I should definitely preface this post by stating that what follows is my opinion only. It may be that I’m alone in these views or it may be that other guitar builders and repair-techs agree. The post below, however, is my take on things.

I recently had a Tanglewood TW130 through the shop for repair.  It’s a nice little acoustic—I’ve always been a sucker for all-mahogany acoustics. The guitar had taken a fall and the heel had come away from the body. I’ll detail the steps taken to assess and repair this damage in a later post but I wanted to discuss the guitar’s construction as a separate issue.

Before I get to that though, a little primer on acoustic guitar neck joints. Bear with me…

The Traditional Dovetail Neck Joint

Historically, acoustic guitars had their necks fixed to the body with a dovetail joint. This is a very strong joint and when glued is damned solid. The dovetail is considered the ‘traditional’ neck-joint and it tends to be more prized by many who consider it imparts a superior tone to the guitar. A good dovetail joint tends to require a little more work and care to accomplish well though, and it makes for a little more work when performing a neck-reset on an older guitar.

The Bolt-On Neck Joint

For these reasons (and possibly others), many modern guitar makers use a bolt-on neck joint. In this joint, a short mortice and tenon is cut in the neck block (in the body) and in the neck. This is used mainly for alignment purposes although it provides some strength. Most of the joint’s strength, however, comes from the bolts that are attached, through the neck block, into threaded sockets in the neck heel. These tighten to pull the neck securely into the body and, questionable arguments about tone aside, provide a strong, solid joint. And, when it comes to setting the neck at some stage in the future, it’s much easier to undo some bolts than it is to steam out a glued-in dovetail.

The New Neck Joint?

This Tanglewood doesn’t use either of these methods, however.

This guitar has a quite small neck block (the part that the neck usually bolts or dovetails to) and has a slightly larger than usual support under the fingerboard extension. The reason for this latter is that there are channels cut here to accept the truss-rod (in the middle) and two square, box-sections of steel on either side.  It’s these steel sections that—glued into the channels on top of the guitar—that provide the bulk of the joint’s strength.

You can see three dowels poking out the front of the neck block/body—one of these is wooden and two are plastic. In my opinion, their primary role is alignment as they’re not going to provide much support.

The face of the neck-heel—where it butts against the body—is a glueing surface on this guitar and I guess this was considered sufficient support when combined with the dowels and channels. I’ve a couple of problems with this.

• String tension does a mighty fine job of trying to pull the headstock of a guitar down to meet the bridge. Poor support along the heel area can only make this job easier. Think of a long-bow. The tension of the bow-string pulls the bow into that arched (bow) shape. That’s what the strings are doing on your guitar too. The poor thing needs all the help it can get to resist those damn strings. One knock was enough to break the (slightly brittle) hold this glue had.
• Dovetail and bolt-on neck joints both pull the neck snugglyinto the body. As well as strengthening the joint, this can only help tone and string energy. The Tanglewood’s neck is, effectively, sitting on the body with a bit of glue and a couple of pins holding it in place.
• While it’s fair to argue the practicalities of the owner of a lower-cost guitar deciding to plump for a neck-reset at some stage in the future, should that happen, legitimately disassembling this sort of joint would (perhaps counterintuitively) be much more problematic than what was achieved with a simple fall in this case. As it happens, reassembly is more difficult too.

Now, I’m not being elitist here. This is not a guitar that cost thousands and there are many valid reasons for manufacturers to economise where they can. I’ve owned, played and repaired many cheapies and budget instruments in my time and many have been absolutely fine (and some have punched brilliantly above their weight). I’ve no idea how much money was saved in the manufacture of this instrument in this manner rather than with a regular bolt-on neck and I’m slightly conflicted in passing judgement as it’s great the there is now such a selection of fine instruments available for peanuts. It certainly wasn’t the case when I began playing guitar.

Personally, though, I can’t help feeling that the decision to go with this joint over a regular bolt-on has compromised this instrument. At very least, I feel it’s durability, and therefore longevity, is compromised. I don’t think that’s a good thing on any instrument, no matter how much it costs.

