, they don't normally have someone come in and they just let run the show. That was a first for them as well. And but I've been there so many times and have done so many things with them. I was just like, listen, I have this idea for this big swing, and they were so supportive and so commandeering that or commandeering that it was just uh what a great experience.

Stressful, but wow, we drank a lot of coffee.

We did drink a lot of coffee. I also got to, you know, they have a whole cafeteria there. The food's pretty good. Pretty good. They have uh a bunch of delicious yum yums, baked stuff, they sure do. Um, but they have, of course, the retail store there. Which is a dangerous, dangerous place. Super dangerous, yeah.

Stranger danger. And I found a piece of like gear that I have been waiting to find. You know, it's in my saved searches on all the platforms, and it will seem like a funny pedestrian piece of gear, but the boss ME3, I picked one up when I was there, a used one, because I have a used store there.

And they made you a great deal on it.

They made a very good deal. Thank you very much.

Yeah, shout out to uh to the used store, to the gear exchange store guys that are just hanging out there. How cool those guys, every time I come in, they go, What's up, dude?

You're gonna spend some money, are you? Anything you want to look at?

I'm like, no, shut up. No, I don't want to look in.

You can put it on your card. Yeah.

I have your card right here. I have it pulled up. I can you have enough to cover it. No, do you sure you don't want to look at this last part? No. Maybe just let me steal this ball real quick.

This one over here you have in your uh in your bag. Yeah. In your shopping bag. God, what a cool place that is, though.

Yeah. Uh what about going home? So, so we filmed this whole thing. We have the car, we're going home. It's time to go now.

We're celebrating, we're patting ourselves on the back. You're like, I have to edit this now.

Oh, dude, I'm freaking out. I'm literally, I'm like, oh God. Mike is already changed channels because he has to immediately basically we fly in, and then you have to fly back out to tour.

I'm supposed to go to a wedding that night, the next day, have my girlfriend's birthday, and then leave on tour the day after that.

So we we are at Fort Wayne, we turn the car in, and we're gonna take a connecting flight back home the way we were supposed to come, and we take, we're supposed to take the flight to Chicago and Chicago home. And right away our flight is delayed.

unknown What?

Our flight coming, the the plane coming in to get us at Fort Wayne is like two hours late. And then not taking off. And then not taking off. It sits there for like an hour.

We're like, would have been cool to drive back. We would have made our flight.

We would have made our flight. So we make it to Chicago, and we have ten minutes before shove off. We are running home alone style to the terminal, as I already said, and they close the door as I'm like, hey, hey, hey, wait, wait, wait. Close. Gives a little wave and says sorry. Yeah. Door doesn't open back up.

So was it the horizon? Who was the partner? Was it the American? American Airlines, right?

I think it was American.

The partner, so it was so for the bulk of at home, it's Alaska. Shout out to Alaska. We'll get to them in just a second. They took care of us. But then the puddle jumper from Chicago to Fort Wayne and Fort Wayne to Chicago was operated by their partner in America American Airlines. Whatever it was, yeah.

Yeah. This lady was so She was like, nah. She was She was like, well, that's not my problem.

And I was like Basically. I mean, those weren't her words, but she was like, Well, you didn't book this through Americans, so I can't I can't re- I don't have any access to their clients.

And I'm like, Really? Yeah, but She's like, Well, I would just wait, I would just wait till till you get some hear an email or get some kind of a notification for your flight home. And we're like, but we don't have a we need a replacement flight. She goes, I'll just wait until you hear something.

Yeah.

What? What the fuck? Now. So we go to Alaska, and Alaska is so helpful and is so nice. That lady stopped what she was doing to help the three of us. We ended up having to take two different flights. They couldn't get us three seats. We had to take two different flights. Did you go before us or after us?

You went right after us, didn't you? Uh no, like an hour after. Yeah. I four went. So dad and I went home because they only had two seats on that flight. Yeah. So dad and I went home, and then you went an hour after. Yeah. That sucked. And then well, ironically, it was uh, you know, Dave Friedman who was like, no, you just gotta fly into Detroit and then drive into Sweetwater.

