The Wampler Paisley Drive Pedal

About a year ago I decided to buy a Wampler Paisley Drive to add to my small pedal collection. I'm really not big on effects pedals but after hearing this Wampler Paisley Drive I decided to buy it. Its not that I wanted to play any Brad Paisley songs, or even sound like Brad Paisley, I just like what the pedal will do. I pretty much use it as a clean boost but its capable of getting down to some serious rock and roll playing when you turn up the gain. Its got three knobs, Volume, Gain, and Tone, and two switches, Presence, and Mid Contour. Unlike a lot of pedals out on the market these controls are very responsive and distinct. You can really dial in your sound with one of these things. Like I said, I'm really not much of a pedal kind of guy, but the Paisley Drive is one I would recommend to anyone. You can get a ton of boost out of them without distortion. And if you want some distortion its got plenty of it. I don't think I would recommend it for playing death metal, but its definitely a nice pedal for blues, classic rock, and modern country music. Also, unlike most pedals I've used over the years its really clean as far as noise goes. I've got a Boss NS-2 Noise Suppressor but you don't really need it for this Paisley Drive. Its that clean!

I know this is kind of a short post today but I've been pretty busy for the last couple of days. I played music over the weekend and I'm paying for it now. Playing guitar has gotten pretty hard on me since my accident and back full of steel rods and screws but I still try my best to keep playing. I'm going to leave you with a video demonstration of the Wampler Paisley Drive and encourage you to check out their other pedals and even subscribe to the Wampler Pedals youtube channel. They have regular podcasts on the channel and its usually pretty informative. I'm not necessarily trying to sell anybody anything, nor am I endorsed by Wampler. Unless Brian happens to read this and wants to send me some free pedals to review haha. Yeah, fat chance I'm sure.

I just think they make some really good pedals and I would encourage everyone to try them out. Brian Wampler is not only an electronics genius, he's a guitar player too, so he does have a little advantage when it comes to making a good effects pedal. I plan on adding another one of their pedals soon too. I'm going to get an Ego Compressor as soon as possible and as soon as I get to another Guitar Center store to try it out first hand. I already pretty much know I want one just by the video demonstrations I have watched on them. And really, no pedal board is complete without a compressor anyway. You can also purchase these Wampler Pedals directly from the Wampler Pedals website. I know the prices seem a little high, and that's what kept me from buying one until I tried it out. A year later I still think it was worth every dime I paid for it @ $ 219.97. I know you can buy overdrive pedals all day for 50 to 100 dollars and get a pretty decent one, but I have never tried a more versatile overdrive that's as clean as this thing is. Most all overdrive pedals put a lot of hiss in your signal chain and you can clean them up using a noise suppressor. But, you don't even have to have a noise suppressor with this pedal.

Its a super clean pedal and it loves tube amps especially. It doesn't sound as good on my little solid state practice amp, but there's a ton of difference in my practice amp and my gigging amp, which is a tube amp that I've written about on this blog not long ago. My practice amp is a Fender Frontman 25R which I believe is out of production now. The 10 inch speaker in them are kinda crappy Chinese made speakers with scrawny little magnets. I plan on replacing that 'spanked' speaker with a good one eventually because it really was a good sounding amp with a fresh speaker. Anything past 7 on the volume knob is just making it sound bad. Its just not quite enough for using as a gigging amp (not enough stage volume) but its plenty good for practice because its small and light. My Fender Hot Rod Deluxe III weighs over 40 pounds and I have to have help with that one. I'm literally not supposed to lift over 10 pounds for the rest of my life because of my back being pieced together, so I either use a dolly and or get someone to carry it for me. That's a lot of the reason why I got a Telecaster and put my Les Paul in its case on standby. My Telecaster is between 3 and 4 pounds lighter than my Les Paul. That probably has a lot to do with why it always took me 3 or 4 days to get over playing a few hours. Its worth a little pain though to be able to play with a whole band, (just as long as you have some pain pills with you) haha.

Check out the Wampler Paisley Drive and see what you think of it. Go try one out at your nearest dealer and see for yourself just what this pedal is capable of. I think you'll love it as much as I do.

