Home, Sweet Home…

My own reminiscences about Paul Reed Smith’s guitars begin around 1992. Up until that point, all I had seen from the company was its 24-fret neck models and, call me strange, but I have never got on with 24-fretters. But then, one day the brand-new Custom 22 came into the Guitarist office and my heart skipped a beat. Okay, that might be a little bit of an exaggeration, but I was assigned to review the guitar, which meant I had an extra dose of ‘hands on’ with the instrument. We’ve all had that experience where you’re desperately trying to justify yet another guitar joining the family to both yourself and your partner, and, in the end, I had to bid the 22 a fond farewell and it disappeared from my life. Since that time, I’ve accumulated a number of twin-humbucker guitars, but I remain PRS-free. Admirable restraint on my part, methinks. But I wholeheartedly applaud Paul and his team for continually surprising us with innovation and superlative design. We’ve even got a soft spot for the Silver Sky… So please join us in celebrating PRS’s 35th anniversary in this very special issue.

Elsewhere, you’ll find an extraordinary video lesson from Cory Wong. I was introduced to his playing via a Fearless Flyers video during one of those YouTube safaris that we all find ourselves on from time to time. I sat there smiling for the video’s duration. This was not only funk, it was precision funk. But it was still chock-full of passion alongside the admirable chops from all concerned. When I saw that Cory was performing nearby, we managed to join the dots and invite him to our studio for our resulting masterclass.

Meanwhile, this is another ‘lockdown’ edition of the mag, put together via phone, email, text message, video conference and sundry other methods of communication available in these strange times. I hope you enjoy it – stay safe!