New Guitar Pedal Day: TC Electronics Grand Magus: A Review For New Guitarists

I remember the excitement I felt when I bought my first guitar.  Unlike most guitarists who start with a guitar that resembles a piece of gloried plywood, I actually had a pretty good guitar.  I still have it, and it's still a dang good guitar.

But I also remember the first time I walked into Mars Music and tried to buy strings for that guitar.  Before I purchased it, my guitar had been sitting a long time and the strings were beyond dead.  As a cello player I had the experience to know to put new strings on it.  There was no doubt about that.  I could hear how completely lifeless they were.  Not to mention rusty.

So I walk up to the guitar string counter at Mars Music.  There were over 200 types of strings hanging on the wall.  I ask the salesman "What strings do I need to put on this guitar?"

He said, "He didn't know.  They were all good."

I just looked at him, and thought, "Um, isn't this your job?"

For the record my guitar was/is a 1998 Paragon Music Center (PMC) copy of a Joe Pass hollow-body guitar.  It was built in the same factory as the Epiphones at that time.  It's only difference was the headstock design.  It actually came stock with Epiphone pickups.

So I ask the salesman, "Well, I see the sets come in different sizes.  What size do I need?"

He asked if he could check out my guitar.  I said, "Sure."

He replied, "Yeah, those are 10's on there."

"So I guess I should buy some 10's?" I asked.

"Yeah."

"Okay, what brand do you recommend?"

"I dunno."

I started to get a little perturbed.  "I just bought this guitar a few days ago.  I need to put some strings on it.  What should I do?  I don't know jack squat about any of the brands."

So he ended up handing me a pack of GHS 10's.  In some weird way I'm glad he did.  After playing for 20 years I like GHS strings the best.  They have the best bite to them, and they work for my style of playing.

But then a month goes by, and I decide I need a distortion pedal.  Again, I go up to the Mars Music counter, and see hundreds of pedals.  What am I to do?  Where do I start?  This time I asked a different salesman.  Might I say this was also before YouTube and websites that would let you hear what a pedal sounded like before you went to the store.

I tell him what I want, and he says, "Why not try out the DOD Grunge pedal?"  Long story short, I ended up trying it out, and buying it.  I'll say this, it was a good starter pedal.  But also looking back there were much better choices out there.

Now I think of today's new guitarists.  They have ten times the choices that I had!  That goes from guitars, pedals, pickups, amps, picks, cables, mods, etc.  Where does a new guitarist start?  The good news is they have YouTube and guitar forums.  That's a huge help.  I personally have learned a lot about electronics from the internet.

One of the biggest hurdles I had to overcome was music's "marketing language."  You see, a brand can't really say, "This is our take on Marshall's blah, blah, blah."  No, that's trademark infringement.  So companies have these code words they use to describe when their gear has a similar sound to another companies' product.

It goes like this:

American Rock Sound = Fender.
British Rock Sound = Marshall.
California Sound = Mesa Boogie.

When they can't say "Les Paul" or "Les Paul style" guitar, they say, "LP" or "Single Cutaway."
When they can't say "Stratocaster" they say, "Double Cutaway."

If you read study enough and look around the internet you'll start to pick up the lingo.  And why is that important?  Because like I said earlier, todays' musician has more choices than ever before.

When I started the very first distortion pedal everyone usually bought was the Boss DS-1 Distortion.

It's a simple circuit and has been used by many famous guitarists despite being a relatively cheap pedal.  For years you could buy one new for $39.99.  Heck, Kurt Cobain used this pedal on a lot of Nirvana's songs, especially on the their first release "Bleach."  

Today, the pedal market is at an all time high for the sheer number of pedals on the market.  You have the brands that have been there for a while, "Boss, Digitech, and Electro Harmonix."  You have also more custom builders now than there ever has been.  And then you have everyone at every price point in-between.  

Lately TC Electronics has been making some great pedals at a dang good price point.  During a holiday sale two years ago they had a special going at Guitar Center.  Three pedals for $99.  You have to remember back when I bought that DOD Grunge pedal, it cost $54.99 in 1998.  

With inflation think of what that pedal would cost today.  The CPI Inflation Calculator says that would be $87.85 in today's money.  And those were the cheap pedals!  So this leads to the question, "Well, how good can TC Electronics' pedals be if they are that inexpensive?"

