An SG with a Floyd Rose Trem? Yes, this is a direct shot back at companies that offer similar SG style guitars for Metal guitarists and in my opinion probably should have been introduced a long time ago. Of course if you would prefer a Metal SG without the trem you can always go with the cheaper SG Gothic Morte. As you can see the controls have been simplified from a regular SG to just a single tone and volume control and all chrome hardware including the Floyd Rose Trem and Humbucker covers.

Features

• Sold Mahogany body with gloss black nitro finish
• Mahogany neck with fast, slim profile
• Bound North American Rosewood fingerboard with acrylic trapezoid inlays
• Powerful 490R Humbucker in the neck and hotter 498T Humbucker in the bridgeFloyd-Rose™ vibrato tailpiece with locking nut
• Grover™ kidney tuners with 14:1 tuning ratio

msrp $2,799

Find out more – http://www2.gibson.com/Products/Electric-Guitars/SG/Gibson-USA/SG-Diablo-Tremolo.aspx

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One for the shredders, Gibson have created a Les Paul with features to lure the Metal fans including a Floyd Rose Trem, which some would say was sacrilege on a Les Paul but those people probably don’t play Metal. I’m not really up on my Gibby’s so wondered what Richlite was reading the stats:

The 22-fret fingerboard is crafted from Richlite®, a fabricated material composed of cellulose fiber and phenolic resin, which offers the constructional and resonant properties of fine hardwood, but with improved durability, for a superb playing feel.

Interesting, probably feels great but I wonder if that will put some people off who would probably prefer Ebony on this guitar? Are we going to see Gibson move more and more towards this kind of fingerboard since the recent legal issues they have faced with importing wood?

Features

• Sold Mahogany body with high-gloss ebony nitro finish
• Mahogany neck with rounded Studio ’50s profile
• Richlite® fingerboard with acrylic trapezoid inlays
• Powerful 490R Humbucker in the neck and hotter 498T Humbucker in the bridge
• Floyd-Rose™ vibrato tailpiece with locking nut
• Vintage-style TonePros™ tulip button with 16:1 tuning ratio

msrp $2,369

http://www2.gibson.com/Products/Electric-Guitars/Les-Paul/Gibson-USA/Shred-Les-Paul-Studio.aspx

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If you do any home recording you will need some kind of mic preamp so that you can get the signal from your mic’d cabs to your computer, PreSonus have lots of options available on their website but these new affordable mic preamps look cool with their dual solid state/tube paths. Check out the press release below:

Press Release
PreSonus is now shipping new and improved versions of two of its classic tube preamplifiers: the BlueTube DP V2 and TubePre V2.

Enjoy solid-state clarity or tube warmth with the BlueTube DP V2 dual-path mic/instrument preamp. The solid-state path feeds PreSonus’ Class A XMAX™ mic preamplifier with 80 dB of variable gain-an upgrade from the original BlueTube DP. The tube path features a 12AX7 tube that operates on voltages double that of other preamplifiers in its class, producing lots of headroom and big tone. The Tube Drive enables you to achieve anything from gentle warmth to edgy distortion. You also get 48V phantom power, an 80 Hz high-pass filter, -20 dB pad, and polarity reverse.

With two combo mic/instrument inputs, the half-rackspace BlueTube DP V2 is a great choice for guitars as well as vocals. Singer-songwriters can run their vocal through one channel and their guitar through the other, feeding both to the P.A.-no guitar amp needed. It also serves as a DI box, thanks to balanced XLR and unbalanced ¼” outputs, and is housed in a new, rugged, 1/2U case. Try the BlueTube DP V2 as a front end for a DAW, too. The BlueTube DP V2 is available immediately; MAP/street price is expected to be $229.95.

TubePre V2
The single-channel TubePre V2 tube preamp is an affordable way to add high quality tube warmth and character to your sound. This new version provides an even wider palette of sound options, and a much more focused tube saturation, than the original TubePre. It has been upgraded to employ PreSonus’ popular XMAX Class A solid-state preamp, which is followed in the signal path by a 12AX7 vacuum-tube stage with Tube Drive tube-saturation control.