Much Peace and Love to Everyone .... and remember ...
~Its All About The Music~

More on Pedals and Pedal Boards

I recently made myself another pedal board. The first one I made would only hold three Boss type regular sized stomp boxes. I never intended to have a pedal board at all, but after I bought my Boss TU-3 Pedal Tuner, well, I suddenly had a pedal. There had been a specific pedal I'd had my eye on for a while but couldn't bring myself to get it. After all, its a signature pedal, and I've got a thing about that,  in fact I could probably write a small book on. But I won't go into that here. The end result is that, I WILL use a signature pedal. Maybe not just any signature pedal, but I will use at least this one.  I got a Wampler Paisley Drive after trying it out a little while and it was pretty much what I thought it might just be. Its a clean boost with a good distortion circuit. Don't get me wrong, its no thrash metal pedal. This thing is more for playing clean guitar sounds. You can put some distortion with it too. It's just right for most of the kinds of music I play. The more Country,Texas Country, Red Dirt leaning stuff is great for the Paisley Drive. Its the perfect pedal for that genre of music. Its great for Blues too, although I feel there are a few out there specifically made for blues that might get the job done a little better. But that's just another personal preference type of thing in my book.

Well hummmm, there's 2 pedals I have now all the sudden. The Paisley Drive made a little bit of noise, though not anywhere near as much as other drive pedals. So I eventually talked myself into a Boss NS-2 Noise Reduction.  And trust me, if you want to run a pedal board, a Boss NS-2 is the way to go. Then, if you must, you can plug in all those old 60's and 70's pedals that were all notorious for noise. Especially when you were using single coil pickups and there happened to be florescent lights overhead.  I have a set of Fender N3 Noisless Pickups in my Telecaster and they still get a little hum out of  fluorescent bulbs when I'm not running my pedal board. They advertise as being without the 60 cycle hum  but they do make a tiny bit of noise. So I know that Boss NS-2 Noise Reduction is still doing its job and then some. For 99 dollars plus tax its a must have pedal on any pedal board.

I started pricing pedal boards at all the big name dealers and for what they were, I just couldn't see the value in the money they were charging. They are basically stamping these things out on high speed presses. And then spot welding and or bolting them together, painting, or powder coating. Some of them attach 4 rubber feet on them. Some boards come with velcro, some come with the board only velcro'd. And most of them come with a cheap case that the zipper lasts about 2 or 3 gigs before the threading starts ripping out.

I had some nice white pine lumber laying around just waiting on something to be built out of it. So naturally one night I was out in my shop looking at the lumber and thinking about guitars etc ,, and said "why not build a pedal board out of this wood"?  I could either "throw one together" that would be about as good as anything else out on the market OR I could even come up with some really cool designs and other things that would make them stand out from the rest.

In my next post I'm going to show you how I built my own pedal boards. I've got a camera reader card to find between now and then but I'll get it done somehow. I'll show you start to finish pictures of how started and how I have already done a little bit R&D on it. I'm also drawing up blueprints and instructions for these in case there arises a need for them again.

So stay tuned .... I've been pretty sick for the past several days and I'm still not up to speed just yet.

~Its All About The Music~

New Fender Telecaster

This isn't really new news for me, but it is for this blog. Since I've been gone from blogging and out playing gigs, I've added a new guitar to my stable, and by far, its the best playing guitar I have ever purchased. Its the first real top of the line guitar I've ever bought too. My other guitars were all medium price range, enough to get the job done, guitars. This time I got a Fender American Deluxe Telecaster in Aged Cherry Sunburst. It has the new Fender N3 Noiseless Tele pickups as well as the S1 switch on the volume knob.

I don't know how much can be said about Fender's Telecaster Model that hasn't already been said. For me, its the best playing guitar I've ever had. I like the noiseless pickups too. I've always stayed away from single coil pickups in the past because they have been notoriously known for the buzz they can create. Especially if you're anywhere near a fluorescent lamp. But not these babies, no way, no buzz. 

I had been wanting a Telecaster for quite a long time, but I wanted an American made Telecaster if I was going to ever get one. Its a fairly serious investment so I wanted to go big and get something that holds its value. I got mine from Guitar Center and couldn't be happier about the service those guys give you there. Everyone that I've ever met there have always been very helpful in answering any questions I've had. And if they don't know the answer to your question, someone in the store will. And that's because they have specialist's employed in every department of the store. 

They also offer Pro Coverage on their products, which can be a very good thing to have in case you have a mishap. It might seem a little pricey when you're thinking it over, but when it comes to something you're going to drop some serious cash on its something well worth considering. 

I got a new amplifier at the same time I purchased my guitar, but I'll save that for a new blog post.
Stay tuned .......