That's the only way to do it. Right. And where I was like, noted, Dave. Noted.

Uh, and funny enough, there was a bunch of bag shenanigans, and by the time you landed and got your bag, I was in line to get my bag from special baggage crap, and you had just gotten in your car.

Yeah, dude. Oh, yeah. So I we show up, dad and I show up, and he goes, So we go out and we're like, oh, nothing. Our baggage didn't show up. Our baggage showed up way before we ever did.

Our bags made the flight.

How is that even possible?

I don't know. Our bags made the flight. And the guy goes, Oh yeah, I can see they're here. Um, you're gonna have to go ask Alaska. I gotta take my lunch. I was like, American sucks, dude. American Airlines sucks. All the dicks. I hate them.

I don't like it.

I just cannot. I've never flown Allah uh American. I haven't flown American in 25 years.

They're friends with who, Delta or Alaska. Are they friends with Alaska?

But before that, they were just on their own.

Now that I'm back on the West Coast, um Alaska and Delta are my favorites. Right. When I was in New York, it was Delta or United. Strangely.

I used to be a United guy.

Also, Virgin Atlantic was a really great airline to fly.

You're not getting me started on Virgin. They are so nice and cool.

It's great.

So nice you pay for it. Sure. But you know exactly where your money went the second you step on that flight. Yeah. I got to take. I got to take. Speaking of flights, um, I went over to the UK once and something got shifted around. I can't remember what it was. And I went over uh I was gonna do some work at the Marshall Factory.

Something happened and my flight got switched to a virgin. Oh, that's what you want. So I show up and I go to the kiosk and I say, hey, I th I see my thing is uh switched. I'm on a different flight now. Like, oh yeah, you're on virgin flight, blah blah blah. I went, cool. Hey, I have a question Is there any way I could upgrade to business class?

That's the And he went, in fact, there's actually we have uh an open one of the bed, one of the bed uh seats, um, but it's gonna be like $700. And we're talking for like a 12-hour flight. Did you do it?

And I wouldn't spend that much money on that.

Oh, I did. Yeah. I did. Because I just invoiced Marshall.

Hope they're not listening. Just kidding.

Just kidding. Well, I mean, this is a couple years ago now.

Uh I got to fly first class to Japan once. And were you playing?

unknown Yeah.

You were in Loaded? Yeah, yeah. I've never gone there as a tourist. Oh, okay. Um, yeah, I was playing with it was Loaded's first trip over there. We didn't pay for our tickets. We did like this arena tour with this big Japanese star named Jay, who was in a band called Lunacy. He's got that signature ESP Les Paul Jr.

bass. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And there was like straight up a buffet that you could engage through the entire flight, like a sushi buffet. It was wild. It was sick.

That's so cool.

But it was a it's a gnarly flight, also. You've been.

I have. Yeah. I have. One of the gnarliest. And it was comfortable, but like breakfast, lunch, dinner, sleep, and breakfast on the plane. Yeah. That flight was so long. That was the first time I ever had sea legs for like a week afterwards. Right. You just felt that that wobble.

That uh going to Australia is like that.

I've never been to Australia. I've always wanted to go.

I mean, I like Australia. I know Australia is really big for podcasts. So if you're Australian and listening, don't take this the wrong way. It's it's kind of a compliment. It's a back-handed compliment. Do you love San Diego?

I love San Diego.

Everywhere that you visit, everywhere that you would go as a musician in Australia is San Diego with that accent. Okay. That's it. Everyone's beautiful and exercising, and everywhere is a everything is a boardwalk and the weather is amazing in February because you know. Um, yeah. I was there for Soundwave also, and so my experience there was just like, whoa, are you kidding me?

Right, right.

You know?

Who else played uh that you were with Soundwave?

Oh, that would be your Metallica. Oh, your Slayer. Small bands. Your uh Anthrax. Was it a Big Four? Your Ghost. It was Big Four minus Megadeth. Wow. Um, one of the Mike Patton bands that is not Faith No More, Mr. Mongol. Not Tomahawk. What's the one? What's the one that he's got with um the guy from Jesus Lizard?

