SeSSion diary New Year, New Gear
Session Ace Adam Goldsmith rounded off 2016 by having a rig overhaul, but there’s one piece of gear that looks set to stick for 2017 and beyond
Thinking about the annual gear pilgrimage to NAMM coming up, and having just returned from playing in the house orchestra for ‘Sports Personality Of The Year’ (well done Andy Murray!), I’m now off to treat myself at my friend John’s excellent guitar shop, Peach Guitars, in sunny Essex. I’ve had my eye on a lovely Gibson Custom ’63 reissue ES-335 he’s had in for a while. The 335, for me, is the perfect guitar and I’d never want to turn up on a session without one. It was my first ‘proper’ guitar when I was young and despite going round the houses with many different makes and styles, I think I got it right the first time around.
I’ve pretty much changed my whole main rig in the past few months, having discovered a couple of new pieces of gear that are serving me well live and in the studio at the moment. The first change was a gorgeous Fender EC Twinolux amp – lighter than a normal Twin and also lighter than my current go to gigging amp, the Fender ML Deville, with a power scaling ability, a switch on the top panel reducing the power down from 40 to 20 watts, and also with an ability to switch off one of the two speakers. I’ve found these features to be super useful in the studio because you can achieve that ‘small tweed amp’ vibe, but also have an amp that is loud enough for gigs (I’ve had in mind my fairly regular opening slot at Ronnie Scott’s). It’s a fabulous amp, sadly now discontinued, but, to be honest, I think the list price of somewhere around £3,000 is a touch high, so maybe a secondhand model would prove better value.
The thing that the amp doesn’t feature, however, is reverb. Easily curable with a pedal I thought, but most reverb pedals, in my experience, seem to sit‘on top of’your sound, rather than being part of it, like reverb provides if it’s amp-based.That was until I bought the incredible Strymon Flint, which seems to feel exactly like amp reverb, but more flexible as it provides various types (denoted here by decades: 60s, 70s and 80s).
The final (at least for now!) piece in the never-ending search for tone nirvana, which we all love, is theneedf or aJRo ck ett Audio ‘The Dude’pedal. Its mission statement is to provide the elusive‘ Dumb le’ tone. I have no real idea if it does that, having never been lucky enough to play a real Dumble, but it certainly provides a highly musical and‘amp-like’drive, which truly does feel part of your sound.
The last thing, which I don’t keep in the signal chain but I have on me for every single session, is the get-out-of-jail-free card pedal that amazingly contains pretty much every effect known to man for roughly £100: the Line 6 M5. I’m sure most of you have come across these or one of their big brothers, the M9 or M13, at some point. However, if not, they are a brilliant investment, ridiculously easy to use and a pretty much essential backup pedal for unexpected requests at sessions.That one isn’t going anywhere for the time being! Happy New Year to you all and here’s to a great 2017.
“The 335 was my first ‘proper’ guitar when I was young and despite going round the houses with many different makes and styles, I think I got it right the first time round” adam goldSmiTh