What do you reckon?

This article was brought to you by Gerry Hayes from the workshop of Haze Guitars and is cross-posted there.
 Haze Guitars provides guitar repair, restoration and upgrade services and makes beautiful, hand-built instruments

The massive-noggined boffins at TC Electronics have just released an incremental version of PolyTune for iPhone.

You’ve probably all read about the PolyTune tuner pedal – the world’s first polyphonic tuner. Strum all strings together and the clever gubbins in the pedal shows the tuning situation of each of your six stings. You can easily tell if one or more strings is out of tune.

Not content with hammering all that cleverness into a stompbox, TC also ported it to the iPhone. And now, that app is at a 1.1 release. It’s all Retina display ready with snazzier graphics. It also has an interesting option to change the tuning graphics to yellow/blue for phone users with any red/green colour-blindness issues.

There’s lots of other stuff shoved in there but there’s no time to waste listening to me drone on. The PolyTune iPhone app is for sale from December 16th to 19th, 2010. During this time, you can get PolyTune for $0.99 (or local equivalent) from the app store.

I’ve got it and tried it and it’s good.

Off you go then. PolyTune for iPhone (iTunes link).

There’s a funny thing that happens with some basses. It’s called the dead spot.

What’s A Dead Spot?

The dead spot is a particular note that won’t seem to ‘ring’. It won’t sustain and instead, the fundamental just dies away almost immediately. Sometimes you’ll hear some overtone-type vibrations of the note sustain very faintly but for the most part, the note is gone.

This tends to be most noticeable on one particular string and on one particular note but it can be evident (possibly to a lesser extent) a half-tone higher or lower and with the same note(s) on different strings.

The dead spot can, theoretically, occur on guitars too but it tends to make itself known on basses. Also, although not exclusively, it tends to make itself known primarily on Fender basses.

It’s possible to confuse a dead spot with a note that gets choked by a high/low fret but it’s a different beast entirely.

What Causes A Dead Spot?

To go into detail about this is beyond the scope of this article and beyond the scope of stuff I can bluff my way through.

In basic terms though, any note you play on your bass is the result of the string vibrating at a particular frequency. With me so far?

You’ve probably experienced sympathetic vibration when you’ve played. This might have manifested itself as the drummer’s snare vibrating when you play a certain note or your mum’s fine china rattling on the shelf every time you play an open ‘A’. These things happened to resonate in sympathy with a particular note.

Sometimes, a bass guitar resonates in sympathy with a particular note too and, sometimes, that resonance happens to work against the note being played with the result that that note’s vibration is quashed. You hear it as a quickly dying note or a dead spot.

Bummer.

So How Do I Cure A Dead Spot?

It’s all about changing the way the bass resonates. While I can’t, unfortunately, give you a definitive guide to fixing your dead spot, I can let you have a couple of tips. Your own mileage may vary and one or all may not work. One or both have worked for me in the past so… good luck.

1. Alter the resonance with cash

Groove Tubes make a device called the Fat Finger. This is a relatively chunky piece of chrome-plated brass (the same as that used to make bells, apparently) that is designed to clamp onto your bass headstock. It attaches without permanently altering the instrument so you can remove it at any stage in the future.

The increased mass at the end of the neck alters how it vibrates and may be sufficient to change the frequency at which your dead spot occurs. All going well, it will be shifted to some frequency between those that make up the notes of the western scales we’re used to. If you don’t get the result you want, try moving it about the headstock – different placement gives different results.

There are claims that the Fat Finder can increase sustain and improve tone. As to the former, I’d say it does make a small difference but the tone claim is probably a little more subjective.

Some don’t care for hanging a hunk of metal from their headstocks and doing so certainly alters the balance of the instrument. For these people the following may help.

2. Alter the resonance for free

So, this time around what we’re going to do is to partially decouple the bass’ neck and body.

As a little background, once while trying to track down a dead spot, I did all manner of things to improve the couple between the body and neck with the result that everything I did made things worse. After chasing my tail for a long time, it occurred to me that I was on the wrong track.