Housed in a rugged, 1/3-rackspace case, the TubePre V2 rear panel sports separate unbalanced, ¼” instrument and balanced, XLR mic inputs and unbalanced ¼” and balanced XLR line outputs. The front panel offers controls for gain, 48V phantom power, 80 Hz high-pass filter, and polarity-reverse, as well as a mic/instrument input switch. A lighted VU meter and a clip LED help you keep an eye on your levels. The TubePre V2 is available immediately; MAP/street price is expected to be $129.95.

Check the PreSonus website for more products.

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I hope “Satchurated” shows in Australian Cinemas but in the meantime it is just select U.S. Theaters March 2012. Remember this will be available in both 2D AND 3D!

Check out Satriani.com for more updates.

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For more information on Cameron Amplifiers – http://www.cameronamplifiers.com/

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Press Release
Suhr announces the “Limited Edition” Riot Pedal – only 500 available

To celebrate the opening of our new factory, Suhr is proud to offer the “Limited Edition” Riot Pedal.

Riot “Limited Edition” features a very cool black anodized aluminum housing, custom etching, unique numbering, and is limited to 500 pedals worldwide

To order, contact your local Suhr dealer.

For more information email us at: Riot.LE@suhrguitars.com

http://suhrguitars.com/

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via http://www.youtube.com/user/theperfectguitar

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Aussie guitar virtuoso Chris Brooks has started a series on his YouTube channel called ‘Guitar Licks on Demand’ where you, the fans, get to choose something you would like Chris to teach in a short video. I asked Chris to teach the opening riff to ‘Feeding The Myth’ from his album ‘The Axis Of All Things’ and he kindly obliged (#3). I’m going to try out #4, Chris’ insanely economic Yngwie-esque right hand picking style although I tried it when I was younger and it’s not as easy as Chris makes it look!

Make sure you head over to http://www.chrisbrooks.com/ for all the latest news and subscribe to Chris’ youtube channel.

Chris Brooks – Guitar Licks on demand #1

Chris Brooks – Guitar Licks on demand #2: Velvet Claws

Chris Brooks – Guitar Licks on Demand #3: Feeding The Myth

Chris Brooks – Licks on Demand #4: Economical speed picking ala Yngwie

Chris Brooks – Guitar Licks on Demand #5: Kotzen / Gilbert legato arpeggio

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Guitar World dropped by the ENGL Amps booth at Winter NAMM 2012 to check out the Retro Tube 100 with its’ interchangeable face plates and 2 channels of great sounding clean and smooth overdrive tones. It has a built-in Noise Gate including threshold control, a bright switch on Channel 1 and mid boost on channel 2 and a gain boost switch for both channels. The amp is powered by 4 12AX7′s in the preamp and 2 EL34′s in the power amp.

Check the ENGL Amps site for more info: http://www.englamps.de/index.php?id=228

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Having recently reviewed Toontrack EZmix (see the review here) I was lucky enough to get sent a beta copy of the latest version of the software EZmix 2 to review. I was really impressed with the original EZmix, I love the simplicity of choosing presets to enhance your various tracks or overall mix but with EZmix 2 Toontrack have stepped this software up a notch by adding guitar amplifier models which is a huge upgrade. I decided to focus on this new addition to the software in my demo, if you want to see how you can apply the various effects presets to tracks I suggest you check out my review of the original version of EZmix.

As you will hear the amp models are a great addition especially when you consider that EZmix 2 is only 139 Euros, even without the amp models you are getting a massively useful plugin for that money.

“A big part of our users as well as the overall music community are guitar based in their craft”, said Mattias Eklund, Toontrack Music’s founder and head of sound design. “Expanding the EZmix software in that direction is a natural as much as a pivotal step in developing the EZmix Line into an undisputable platform for any kind of mixing needs”.

“Just like all our other products, we developed EZmix on the basis of what we, ourselves, were missing in order to make writing and producing our own music easier”, said Mattias Eklund. “When the idea was born, no one could really argue with it. The fact that having a one-click multi-effect tool with ready-made signal chains for all common instruments, genres and general mixing needs designed by multi-platinum business veterans such as Chuck Ainlay or Mark Needham is useful in any given situation”.

Toontrack EZmix 2 (available Feb 7 2012)

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