To be honest, I have found them shockingly good.  I love their Choka Tremolo pedal.  The Nether Octave is a great octave for it's price point.  The El Mocambo is one of the best Tubescreamer clones I have heard.  I'll say it this way, it works for me.  It may not be for everyone, but it works for me.  

So when I saw that TC Electronic had a pedal called the Grand Magus I was immediately interested.

What surprised me was how many I found on the used market. Unlike a lot of TC Electronics' products this one didn't have as many good reviews.  I listened to a few clips of it on the internet, and was really on the fence about it.  It sold new for $50, and used for $25 plus shipping.  

I ended up pulling the trigger on one, and couldn't wait to plug it in when it arrived.  I immediately loved it.  So what changed my mind?  There are quite a few reasons.  Let me start at the beginning. 

One of the best pieces of advice I can give any beginning metal guitarists, is that, there are two main ways of EQing your amp.  I'm going to keep it overly simple because again, I want to speak to a beginner.  First up is what I'll call, "The Metallica way."  On your EQ knobs you turn up your treble and bass, and turn down or (scoop) the mids.  Dimebag Darrell's signature sound was also like this.

Next up, we have what I'll call, "The Slayer way."  Think of Slayer's song, "Seasons in the Abyss."  That first really heavy cord you hear?  That's mids baby.  Slayer uses what they call the "frowny face" EQ.  They turn town the bass and treble and crank up the mids.  

So the "overly simple" explanation is there are two main EQ's when playing metal.  #1. Scooped mids, or #2. Lots of mids.  Players tend to be in one camp or or the other with no in-between.  The scooped sound is all the rage, but your bass can be lost when playing with an actual bass player.  I'm in the camp that says, "Mids are where the angry lives."

Marshall's sound is known for their full midrange sound.  This is due to their use of EL-34 tubes.  The Grand Magus pedal has a lot of mids.  When you go to the Grand Magus webpage they use every bit of musician lingo to try to let you know this is a Marshall type of sound.

https://www.tcelectronic.com/Categories/Tcelectronic/Guitar/Stompboxes/GRAND-MAGUS-DISTORTION/p/P0CAU#googtrans(en|en)

There are a few reasons I didn't care for the reviews online.  First, recording and making mids sound right is tough.  It tends to come through as buzzy.  Then, when that same clip is played through computer speakers it sounds even worse.  

The other reason I didn't care for the reviews online is for something you wouldn't think of.  The tone control on the Grand Magus pedal is extremely wide.  It's so wide you can get a bad sound out of it.  Think of it this way.  The doom/stoner metal crowd is a big fan of Orange amps.  To me they always sounded muddy with no harmonics, but to each their own.  

Well, the tone control on the Grand Magus is so wide that you can get into that doom/stoner metal territory.  But if you turn the tone control up, you can get that classic Marshall sound.  I also want to give TC Electronic props for having the gain control have such a wide distortion.  You can use this pedal for slight blues breakup to full blown Marshall stack.  One thing you'll learn is a lot of pedals' gain knob maxes out of 12 O'clock.  The Grand Magus makes full use of the gain control.  

I realize I may get a lot of hack on this post.  I'm sure a lot of more experienced musicians will say, "So you think a $25 pedal is good?"  I'm saying I wish when I started it was the first pedal I bought.  It would have been a lot more useful to me than the DOD Grunge.  

And for the record, my "good" pedal is a Hughes and Kettner Tube Factor pedal.  

But I'm not going to tell a new player they should buy a $279 pedal right out of the starting gate.  I'm saying if a new player wants that mid heavy Marshall sound at a decent price, buy a used TC Electronic Grand Magus.  It will be a great decision.  Also if they hate it, they can get their money back on it by selling on Craigslist.  

So to my beginner guitar players.  You have many choices out there.  Remember this.  You vote with your dollars.  That goes for anything in life.  My small amount of advice to you is this.  If I was the salesman at Mars Music, and I had a first time pedal buyer asking me about the first pedal I should buy, it would be the TC Electronic Grand Magus.  (Note: Yes, I realize they didn't exist back in 1998.)  

For those players who say, "No man!  I want that mid-scooped sound!"  Well, you can always buy a Biyang Tonefancier Metal End King.  That will sure scoop the hell out of your mids.

What If Guitar Forums Had Been Around In The 60's?