I tried backing out the screws that secure the neck to the body and immediately saw a difference.  What I’d done was to alter, slightly, the way in which the neck and body vibrated as one.

I have to stress that you’re not loosening these screws by much – the smallest fraction of a turn. The last thing you want is a neck that wobbles about in its pocket but, a tiny amount (an eight of a turn or even less) seems capable of making a difference.

Purists will argue tone and sustain with me and, while they’re probably right in theory, in practice, I haven’t been able to detect a difference. The amount of loosening is not sufficient to cause an audible difference in my experience and opinion.

What it has done though, again in my experience, is shift the dead spot sufficiently that it’s cured or very much improved.

Out Of The Dead Zone

As I say, there are no guarantees with this one. Both of these solutions are things that you can try yourself for little or no outlay and both are completely reversible.

Worth a try.

This article was brought to you by Gerry Hayes from the workshop of Haze Guitars. Haze Guitars provides instrument repair, restoration and upgrade services in Dublin, Ireland.

In common with many (probably) on this side of the Atlantic, my first experience with Seasick Steve came in 2006 on Jools Holland’s New Year show; his Hootenanny. Also in common with many (almost certainly), I was blown away by what I saw.

Here was Steve, this bearded, crazy, red-neck stomping a box for percussion and playing a beat-up, three-stringed shit-box of a guitar.

And it was brilliant.

I was a fan straight away.

I’ve been lucky enough to see him play live a couple of times and that’s when he’s in his element. I was also lucky enough to see him threaten to come down after some loud and obnoxious idiots in the audience who quickly became much more quietly obnoxious. Nobody likes the idea of a pissed-off Seasick Steve coming for them.

Have a listen to the first Seasick Steve I heard. This song is on Dog House Music (Amazon MP3 link) and I heartily recommend you go get yourself a copy.

I hate using terms like lo-fi and old-school (or skool) to describe music – simply put, this is blues. Good, proper, blues. And what’s not to love?

You’ve read about the new Joe Bonamassa Les Paul from Epiphone. You’ve broken open your piggy-bank and counted all your pennies. Not enough, not enough. Maybe you could take on another paper-round? But, it’s a limited edition guitar. There’s no time. What can you do?

One thing you could try is winning one.

Over at Epiphone, you can enter a competition to possibly win yourself an Epiphone Joe Bonamassa Les Paul.

Why wouldn’t you enter?

Maybe that paper-round money can go towards an amp.

So we all know that there’s never a 9V battery in your guitar case when you need it. Trailing sockets and extension leads do the trick but they do get in the way and there’s all those wall-warts and their associated knot of power cables to consider.

Sanyo reckon they have the answer. Pictured left* is the Pedal Juice (or KBC-9V3U Pedal Juice, to give it its catchy moniker). It’s a rechargeable, Lithium-Ion battery that provides 9V of clean, DC, power to your pedals. Neat.

Depending on use, it can supply up to 50 hours of juice (see infographic below) and it can be recharged in three and a half hours. It’s water and shock resistant and features a handy on/off button so you can turn off all your pedals at the same time and not have to worry about unplugging them to save power. A red/amber/green indicator shows remaining charge.

Sanyo also tout the fact that, by eliminating the requirement for mains power to your pedals, and the possible ground-loops and interference that could be associated, your signal path could actually be cleaner and your tone improved. While technically true, I’m a little sceptical as to the degree of improvement that would be evident but I’m open to being convinced.

At a cost (reported by Engadget) of US$149.99, the Pedal Juice doesn’t come cheap but this seems like a relatively neat and handy solution to fiddly wall-warts and the requirement for a never-ending supply of 9V batteries.

More at Sanyo.

*Of course, you could argue that, if you’re putting it in a powered pedal-board, like that shown in the promotional image, you are lessening the argument for its existence – not totally, but maybe just a little?

File under: That’s Clever, Why Has Nobody Thought Of That Before.

