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The Latest Breaking News from Phil Barker

“The quality of guitars didn’t plummet overnight – some might argue that it remained high for at least a decade”: Fender CBS guitars get a bad rep – but what actually changed?

The CBS takeover of Fender was many things but it was not an overnight revolution. We track the key changes to its builds through the era

Guitar World

“A first-class build that’s impossible to fault… it would be criminal if this didn’t hit a stage”: Patrick James Eggle Oz-t Cabronita Thinline review

Upholding the craft of the luthier, Patrick James Eggle’s latest build is another reason to look to the UK if you want the best

Guitar World

"Will it knock your socks off? For some, absolutely, but for me, I find it works admirably in a cranked rig and stacks nicely with other gain pedals": Warm Audio Tube Squealer overdrive pedal review

Warm Audio’s latest overdrive machine serves up the three greatest hits of the 'Green Screamer' overdrive in one stompbox

Guitar World

From analysis to the latest developments in health,
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“Boss’s claims of the pedal being artifact-free more than hold up. I’d have the confidence to gig with this and use it to avoid guitar changes”: Boss XS-1 Poly Shifter review

The Japanese giant's new pitch-shifting algorithm has been in its laboratory for years, but patience has proven a virtue with this small-but-mightily-usable stompbox

Guitar World

“All-solid body construction and premium electronics for under $350? You have my attention”: Harley Benton CLC-650SM-CE review

Harley Benton is once again pushing the boundaries of what 'bang for your buck' actually means

Guitar World

“The standard-bearer against which to judge all small combo amps”: Fender Blues Junior IV 30th Anniversary review

Decked out in tooled western-style livery with a saddle bag’s worth of speaker and circuit upgrades, this anniversary edition stands strong in the lineage of the classic benchmark combo

Guitar World

“It may be a cliché, but let’s say it anyway: Jimi Hendrix didn’t do too badly with CBS Fenders”: Fender’s CBS era is often associated with the company losing its reputation for quality – but is that view still justified?

Fender’s CBS era is often boiled down to an equation of ‘corporate drive for profit and quantity = lowering of build standards,’ but like many things in life, it's not so simple

Guitar World

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“Some might say a guitar at this kind of price point has no business resonating so well”: Harley Benton ST-80FR MN review

Harley Benton pays homage to the golden age of shred with this single-pickup and Floyd Rose-equipped firecracker

MusicRadar

"A Bluesbreaker and a King of Tone walk into a bar… and I went home with both of them": Warm Audio Throne of Tone pedal review

Could this be the finest drive and boost pedal of the year?

Guitar World

“Scoring especially highly for its superb ergonomics”: Sterling By Music Man Kaizen 7 review

Progressive guitar icon Tosin Abasi's dramatic Music Man custom seven-string, re-imagined for those with lighter wallets

Guitar World

“It’s a vintage Les Paul with a different shape. I wanted to have my own recipe”: Meet the Tributo, the Italian super-guitar that turns the ’59 Les Paul formula on its head

Based on the home of Italian supercars comes a super-electric with serious boutique pedigree. The inspiration is obvious. The upgrades less so, and it could be the acme of vintage-inspired design. Luthier Nicolas Giordano explains his process

Guitar World

“While it doesn’t reinvent Fender’s decades-old designs, this Stratocaster is not only crisply made but really hard to put down”: Fender American Professional Classic Stratocaster review

Replacing the out-going Performer model, is Fender’s American Professional Classic Stratocaster the perfect vintage/modern hybrid?

Guitar World

“At this upper mid-range price point, it's hard to think of a guitar to rival it”: Strandberg Boden N2 Standard review

The second model in the progressive Swedish company's new Boden N2 series more than holds its own

Guitar World

"It becomes very hard to put this guitar down": Strandberg Boden N2 Standard review

The next generation of the Swedish firm's headless guitar design has arrived; is this the guitar to finally convince the cynics to try one out?

MusicRadar

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Guitar World

“John Lennon’s 12-string has a similar trebly edge to it… this guitar passes the ‘Fab Four’ test”: Framus Hootenanny 12-string and 6-string review

John Lennon famously used a Framus 12-string acoustic with the Beatles, and 60 years later the company has reissued the model in all its fab finery – and it comes with a little help from a friend!

Guitar World

“The guy in the support band was playing a Jazz Bass. We agreed to swap instruments… That guy was Ian Hunter who went on to form Mott the Hoople”: Leo Lyons on the bass that appeared at Woodstock, has been played by Hendrix, and is on three UFO classics

The Ten Years After bassist’s 1962 Fender Jazz Bass is one of the coolest four-strings you will ever see, with buckle rash on the back that any Fender Master Builder would kill to recreate

Guitar World

“The pickups on that old Univox were amazing. It really makes you wonder about the Japanese guitars produced backthen. They weren’t so bad at all”: How Vintage’s REVO range breathed new life into the oddball electric

Just back from a long stint in China where he oversees the design and production of Vintage guitars, Alan Entwistle delves into what makes REVO that little bit different

Guitar World

“Considerably less money than going down even the light-relic route in the Fender Custom Shop”: Fender American Ultra Luxe Vintage ’50s Telecaster and ’60s Strat HSS review

This latest wave of Fender’s American Ultra models continues to cater for the modern player but with an old-looking vintagevibe. We just can’t escape the past!

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Guitar World

“The scrutiny we were under lent itself to the atmosphere of the record. We really had to come out swinging”: Jake Kiszka and Chris Turpin on conjuring old-school guitar magic for Mirador’s debut – and the difference between US and UK guitar players

The Greta Van Fleet x Ida Mae collab is a 21st-century exercise in rock classicism, bringing the ancient and the modern together, using high volume to bind, and to relieve some of the pressure, too

Guitar World

“You get emails saying they’d like to try a guitar and you think, ‘It’s not going to be THAT Audley Freed, is it?… Then the penny drops”: How Ivison Guitars became Britain’s hottest high-end brand

With new staff, in-house pickups and the continuing success of the Dakota, there’s plenty to discuss. We grab Neil Ivison for a quick chat

Guitar World

“There isn’t a bad sound in the RT-2, and this thing has real mojo”: Boss RT-2 Rotary Ensemble pedal review

Boss attempts to take everything that made the RT-20 great, and shrink it to a third of its size

Guitar World

“Proof that semi-hollows can rock as hard as the clichés, even if they are bedecked with gold”: Gretsch Professional Broadkaster LX review

The Broadkaster is back on the air, this time with a number of modernized features to make this a contemporary, high-performance semi-hollow rocker

Guitar World

“Something a little different, with vibey anddiverse sounds for not a lot of money”: Vintage REVO Galactica and Astrostar review

Revisiting guitars of yesteryear, the REVO models continue to move Vintage away from slavish repros to inspired retro champions for not a lot of money. Let’s hop in that time machine and take a look

Guitar World

“It might not be to all tastes, but its retro charm and sonic potential are compelling indeed”: Squier Classic Vibe Telecaster Bass review

Squier reissues an oddity from Fender's bass archives, complete with a Wide Range humbucker – is this its time?

Guitar World

“When you strip it down tothe essentials, I believe it mostly comes down to the wood and the strings”: Why do some guitars sustain better than others? It’s complicated

With some help from Banker Guitars’ Matt Hughes and SonoTone Strings’ PK Pandy, we unpack the mysteries of sustain – and why it differs from resonance and volume

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