Even on internet guitar forums, members crack jokes about players who spend more time talking about music on the forums than actually playing music.  I have to say I used to spend a good deal of time on two guitar related forums, but the overall negativity just started getting to me.  I had to stop looking at them.

I checked out a few other forums besides those two, but the majority of the posts were by bad musicians giving bad advice, or just overall negative comments.  There was one common thread they all seemed to have though.  Kirk Hammett of Metallica was their favorite punching bag.

The funny thing was it always came down to the same complaint.  That being, "Kirk Hammett needs to lay off the fucking wah, man!"  For those of you who are not musicians, they are referring to a wah-wah pedal.  

I have no idea why this tends to bother some musicians so much.  Honestly, I never would have given it any thought.  As players we all use pedals, some more than others.  So what if Kirk likes to lay on his wah wah pedal more than other players?

This got me to thinking... a dangerous thing, I know.  What if they had internet music forums back in the 1960's.  Would players have posted, "You have to check out this new sound," or something like that?  Or would it have been, "Eric Clapton needs to lay off the fucking wah, man!"

For those of you not familiar with Eric Clapton's career he was in many bands, but he made a huge impact musically for the band, "Cream."  You may be familiar with the songs, "Sunshine of Your Love" and "White Room."  They were from the classic masterpiece, "Disraeli Gears."

At the time the wah wah pedal was pretty new, and Eric Clapton pretty much laid on it throughout the entire album.  Here's "Tales of Brave Ulysses."  Listen, and hear how the wah never stops.

In the 1960's there was an actual saying, "Clapton is God!"  Here's a famous photo that shows where someone had spray painted it on the London Underground.

While Eric Clapton is an amazing musician and a "players' player," I can't help but think if they had music forums in the 60's that the majority of posts would be shitting all over his playing.  

Complaining about music and not actually playing it is what they do today.  That's why I gave up the forums.  Except for the trading posts.  Musicians that are unsatisfied with their equipment tend to offer it for a good price.  

So my musician friends, the best advice I can give you is be yourself.  Play what you want.  Lay on the wah if you want.  But limit your time on the forums.  It's not good for your mental health.  

The Bass! Part 4,

Part 1:  http://angjellockheart.blogspot.com/2014/10/the-bass-there-are-no-such-things-as.html

Part 2:  http://angjellockheart.blogspot.com/2014/10/the-bass-part-2.html
Part 3:  http://angjellockheart.blogspot.com/2014/10/the-bass-part-3-punk-rock-bass.html

So I had been waiting on the bridge to arrive, and it finally did. 

While it was not an exact replacement of the old one, the saddles lined up just fine.  And in the end, that's what's important.

I then had to deal with the pickguard not lining up exactly.  However, the use of a long screw took care of a, now, tiny problem.

As you can see, it worked out pretty good.  It holds rather nicely.

However then came a problem I did not forsee.  This happens with older guitar or bass necks.  With no tension on it, the neck is straight.  But with the strings at full tension the heal kicks up.  So I am torn between having insanely high action, or the frets not being playable from the 12th fret up. 

Now, the normal way to correct this is to yank out the frets below the 12th fret, shave the fingerboard, and replace the frets.  However, the fingerboard is maple, and if I shave it I will have to re-finish it.  Right now, I don't have time for that.  I have to make the bass somewhat playable for the next gig. 

Once we cross that bridge, I will go back and start work on it.  I might be able to shave the frets down, and make it playable.  But I'll deal with that when I get there. 

I knew I would be a pain to put this thing together, but I didn't think it would be "THIS" much of a pain.  I did a lot more work on this thing than I had planned to. 

But here's the result.  Not too bad.

The Bass! Part 3, Punk Rock Bass

Part 1:  http://angjellockheart.blogspot.com/2014/10/the-bass-there-are-no-such-things-as.html

Part 2:  http://angjellockheart.blogspot.com/2014/10/the-bass-part-2.html

So I have been having problems with the wiring.  Seriously, I've been working something like a week on it.  But instead of making a long story out of it, I'll just say this.  It seems one of the volume pots was bad, and not sending enough signal through to the tone pot.  That's why I couldn't get the tone pot to work.

I do want to say now that the volume is LOUD!!!  Now that I have a proper working volume pot, it's surprising just how loud these Dragonfire active pickups are.  I can't wait to get strings on this bass.

And simply put, I yanked out everything, and started with all new parts.

