Guitar Noize - guitar news, crazy guitar designs and cool guitar videos

The MXR Dyna Comp that was produced in 1976 has long been regarded as the ultimate stomp box compressor. There’s something inherently musical in the way it “tightens up” a guitar signal, raising the volume of quiet notes and leveling off peaks to create rich, full bodied sustain. From country twangers to metal monsters, guitarists have long relied on the MXR Dyna Comp to make their riffs stand tall in any live or studio mix. Now the MXR Custom Shop brings back that highly sought-after sound with the ‘76 Vintage Dyna Comp. Meticulously researched and superbly crafted, it features the exact same circuitry used in the original 1976 Dyna Comp, identical in its component layout, silkscreen and handmade wire harness. The key component is the old school CA3080 “metal can” integrated circuit (IC), which yields quieter operation, greater transparency and increased dynamic range. These ICs have been out of production since the ‘80s, but MXR has tracked down a stash of them - enough to produce a limited run of these little red boxes of compression bliss. With supplies limited, the MXR ‘76 Vintage Dyna Comp is destined to quickly become as ultra collectible as its noble ancestor. So get yours now. Available only from the MXR Custom Shop.

I think you will agree when you hear the demo above that this is a really nice sounding compressor. This is a really vintage tone lover’s pedal so if you are put off by the lack of LED and mains input you can get the pedal modded by your local effects specialist. If you are in Australia then Christian from Cubis Effects is your man.

This is part 2 of my Suhr S4 demo (check out part 1 here), this time using a combination of my Genz Benz Black Pearl tube amp overdrive and the Suhr Koko Boost to push the tubes a little more. As you will hear in the demo despite the classic strat styling and my vintage looking chrome humbucker this guitar is certainly capable of some great and pretty heavy rock tones due to the high output SSH+ humbucker.  The single coils are, as are most single coil pickups, a little noisy with the boost but if you don’t mind a bit of hum they overdrive nicely.

I used an Audix i5 Microphone and CabGrabber to hold the mic in place off axis (edge of the cone) and an Armor Gold and a Planet Waves cable to connect the pedal to my Black Pearl.

http://www.suhrguitars.com

In this first demonstration of my stunning new Suhr S4 I show the different clean sounds possible from each pickup selector position. To add a bit of top end sparkle to my Genz Benz Black Pearl amp I used a Suhr Koko Boost set to halfway, this pedal is an amazing clean boost which really brings out the character of my amp and seems to add a little extra clarity. I mic’d my amp using an Audix i5 Dynamic Microphone held in place by an Audix CabGrabber (http://audixusa.com).

Coming soon I will post a demo of my S4 with Overdriven tones to show you how this Strat style guitar is capable of incredible rock tones.

The riff in the demo is an attempt at the intro to Hairflip by Josh Smith from the album Inception. Check out my review of the album here and to hear some of the tracks streaming check out Josh’s MySpace page.

http://joshsmithguitar.com

For this guitar lesson I have decided to take the outro from Mastodon’s Circle Of Cysquatch from the album Blood Mountain. The reason I chose this particular passage of music because I thought that it was an interesting way to spice up a riff, what Mastodon have done is taken a riff and created 3 variations by changing the time signature each time it is played. The first time this riff is played it is actually a bar of 4/4 (A) and a bar of 5/4 (D) followed by a bar of 4/4 (A) and a bar of 3/4 (B) and finally a bar of 4/4 (A) followed by a bar of 4/4 (C). In the video above I have started with the 3/4 or B variation for simplicity’s sake as it is easier to see how the riff is extended.

Here is the tab for the riff and I have indicated the sections that I speak of in the video. The format I have used is A-B-A-C-A-D this then repeats. I have tabbed the riff using single notes for the B,C and D sections but once you are comfortable with the timing play these notes as power chords instead.

Try making your own riff and then creating a variation by changing the time signature, it may be just the thing you need to turn an ok riff into a great riff.

Last week Chimaira played the last date of their Australian tour at the Metro Theatre, Sydney before heading over to New Zealand. While Chimaira was in town I was lucky enough to not only see them play but to meet guitarist Rob Arnold to talk about his live rig including his amp, effects setup, guitars and even his custom guitar picks. Rob was a really cool guy and happy to talk about all of his gear and share his settings, I even got to touch one of Rob’s prototype LTD RA-600 guitars. Later that night I went along to see them live and they were really tight, the sound was really good which is more than I can say for the Sydney Roundhouse for the Mastodon gig! There was a good balance and not over loud so you could hear all the riffs and vocals perfectly. If you haven’t checked out Chimaira yet I recommend you listen to The Infection and Resurrection and if you like them work your way through the rest of their back catalogue.

Thank you to Rob for taking time out to chat gear with me and to Dirk Zeiser and Kelli Wright for helping arrange the meeting. Also a big shout out to Joe P from Rock House Method who introduced me to Chimaira via Rob’s awesome instructional DVD.

Hope you enjoy the rig rundown video above as much as I did filming it, I hope to make this a regular feature on Guitar Noize as bands pass through Sydney.

Guitar Noize readers may remember I reviewed Rob’s Rock House Method instructional DVD a while back, check it out here.

I also reviewed Chimaira’s epic 2009 album “The Infection”, one of my personal favourite releases of 2009, which you can check out here.

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This lesson uses a riff from Chimaira’s “Frozen In Time” from the album “The Infection”, initially you may look at the tab below and think it looks pretty easy as it is all based on the low E string but you will see that the real lesson here is in the timing, the picking and the muting. Watch the video above and follow along with the slowed down version to get the timing right and then slowly build up speed until you are at actual tempo, which I think is around 125bpm.

Download a pdf of this tab here.