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“The White Album was the first thing that I connected with as a kid”: Flea picks his top 5 ‘desert island’ discs
The Red Hot Chili Pepper was also asked to name his dream supergroup. Safe to say he picked himself on bass
The history of Paul McCartney and the Höfner 500/1 bass guitar
What made the violin bass Macca's number one through the Beatles years and beyond – and how he was reunited with his original Höfner, over 50 years after it disappeared
“I loved the sound of doubled guitars, but it just becomes a slog. I couldn’t hate the process more… it goes right against the immediacy I wanted for this record”: Why Jawbox hero J. Robbins changed his attitude to recording… and smashing guitars
The Jawbox leader, who regrets breaking his “dearest companion” Jazzmaster, shares his love of hand-built Hiwatt clones, how Stone Temple Pilots hooked him up with his live guitar arsenal, and what it was like to snag Naked Raygun’s “secret shredder” John Haggerty for his latest album, Basilisk
“Technical playing can get cleaner, and that’s possibly even more challenging than just being faster”: We met the academics who study shred guitar for a living – they explained why it’s changed dramatically since the ’80s, and the 3 ways it can develop
A new study documents the challenges facing modern-day virtuosos, who not only have to balance perfection and authenticity, but now have to be “10 things that used to be 10 full-time professions”
“I was never a huge Led Zeppelin fan, but I always loved that song, and the open strings just set it up for bass”: Watch Stuart Hamm’s bass arrangement of Led Zeppelin’s Going to California
Stuart Hamm walks you through the highlights of his fifth solo album, including a bass arrangement of a John Paul Jones classic
“I hate punching in. If you don’t have your bassline down, you shouldn’t be doing what you’re doing”: Rex Brown reveals the tricks behind his super-heavy bass technique
Pantera bassist Rex Brown on his precision-engineered picking technique, and why he’s not into “bouncing around with Pro Tools”
“I’d always borrow guitars, but after we signed to this asshole label, one of the guys gave me the Jazzmaster. I’ve never had a reason to get another guitar”: Jason Lytle on Grandaddy’s emotional return and his ’70s Fender devotion
The Grandaddy band leader always preferred “keeping things pure” to achieving greatness – and he’s done almost all of it with the one and only guitar he’s ever needed
“I get to call out wrongdoing and injustice. I get to be really angry – ‘I can’t find the words, so here’s a guitar solo that explains it’”: How Emily Wolfe uses her music as therapy
Bandmates helped the Epiphone signature artist through the pain of delivering the deeply personal songs from new album The Blowback – and she believes the ”tough but beautiful” experience will help others
![Dirty Sound Magnet [L-R]: Marco Mottolini (bass guitar), Stavros Dzodzos (guitar/vocals), Maxime Cosandey (drums)](https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/wjqtjU8uisahDGf4NgHzpD-840-80.jpg.webp)
“I never have boundaries regarding the gear I use – my rule is simply to follow my ears”: Dirty Sound Magnet sound like Hendrix meets the Doors by way of Zappa – Stavros Dzodzos explains how analog adventurism fuels their psychedelic sound
Dirty Sound Magnet have the sound of a band trying to shake loose reality. Guitarist/vocalist Dzodzos shares his analog-forward tone approach
“I used to not bend strings at all, but I started doing it as a joke to make my friends laugh when I played classic rock riffs – it became this massive part of my playing”: Omni’s Frankie Broyles on his unlikely journey to post-punk transcendence
Post-punk trio Omni are masters of minimalism, but guitarist Frankie Broyles is having fun with classic rock moves and ZZ Top-inspired tones
