Ever run across those pedals that, even though you have never played through them, never heard someone play through them, never even heard a youtube demo or read a review on them, you just know sound good? And you’re going, ‘I need that pedal. It’s no longer a question. In one week (less if people would just use Priority instead of blasted UPS) I will see that pedal on my board. And there will be much rejoicing.’ And then you literally like, can’t sleep until you have obtained, tocuhed, caressed, and…we’ll just leave it at that…that pedal? But you’ve never even heard it? Or heard of it?!
Yep. You know the ones. The BJFe ‘Sea Blue EQ’. The Subdeceay ‘Liquid Sunshine’ overdrive. The Blackbox ‘Ultraviolet’ fuzz. The Mad Professor ‘Deep Blue’ delay. I mean, how can a pedal called ‘Liquid Sunshine’ not sound good? You’re playing your rig one day, and you’re like, ‘You know what my tone could use? More brightness. But…with more smoothness and warmth at the same time.’ You go online, start looking for pedals, and viola. ‘Liquid Sunshine.’ And somehow, your brain literally can’t comprehend how something called ‘Liquid Sunshine’ could not sound exactly like, actual, ‘Liquid Sunshine.’
(Okay, seriously. How can that not sound good? Even if it doesn’t……nope, it does.)
I have bought many pedals this way. And amps. It’s sad. And it’s only when I hear the recordings afterwards that I go, ‘What’s that horrible sound?’ Oh. The good-sounding pedal. No, not the good ‘sounding’ pedal, when you play it; the good ‘sounding’ pedal…when you say its name.
Or it works the other way, too. I didn’t give the Damage Control Timeline, my ‘favorite child’ or ‘firstborn’ of delay pedals now, if you will, a chance for six months after it came out. Why? Because it’s called the ‘Damage Control Timeline’! That’s a horrible name! It’s trying way, way too hard to be cool. And, of course, ‘Timeline’ just brings up images of a certain horrendous movie starring a certain horrendous actor who’s name rhymes with ‘Paul Walker’ (okay, that wasn’t a rhyme, that’s actual name) that I have mentioned before……but have absolutely no qualms about mentioning again:
(hehehe It never gets old.)
Anyway, I’m over at a really cool guy’s house yesterday. Eric Beeman. Check out his blog. He’s a worship leader at another church pretty local to mine, but he’s the one who did most of the training for me to lead worship. So we get together every once in a while, and he gives me worship leading tips, and I give him lead guitar tips. He’s into trem right now, and asked if I could do a shootout video of the Danelectro Tuna Melt tremolo and some other trems. And immediately I’m hooked. And I went home and bought one. But I think it was moreso because I was hungry, then actually into the pedal.
See, I’m also on this lemonade fast. It’s the new ‘green’ thing to do. It’s supposed to totally clean out your system of all the processed junk that we eat that sticks to your intestinal walls and causes dormant viruses for years and years…you know, like those times that you actually dare to read the ingredient labels of the food you eat, and you’re like, ‘How is it possible to eat colors?’ Yep. You drink fresh-squeezed lemons and pure maple syrup for ten days, and (I can’t believe I’m seriously going to quote Beverly Hills Cop 3 here): ‘Out comes a candy bar from when you were five.’ My wife and I did it about 6 months ago for the first time, and we each lost like, 25 pounds. So I’m trying to do it every six months. Mostly because I have hero issues, and always like to pretend that I’m an actor or studio musician in Hollywood. And since this diet is the latest Hollywood craze, if it’s good enough for Brad Pitt, it’s good enough for me. Which is basically my motto for all things life. (In fact, before we found out that they literally build a fortress around the Kodak Theatre for the Oscars, we were going to go down there tomorrow so that I could see my big boy crush, Brad Pitt, and she could see her big girl crush, Amy Adams. Both are nominated this year, and well-deserved. But also, we’re like the only people in the world who actually saw Richard Jenkins of ‘Fun With Dick and Jane’ and ‘I Heart Huckabees’ fame in ‘The Visitor’, and he actually got an Oscar nomination! He was amazing in it. So we were planning on making his day by being the only ones screaming, ‘Richard Jenkins! Richard Jenkins!’ ……Uh, anyway……)
Today is day 6 of the fast. So needless to say, I’m dastardly hungry. (Okay, I thought I made that word up, but wordpress totally didn’t underline it. Score!) So Eric mentions ‘Danelectro Tuna Melt’ and all I can think of is ‘Mmmmmm…tuna melt.’ I have no idea if it’ll sound good or not, or even if I’ll be able to resell it…especially if it loses really badly in the trem shootout like I hope ‘Slumdog Millionaire’ loses in the Oscars tomorrow. I mean, it was a good film and all……but can we please stop trying to show how cool we are because we like, or will vote for ‘the foreign indie’ film? (And by ‘we’, I mean ‘Hollywood.’ Nope. Stop. Don’t say anything. Just let me have my delusions that I can refer to Hollywood and myself as ‘we’.) Let’s be real here. If it’s now in every theatre across the world, and is now the favorite to win, it’s no longer indie, people. If every single person you know talks about Slumdog Millionaire as if it’s the underground sleeper movie and how cool they are for having seen it, then it’s not. You just can’t have your ‘indie’ and your ‘widely accepted’ together. Now, if you truly dug the movie, then awesome. But my humble (okay maybe not) opinion? It’s a decent flick that wasn’t incredibly well-done or well-written, but does gain a lot by being able to show a history of India we haven’t seen before. But of course, being ‘decent’ is all a film needs when it’s also ‘foreign indie.’ And that had nothing to do with the Danelectro Tuna Melt (mmmm), but hey…if you’re here…you gotta be expecting this by now. ;)
(This is the Danelectro Tuna Melt. I used to like the looks of this pedal. Now it just looks like disgusting lemons. I used to like lemons, too.)
So where was I? Oh ya! Dastardly (hehe) hunger, and wanting to eat the Danelectro pedal. Ya, even electronics are sounding good to eat at this point. I’m so hungry. I feel like I’m pregnant. The cravings are uncontrollable. I’m craving peanuts, string cheese, and a monte cristo from Crepe Vine in Pasadena. Oh ya, and a tuna melt. In fact, this may be the closest a guy will ever feel to being pregnant. Well, that and a kidney stone. Okay, yikes. Where in the world am I going with this right now?! My apologies. I haven’t eaten in six days.
Suffice it to say, pedals that have ‘tone’ names just sound better. I don’t care how it sounds, the Catalinbread ‘Silver Kiss’ sounds good. And I will be doing a shootout of a couple tremolo pedals in the near future; I’m going to try to pick up a couple more before the Tuna Melt comes in this week. Mmmmm……tuna melt.
Splendid.
Karl.
Guitar for Worship 