So after getting all the electronics working, I made holes for all the screws, and fitted the pickguard and output jack. 

Even though I don't have the bridge yet, I used my straight edge to get a proper angle on how I should shim the neck.  I used a rather thick piece of wood, and shimmed it.  It came out exactly how I wanted.  I may have to adjust it further once I get the bridge in, but it's a good start.

So onto the pictures!!!

So the bass looks very worn and punk rock to me.  It was a great bass to get some practice in on a few things.  More to come when I get the bridge in the mail, and get the bass finally set up.

New Broken Amp Day, Part 4

Here are the previous parts of this post:

Part 1. 
http://angjellockheart.blogspot.com/2013/11/new-broken-amp-day.html

Part 2.
http://angjellockheart.blogspot.com/2013/11/new-broken-amp-day-part-2.html

Part 3.
http://angjellockheart.blogspot.com/2013/11/new-broken-amp-day-part-3.html


Well, here's what happened so far.  I bought some Electro Harmonix tubes for the amp.  After putting them in, and making sure the amp's switch was put to EL-34, I fired it up.  Shockingly, I actually got guitar sounds out of it.  But I also got a loud humming.  At this point I knew I had gone as far as I could with this amp.  It was time to take it to a pro.

I took it down to Diversified Audio where they discovered that the tube sockets needed reseated and soddered.  They also biased the amp to fit the new tubes.

So here's the rundown so far.

$90 - Amp
$15 - Gas and Tolls to go get the amp
$100 - Tubes and handle
$7 - Fuses and washers
$107 - Repair costs
$4 - Silver/metal polish

Total cost - $323

But here's the main question, what does it sound like?  It sounds awesome.  It is brighter than I thought it would be, has a touch of compression, and sounds like a high end amp should. 

On a side note, I decided to go with a "hard" tube quartet.  That means that the tubes won't overdrive as easily.  But there is a method to my madness.  This amp has so much gain on tap that it makes it more usable if I were to use tubes that won't distort as quickly.  It spaces out the gain more evenly. 

I haven't gotten to play it much, but I plan on taking it outside and really cranking it up. 

Here's the picture of it after all the work.

New Broken Amp Day

I used to work at a music store that carried Laney Amps.  Until I worked there, I didn't know much about them.  I kind of found out they were the "other" British amp aside from Marshall.  They are very well made, but they aren't too big over here in the U.S. as they are in the U.K.

To make a long story short I found a guy on Craigslist selling a Laney GH-100-L amp for only $90.  Normally they cost $1200 new, so I knew something was amiss. Actually, I have to be a touch honest in that, he posted that it was broken, and roughed up.  It had no sound coming out of it.  He didn't want to mess with taking it to a repair shop, so he was just getting rid of it.

Here's a funny thing.  He lives halfway between Tampa and Orlando.  So he had about 20 people interested in the amp, none of them wanted to make the drive for it though.  They wanted him to deliver.  I was the only one who would drive to him.  And to be completely honest, it was a 98 mile round trip.  That's what the car odometer said.

So I did look it over, and decided that it was a worthwhile investment.  But here's what's wrong with it.

1. No handle.
2. No back plate.
3. Missing a foot.
4. A lot of dust, and more rust than there should be. I mean, was this thing near the salt water?
5. Powers up, but no sound.
6. 2 of the output jacks are shoved inside the chassis. Why? I have no idea.
7. Some of the switches on the back are also not lined up with the chassis.
8. This is normally shipped with EL-34 tubes, but has a switch that lets you put in 6L6 tubes. Right now it has 6L6 tubes.
9. The one part on the side looks taped up for some reason.
10. This thing had set for 5 years or more without being fired up.

So here's what I'm looking at. I need to buy all new tubes. For those of you who know me, know I love EH tubes. This has J.J. preamp tubes, and Mesa 6L6 tubes. Nothing wrong with the Mesa tubes, but I bought a British amp to sound like a British amp. So EL-34's are going in this thing.

Since it's sat so long, I'm sure it needs a sodder job. That's one reason I'm sure that it will fire up, but not have sound come out.

I need to clean it up. No biggie on that, I can wipe dust and rust off.

I do need to buy a handle, foot, maybe a back plate for it. I also need to staple down the tolex in the back.

