Grunge is Dead - Nirvana

An iconic band, lead by an iconic guitarist/singer/songwriter. Nirvana's raw power swept the world of popular music, their breakthrough album, Nevermind, single-handedly overthrew the pretentious glam scene. Though Pearl Jam, Alice in Chains, Soundgarden and others are all great bands on their own, Nirvana was the one that allowed all of them to become commercially successful. The huge stardom eventually led to Kurt Cobain's downfall, he died on April 5th, 1994, joining the 27 Club. The circumstances of his death were quite strange and controversial, it was officially ruled a suicide, though you could make a strong case for murder. You decide, check out www.justiceforkurt.com.

Kurt was sort of an anti-hero of guitarists, he was not caught up with the nuances, but his songwriting skills and characteristic voice made him a legendary player. After a few hours of playing Nirvana songs, probably your hands will be stuck in a power chord shape, but nevertheless, as he once said in a Fender FrontLine interview: "I can't play [guitar] like Segovia. The flip side of that is that Segovia could probably never have played like me." (You can read the interview here http://tinyurl.com/6plz2wq and here http://tinyurl.com/7ruj546 - Segovia was a famous classical guitar player, regarded as one of the greatest guitarists ever to play) Bob Dylan was also a fan of Kurt's songwriting, after hearing Polly, he remarked: "That kid has heart".

Kurt's guitar sound is probably one of the most easily and inexpensively recreatable ones, but the feel-oriented style he played with is probably impossible to emulate. The guitar most widely associated with him is the Fender Mustang, which was, at the time, a cheap guitar, one you could probably pick up at a pawn shop. Kurt replaced the bridge pickup for a Seymour Duncan Hot Rails humbucker, and installed a tune-o-matic bridge. Other "pawn shop pickups" include his Fender Jaguars, now, needless to say, going at a much higher price than back then. Fender now offers Kurt Cobain signature models of both the Mustang and the Jaguar. Kurt was also experimenting with a new guitar he called the Jag-Stang, which combined the strengths of both guitars. Fender eventually created it for him, but it was rarely used. Japanese-made Jag-Stangs were available for purchase for a short period of time, but it has been discontinued since.


Kurt's pedalboard's mainstays were the BOSS (Roland) DS-series pedals, he started out with the DS-1, then switched to the DS-2 Turbo Distortion in February '92. Other overdrive/distortion pedals he used include an MXR Distortion, a ProCo RAT, an EHX Big Muff, and a Tech 21 Sans Amp Classic, which was his main distortion during the In Utero era. His choice of chorus pedal was the EHX Small Clone (which is still surprisingly cheap), its sound can clearly be heard in the song Come As You Are. Other pedals he used include an EHX PolyChorus/EchoFlanger, but he used these sporadically. You can't go wrong if you get yourself a BOSS DS-2 and an EHX Small Clone, then rock away.

Lots and lots of videos, books, websites, and films have been made about Nirvana and Kurt, some good, some terrible, but there are two things I recommend you to check out if you are interested. The first one is http://www.kurtsequipment.com/, which covers everything you can possibly know about Kurt's gear. The other is a film called Kurt Cobain: About a Son, which is narrated by Kurt Cobain himself, the autobiography introduces us to the world he grew up in.

Are You Experienced? - Jimi Hendrix

"I don't believe in God, but if I did, he would be a black, left-handed guitarist" The Dreamers

Jimi Hendrix. Even if you never followed popular music, you heard about this guy. Eccentric behaviour, Woodstock, Club 27, he had everything to become a rock legend. He was not necessarily the most sophisticated guitar player (still, I think most of us would be happy with what he got), but he was creative, he was an innovator. He is credited for bringing a number of effects into mainstream use, he was famous for using a lot of feedback and cranking up the amp to 12 (yeah, he could do it).

JH's signature, upside down right-handed Fender Stratocaster was a huge part of his sound. This inversion changed the usual sound characteristics of the Strat, since his lower strings had a bright sound and his higher ones had a mellow sound this way. His longtime friend and technician, Roger Mayer, mentioned in a recent Guitar World interview (http://www.guitarworld.com/interview-roger-mayer-secrets-jimi-hendrixs-guitar-setup#slide-0) that they also strung the instrument in a rather unconventional way; the gauges ran .010, .013, .015, .026, .032 and .038, in order to balance out the sound, to avoid the general G-heavy (the G-string generally has a higher diameter than what would come in a logical series) guitar sound. He didn't mess with the stock pickups. Another interesting thing to note is that he was able to fret bass notes with his thumb (he had freakishly large hands), while he would play melodic lines with his "regular" fingers easily.

Hendrix's two main effects, which he used almost all the time, were the Arbiter Fuzz Face and a Vox wah-wah pedal. In the first post we have already discussed the way a Fuzz overdrive works, now is the time to look into a wah a little. It is usually combined with an expression pedal (to easily alter the level of the effect with your feet while playing), but there are autowahs out there, which act just like regular stompboxes. Wahs are filter pedals, which emulate human sound by sweeping peak responses, then altering their frequencies up and down to reach that recognizable sound. Probably the most famous example of the Wah-Wah is the Jim Dunlop CryBaby, which is available in many versions (including a Hendrix one) in almost every guitar shop.

Roger Mayer later made him an Octavia pedal, which reproduced the played notes one octave higher and/or lower. The use of this effect can be clearly heard on his legendary track, Purple Haze. He also used a Japanese Uni-Vibe pedal, which was used to emulate a rotating Leslie speaker. It is now manufactured by Dunlop, though its pricetag is quite high.

Initially, Jimi used Fender and Vox amplifiers, but soon he switched to Marshall amplifications, after he was introduced to these British monsters. Jim Marshall's high gain creations helped Hendrix create his original, trendsetting sound, which still inspires and is emulated by thousands of guitar players in the world.

Jimi Hendrix is the quintessential guitar hero, musical genius, and rock legend.