Check it out. This is the Rock Lock. It was designed by entrepreneur, Chris Goulet to fill what is, in hindsight, a pretty glaring market hole. Namely, something to stop that toerag from making off with your guitar while you’re having a well-earned beer at the end of the night.

As Goulet says, ‘guitar theft is typically a crime of opportunity…’ and this product helps to remove that opportunity.

The Rock Lock is a bit like a laptop lock with a clever neck-grasping device. You loop the strengthened cable around something bulky or immobile, lock the neck-grasping thing around the neck of your guitar and you get that beer without worrying about some nasty type stealing your baby.

Rock Lock is available online for US$49.99. At the time of writing, it is on pre-order only (although if you pre-order, you will get free shipping as soon as it’s available).

To succeed as a music accessory, any product must be able to include the word ‘rock’ in its title and receives bonus points if the second word rhymes with ‘rock’. Rock Lock as this nailed and has the added good fortune of, what looks like, a very useful and clever product.

Rock Lock should fit all standard 6-string instruments and is safe for nitro-cellulose finishes. I wouldn’t be surprised to see a wider range soon to fit basses, 12 and 7 strings, etc.

You will, I’m sure have seen the Joe Bonamassa Les Paul from gibson. Quite nice, isn’t it? It’s also quite expensive.

But now, you can get the Joe Bonamassa experience from Epiphone. And it looks like it’s a well considered experience.

Based on the ’59 Les Paul, this Epi is constructed in the same manner. Solid mahogany and maple body with a long-tenon, glue in neck. Nice. It’s got the 50′s profile neck for Joe-friendly chunkiness.

Importantly, and very nicely, this Epiphone comes loaded with two Burstbucker pickups – a BB-2 at the neck and a BB-3 at the bridge. That’s a pretty snazzy touch at this price-range.

Like its Gibson stablemate, the Epi sports a goldtop with black pickguard and pickup mounts. Some don’t care for the black with the gold, but I quite like it. The rear of the body and neck is also black and it has the mismatched control knobs of Bonamassa’s own. Everything else is pretty much as you’d expect.

No mention of pricing on Epiphone’s or Bonamassa’s sites but I’ve spotted this online for US$699. It comes with a Lifton-style hard case and a COA signed by Joe. It’s also limited to 1000 units so, if you like the look of it, you should get a move on.

More at Epiphone.

I don’t know why I think this is really cool. Perhaps it’s the geek in me getting impressed at what the guys in Fender’s R&D department have engineered here.

What they’ve done is to take a solid block of Lucite and hack it into the shape of an Esquire. That’s nothing too unusual. However, they also hollowed out the body to enable it be filled with water.

You see, this guitar is a being auctioned to benefit NASH₂O, a charity helping out after the Nashville floods earlier this year. You’ve probably seen images of some of the guitar-related damage caused by the floods and that’s the least of people’s problems.

Fender built this crazy Esquire to aid the cause. And, to remind of the reasons behind its existence, this guitar is filled with flood-water. Yep, the water was taken from the Cumberland river and from a long-dry, farm pond that was filled by the flood. Bottles of it were shipped to Fender California and it was used to fill the hollow space in this guitar.

And I can’t help thinking it’s cool. Possibly, there are those who will scratch their heads but I like it. I even like the way there’s a ‘gap’ to allow the water slosh around. Nice.

I can’t afford it, unfortunately but perhaps one of you reading this will. Bidding starts at US$5,000 over at the NASH2O site.

There’s no doubt that this is something unique and I’d imagine it’s going to be quite a collector’s item. Just make sure you’ve a good case – it’s bound to stink if it breaks.

The guys at the Lick Library are donning their red hats and fat-suits.

They’re launching their 2010 Advent calendar. This means that, for every day between now and Christmas they will offer a series of special offers. Like the Advent calendar thing that you might have had as a kid, each day you open a box and see what’s inside. Instead of some, slightly sub-standard, chocolate though, inside these virtual doors is some sort of Lick Library offer.

There’s no limit to how many special offers you can grab so you can take your pick from one to twenty-five.

Off you go to the Lick Library Advent Calendar then.