Oh.

I think it was that maybe? Okay. I think it could have been the one he's got with Buzz. Is that Tomahawk? Yeah. I don't know. Uh and Corey Taylor's other band, the band that Christian is in, and the bald guy, Stone Sour. So many bands, all the great bands.

Wow. Sounds like a damn good year to go.

Mindless Self-Indulgence, who I love.

Yeah, yeah.

They're the funniest.

Yes.

Yeah. And the rattles.

Alright. We've talked about our docuseries this entire time. I would like to talk about new gear acquisitions lately that we're stoked on.

Well, I got that ME3.

You got the ME3. I just got another Les Paul. Why do I feel weird for saying that? I feel ashamed. I feel a slight amount of shame. Well for getting my eighth Les Paul.

I mean, you like what you like.

Listen, the older I.

It was all horse trading. It was all trading. It was all horse trading. It's not like you're fucking swinging your dick around and like you went and traded a bunch of shit in.

Yeah, so shout out to Thunder Road and our friend Frank and Bender. I got an 81 Les Paul standard.

It's really killer.

It's so killer. It needs just a couple of little things. It's already been refretted. The finish is toast on it, and it's awesome. Needs a bridge. It's toast.

Well, it's it's not mint.

No, it's pretty far from mint. It's a six-foot guitar. Because all the photos make it look like it's clean. It's not clean at all. And the back's pretty scarred up, but in the best possible way. Yeah, me too. The next straight, it sustains forever. The bridge is corroded to hell and collapsing, and the pots, the original pots, are toast.

Not a big deal. And I knew that. Great. Someone put Grovers on it. But yeah, it's my eighth Les Paul. I have two here. And um here's the thing. I said I think I said this on another podcast. The older I get, and you do like what you like, I fucking love Les Paul's, well, Gibson's Les Pauls and RDs and Music Man guitars.

That's that's what I like. Right. Those suit me and my playing style and my tastes. And those are two completely different kinds of guitars. So in my mind, they're never competing for my artistic attention.

Right.

I always saw Music Man as the much more modern Fender. And you know, being a bolt-on-neck. And then the Gibsons as just that's it's just a Les Paul. It does not do what my stingrays do, and vice versa. Like they're two totally different mindsets and styles and scale links and construction and all that kind of stuff.

There's just there's a place for both of those at my house. And that's what I have. It's pretty hilarious. Loads of music bands, loads of Les Pauls and RDs.

Yeah, I've seen a lot of whatever the other things that you have slowly go away.

Um It's funny. Boiling it down. Um yeah, that's that's exactly it. Like you just get the things that you want to use. I don't know. I used to have a pretty eclectic collection, like you have a lot of cool stuff.

I have a strange collection of it.

You do have a strange collection. I used to have uh that same kind of swath of things. I used to have just everything, but I was only playing like three or four things out of that.

Right. Well, that's what we usually do anyway.

Right. So it's like shoes, right? Three, four pairs of shoes. That's what you some boots, and you're gonna yeah, exactly right. Special occasions, you'll get the third pair out, the boots, the hikes, or whatever it is, the sandals, the birken socks. I don't know, man. I just love a Les Paul. I love an old Les Paul.

Sure.

God, and yours is killer too.

Mine is pretty killer. I mean, you made a video about it.

And you know, I think that's kind of the what is yours? Uh I just saw a video of 74. I just saw uh a different video that I happened to come across uh about Norlin era Gibsons. Yeah. Um that was made just a couple of months ago. Hilariously, the guy uh towards the end of the video, because I'm watching this video, like trying to bone up on my Norlin stuff.

And uh Norland, for those of you who don't know, or who owned and made Gibsons from 68 to 86, 1986. And the guy was like, you know, and now we've seen a resurgence of uh players and YouTubers really uh embracing the Norland era stuff, and he shows a picture of me with my RD, and I was like, what? So weird.

