Way back in the mists of time – September, 2009 to be precise – Warwick began offering a ‘bass of the month’.  What this meant was that they would release a special edition bass each month.  The special bass would be, essentially, a tweaked version of one of their standard instruments but tweaked sufficiently to make it a little more unique and exclusive.  Here’s a round-up of the Warwick’s fall line.
September – Thumb Bolt On French Flamed Ash

A mouthful to be sure.  This is a twist on the regular Thumb …

Rotosound have announced that metal legends, Duff McKagan (Guns & Roses and Velvet Revolver) and James Lomenzo (Megadeth) will lead a line up of artists at their NAMM booth in January.
Joining McKagan and Lomenzo will be Eva Gardener, Warren DeMartini, Robbie Crane (RATT) and also Billy Sheehan.
Pretty impressive line up that Rotosound have bagged there.
The event will take place on Saturday, January 26th at the Rotosound Booth (5596, Hall B) at NAMM.
The list of appearances and times is as follows:

James Lomenzo (Saturday 11am)
Duff McKagan (Saturday  1pm)
Eva Gardner    (Saturday  2pm)
Billy Sheehan  (Saturday  3pm)
RATT …

PRS is offering a, rather snazzy-looking, collection of guitar images in a large, coffee-table book.
Photographed by Japanese photographer, Tomuku Ohtani, the book features a collection of Private Stock electric and acoustic guitars and basses.
The Art Of PRS has more than 80 pages of, what seem to be stunning, images of PRS instruments.  It’s a hardback book, measuring 23.5″ x 16.5″ and includes a double-sided poster.
Paul Reed Smith himself commented, “the quality of the flats and guitar photos that I have viewed from this book are at the limit of human ability …

A new website, which aims to be – among other things – a social network for guitar-lovers and collectors has just gone live.
dbTwang hopes to become the world’s largest online guitar database, allowing its users to store information on their guitars and browse other’s guitars.
You will be able to view profiles of individual guitars, see images and read information about their history.  You can even ‘follow’ a particular guitar to track it and you can interact with its owner.
One of the aims of dbTwang is to record the ‘provenance’ of …

Now this is clever.
WiaMUSIC are offering a unique method of displaying and storing your guitar or bass.
We’re all familiar with the headstock-style guitar hangers. Two prong-things hold the guitar from the headstock end of the neck. It’s all well and good.
Woodie (the man behind WiaMUSIC, we think) has come up with a new idea.
Two clear, acrylic brackets that hold the strap buttons on your guitar.
The brackets can be screwed to the wall and will hold your guitar in any position, even from the ceiling.  Installation seems pretty easy and they …

MusicRadar have written regarding John Frusciante’s position as guitarist with the Red Hot Chili Peppers.
It seems, that he’s not.
A ‘source close to the band’ has said that Josh Klinghoffer has been rehearsing with the Peppers for the last couple of months and that the band is trying to find a permanent replacement for John.
The source said, “Mentally, John checked out a long time ago. He’s interested in doing his own thing, his own albums – the whole big rock band machinery just doesn’t appeal to him anymore.”
MusicRadar tell us that, …

This is a bit special.  It’s a lovely, pre-war Martin.  Actually, it’s pre-1934 if you want to get a little more precise (but only a little) – it’s fitted with bar frets.
It’s been through the wars a little and has, at some stage in the past had a long side-crack repaired. That repair has lasted some time from the look of it and doesn’t overly concern me.
What is a concern, however, is the bridge.  The leading edge has cracked and broken off under string-tension.  The owner saved the piece that …

Off to Carvin this week.  We’ll get a look at a number of complicated CNC machines make the various bits that make the various Carvin guitars before checking out the finishers applying a couple of different finishes – including a black/blue burst.  You can see the guys in the factory doing final setup and even see pickups being wound.
Take a look.

Are you guitar enough?
Maybe you’ve got some guitar magazines under your coffee table.  Maybe you’ve got some picks strewn around your coffee table.  But, have you got a guitar coffee table?
Were betting not.  Now you can remedy that.
If you provide Fender with $250, they will provide you with a coffee table in the shape of a Strat headstock.  If you’re really, really flush, you could part with $750 for a Deluxe model of either a Strat or a Tele headstock.
We’re guessing most living rooms probably won’t be adorned with these …

If you pop over to Fender’s UK site, you can register to win a Squier Telecaster that has been signed by a whole crapload of musicians.
All you need to do is enter your details at Fender and this could be yours. The winner will be picked on 4th of January.
All of the autographers (yeah, we know it’s not a word) are members of bands who performed at this year’s Reading Festival.
And there’s a lot of them.  The guitar is signed by:

Alexisonfire
Atreyu
Bring Me The Horizon
Deftones
Enter Shikari
Fightstar
Frank Turner
Funeral For A Friend
Glasvegas
Gossip
Hockey
Kids In …