Pedals

So the other week I finally got my hands on one of these bad boys:

Line 6 FBV Express controller for Line 6 amps

To be honest I wasn't even aware of its existence or if it'd make the slightest difference to how I switch between the amp settings. Ok 4 buttons rather than 2 would make it easier but apart from that what difference would it make to me really? Then I found out about the FBV Express's built in wah/volume pedal (the effect isn't part of my old Line 6 Spider 112 amp), not bad for a simple amp switch! After discovering that little nugget of information I had to get one.

A week or two later I stumbled across a guitar show happening just down the road (it was literally a case of finding out about it the night before!). After wondering around the same old stalls selling either really expensive guitars or cheap low end crap (apart from the guy selling vintage Fender acoustics which were really tempting) I found myself a little bored until I stumbled across these 2 second hand beauties for a combined price of just £45!

Boss SD-1 overdrive and Ibanez DE7 delay/echo

I also picked up this cheap Ukelele for £15

With the addition of the above 3 pedals (as well as recent acquisitions of a Dod Supra Distortion FX55-B, a Line 6 Tone Core Tap Tremolo and a power bank to run them all on) I thought it was about time I built a pedal board to hold/manage/store them all. With this in mind I purchased this big block of wood for B&Q.

 I also bought some velcro too but as I was waiting for that to come in the post I had a play around with possible formations.

This piece of wood is way too big!

 Velcro has now arrived but in the meantime I also got one of these cool vintage Boss pedals from Ebay.

 This will most likely replace the crappy old Dinosaur overdrive pedal and I'm also probably going to look into building a few pedals from the BYOC (Build Your Own Clone)website so maybe I'll have to re-think the layout of the board (just as well I bought such a large piece) and poss invest in another power bank too!!

As for now though it looks like I have my next guitar project sorted. Yay!

What's the story?...

I hate that phrase they use repeatedly throughout X-Factor (in fact I pretty much just hate X-Factor in general!), 'telling the story', 'you told the story well' etc. It just seems like lazy criticism for airheads like Cheryl Cole to use because she hasn't got an opinion of her own. Of course they told the story, the lyrics tell you what the song's about, how the author was feeling at the time etc and by reciting those words back to us (along to a melody for good measure) they are in fact 'telling the story'. 

It's a term I really despise and it seems to have become synonymous with these so called 'talent' shows. As I said it's something I think any musician can achieve just by singing a song. This was until the other week when I stumbled across a cover of Katy Perry's 'Teenage Dreams' on Youtube (I was actually listening to a Goo Goo Dolls cover by the same band and for some reason decided to explore the links on the sidebar) by Boyce Avenue. I've heard this song a million times on the radio (mostly due to the station in the office played at work churning out the same 4 songs every hour!) and have never really paid much attention to the lyrics until I heard this version.

Actually quite liked the 1st verse, seems quite meaningful for a pop song/Katy Perry. I never got around to the bit at the end where the lyrics go on about skin-tight jeans, to be honest I much prefer to think of Mrs Brand (Katy Perry that is not Jo Brand or any other Mrs Brand for that matter) when I hear that line but as far as cover versions go it's not too bad. Must be the way they told the story.

And now back to something decent!