Um but it was um correct me if I'm wrong, it was strings and things that were ordering the humbucker routed Les Paul's at that time. That's what he said. He said specifically it was strings and things that were making those special orders. Well, at the time, I think the strings and things are still around.

Legendary music store.

What is it a chain? No. Where were they?

Uh they're on the East Coast.

Wow, wild. East Coast, uh Chicago?

Wait, no, I don't remember where they're at.

So maybe that guitar has done some has some miles.

It probably does, yeah. So it was strings and things that were ordering the 59 spec Les Pauls in '74. Um, because keep in mind you can't couldn't get a humbucker equipped Les Paul standard. You could only get the customs with humbuckers at that time. Right. But it was strings and things that had all, you know, they had the giant uh dealer pole, as it were, so they were getting ibsen to do some of their craziest shit at the time.

Well, I don't know if that's true or not, but that's what he said. That's round. Because yours, Mike's is, for what we can surmise, it appears to be a factory humbucker guitar, which did exist in nineteen.

Yesterday was a momentous day for me.

It sure was. Tell us about it, though.

I I talked about my 78 Music Man Stingray on a previous episode, I'm pretty sure. I've used it in a couple well, in 1995 or six, five, I think, I bought a 78 Stingray from Rob Skinner at Loud Music in Fremont. Loud Music was like a tiny little it was a little bit bigger than this room. And it was crammed full of gear like Sanford and Sun style.

But the best gear. Was rad. I bought a lot of stuff from Rob over the years. I got it for 600 bucks. Really? I didn't know. Which was a lot of money for me.

Of course it was.

Then I could only like this is the part where we talked about, I think we were talking about how many guitars we have and what you asked me if there was ever a time when I only had one guitar. And at this time, I could only afford to have one guitar. Like I, you know.

Yeah.

So I had to sell that guitar to a friend of mine to get a or that bass to get a guitar to join this other band. I was gonna play guitar in a band. So my friend Doug says, I'll sell it back to you, you know, don't worry. And then he kind of falls in love with it. And that was 1997, probably January of 1997, that this went down.

Wow. Almost 30 years ago, exactly.

Yeah.

Over the years, I've tried to talk him into selling it back. I've borrowed it and given him like most recently when I moved back here, finally he said, okay, if you find me a 70s P bass, I'll trade you straight across. And I gave him my Nate Mendel bass so he had something to play at home and record on.

He's a drummer. And so uh for three years I've been looking for a bass, and I just went on this month-long tour and I was looking in marketplace in every single city. You know, I was looking and like, you know, there were things that were close but not quite it. And then I got home, and there was there was a promise, there's something that was pretty promising over at Thunder Road in the bass shop.

And then I looked uh at the Diablo Guitars site, and there was like a museum piece, and it was priced accordingly. And I called Parker, shout out to Parker. What's up, Parker? Um who's always been good to me. Yeah. And I was I gave him my sob story. I was like, here's the deal, you know. But I've been looking for three years, and he was like, he sorted me out proper.

So yesterday, me and Doug went down to Diablo, we opened the case up, Doug was like, whoa. It weighs under nine pounds, also, by the way, which is unheard of for that year. Insane. And um, not unheard of, but certainly not really uncommon. It is the uncommon, yeah. Um, those are like 12 pounds.

Yeah.

Easy. Easy, 10 to 12 pounds. And I mean, it was beautiful. There's one like one mark on the whole thing. Like the the lacquer is clear, it's natural. It looks like someone took a nail punch or a um, you know, some sort of a s a set and dropped it perfectly, and there's like one little pink, one little tiny little ni-s it finished chapter anything?

No. Whoa. Like I'm telling you, it's a museum piece. Even the case just has like the latches are doing the 70s latch thing. Of course. But uh the case has like a couple tiny little marks on it, but it's a museum piece. Came from a collection. Anyway, I finished the deal with Doug. Parker saved me. It's this is something that's been weighing on me every single day for three years.

And I it's resolved. And the Music Man is now comfortably mine. I can do the now I feel comfortable.

And now it's time to send it into Music Man.