So here's the total cost I am estimating I'm looking at.  $90 for the amp.  $15 for gas and tolls.  $130 for new tubes.  $120 for sodder job (if needed.)  New, handle, foot, and backplate, $50.  I suspect that the amp was run in the wrong mode for the tubes it has in it.  That means that a few of the capacitors are burnt or wore out.  Depending upon the number of them, it could be upwards of $30. 

So it's not a cheap repair, but I will see if I can do some of it on my own.  Anyway, onto the pictures.

Repairing Josh's Guitar, Part 2

For Part 1, read this:

http://angjellockheart.blogspot.com/2013/05/repairing-joshs-guitar-part-1.html

I'll start from where I left off last time.  Basically I had glued the guitar's neck back together, and had sanded the rough cracks even.  I had added stain and the first coat of wipe on polyurethane. 

My next steps where just adding wipe on poly once a day for a number of days.  Once I had done that I decided to buff out the neck on my buffing machine.  Here's the pictures from that.

I have to say that I am pretty happy with that.  I wasn't sure how it was going to come out.  Honestly, I have to say this was my best work on a cracked neck.  But truthfully, no two cracked guitar necks are the same.  But I was able to get this repaired, and the truss rod still works fine.  That's a giant relief.

So next was making the bone nut.  Since Josh  had lost the original plastic nut, I had to build him a new one.  I won't go over step by step on how I made it.  Only know that I put a good amount of time into it.  I hadn't made a bone nut in years, and there is a real art to it.  You can put a lot of time and effort into making one, and despite your best efforts it can come out like crap.  Like I said, there is a real art to it. 

But I'm glad to say it came out great.  Here are the pictures of me making it.

If you wonder what the black marks are, those are graphite from a pencil.  It helps slicken the grooves so the strings slide easier. 

Next up was double checking how the poly on the back of the neck had dried. 

I gotta say, I am really pleased with how the guitar came out.  I set it up, and it plays really nice. Now let's hope that Josh won't do something else dangerous to this guitar. 

Repairing Josh's Guitar, Part 1.

I have a friend named Josh.  He's a great guy, but sometimes doesn't make the best decisions.  Case in point, he was doing something not so smart and broke the neck on his Dean acoustic guitar.  Well, that means it's time for to work my magic.  I mean, I fret dressed and set up that guitar to actually make it playable in the first place.  So my goal is to make it at least 95% of what it was. 

Luckily, I took pictures.  Here's what the guitar looked like with giant cracks in it.

So yeah, that's not pretty.  But that's not the only thing.  When the guitar hit the concrete it also scratched up the back.  Here's some pictures of it.

All those white marks are scratches.  It looks like I have my work cut out for me.

First up, I loosened the truss rod, and saw that the wood wanted to lay flat together.  I then loaded as much Titebond 2 wood glue as I could into the various cracks.  Next, I used my old timey clamps to clamp it together.

Here's the pictures of the clamping.

I have the one clamp angled like that to hold one of the splintered ends in, so it could glue up. 

I then let the glue have 48 hours to dry.  I always give Titebond 2 48 hours to dry.  So this is what it looked like after I took off the clamps.

Despite being somewhat jagged, the wood glued together pretty good.  Luckily there is a neat trick I know about working on overseas Dean guitars.  They are actually sprayed with a polyester spray, not polyurethane.  That means you can lay into them on a buffing wheel.  So I took the neck of the guitar and put it on the buffing wheel to knock down the edges.

Next I started sanding out the high edges.  Here's the pics.

As you can see, I taped off the parts I didn't want to get scratched.  I then took a block sander and smoothed down any high spots.  I then took it back to the buffer.

However, I not only buffed the neck, but the body as well.  Remember those scratches on the back of the guitar?  Well, I took them to the buffer as well.

First up, here's the neck after the 2nd buffing.

And here are the pictures of the body.

Not only was I able to get those scratches out, I was able to get a few other ones out as well.  I also smoothed up a few places that couldn't be seen on camera, but could be seen by the naked eye. 

Next it was time to start making the neck look nice.  First up was adding stain to it.  This is what it looked like after the stain.

And then I started adding a Wipe On Poly.  This is only the first coat, but look at the outcome!

I've been working on guitars for a while, but this is the best I have ever done on a repaired neck.  I guess practice makes perfect.  But I've gotta say, this one presented me with a good challenge.  It's not over.  I still need to build up layers of poly, make a bone nut, and set her up again.  Wait until Part 2.  It may look like a whole new guitar.