Now it's now I feel com more comfortable uh sending it off for spa day. Yeah. And maybe putting the like a period correct finish on it with like either Billy Rowe or Joe Riggio or someone that can do a beautiful job on it. Yeah. It's a killer base. It's a really good base.

Very, very special base.

Yeah. So that I'm really happy about that. Well, there's I got one other thing recently, but I don't save that for another side.

Yeah, we don't have to we don't have to give away all the secrets today.

The other one is a is a is a big that deserves its own video. It does. And it really does do.

Yeah, yeah. We'll get to that one. Um, gear is sick, especially when you figure out what you like. For me, it's been very kind of like uh not liberating, but like it's it's nice knowing like, you know what, I'm gonna buy another fucking Les Paul because I love Les Paul's. Or I'm gonna get another RD.

I I got the RD custom, even though I have two old RDs, because I weckon like RDs and I and I can. So I'm going to.

On this last tour I was on, using the Spectre base, I learned something that for whatever reason I just hadn't grasped before. And it's just like using certain things appropriately for certain situations. And I understand exactly when I want that. I know that it's got a gillars, but they're EMG style, you know, preamp in there and pickups, and that into an ampeg, like pushed a little bit, is a glorious rock sound.

It's so killer.

Yeah, I just got my first Spectre.

I can't believe you didn't bring the Eurobass in.

Well, I was afraid you would uh punch me in the face and then run out with it, Mike.

I don't know, officer. Um he was loading his gear out, and uh I was in here, I heard a tumble. I don't know. And now and he's down at the bottom of those stairs with his neck twisted up and he's not breathing.

Yeah.

Somebody help me.

I'm so sad. No, I'll bring it next week for you. It's unbelievable. It's like the amount of sustain it has and like the the way it just kind of hugs you is very, very special.

The one thing that I don't like about the Spectre is that I'm a big boy and it looks small on me.

And that's why you gotta get the uh what's the one that Rouse has? The Nikki Six and two or whatever, yeah.

Kelly Lemieux has a couple of those.

So sick.

I think he said he has four of them, actually.

Wow. Yeah, because it was a limited run of 50.

Well he had he has two two Euros and two custom shops, I think. Wow.

Yeah, I didn't know they they only made that limited run, but prior to that, you basically had to be Nikki Six in order to get them. Like in the 80s, like on the Girls, Girls, Girls tour.

They made a have you ever seen the Spectre Bocker?

I have.

They made it for Kip Winger.

Unbelievable. It's so sick. You sent me a photo of it. It's so sick. So sick.

Because Rickenbacher is one of the sickest looking bases. It looks so sick.

I think I just wish it could sound the way it looks. I do too. Because it does not.

I mean, uh I you know, has anyone thrown an active preamp in one of those before? I'm sure someone has. I don't under it's they're so quacky.

Yeah. The real upper mid.

Real quacky.

Yeah.

I mean, the Spectre has upper mids, but it's a lot of lowly, yeah. And a lot of fullness around that. I still very much want a Eurobase. I want I want one of those neck through icons because I feel okay dropping that or whatever.

The neck through icon is really, really great.

Ultimately, I think what I did is I learned what I love about the Spectre, which is a lot. It's a great recording bass, also. And I learned what modifications I want to make to my Yamaha BB bass.

I still think your best recorded bass tone that I've ever heard is still coming from the Spectre. Yeah. That DI that you sent me that one time. I was like, what the hell is this? Oh my god. Pretty good. What a sound. Pretty good. So good. Pretty good.

Yeah. Well.

Well, I guess that is the uh the gear, right? Am I right? Gear, am I right? Uh do you have a favorite piece of gear that you recently got or ever got? Leave a comment down below if you're watching the video, not if you're listening. I mean, if you're listening, I guess uh go over to the video and just yell at your car stereo.

Just yell at your car. And uh, I guess thus concludes this episode of the Rifts and Beards podcast. Thank you for hanging out with us, everybody. Uh, you've been wonderful. I've been fluff. I'm still your pal Mike. We'll see you next time.

Episode 14: High Gain Doc, Travel Nightmares & New Gear Days

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