Carl J Harding

Proper Gretsch sound and looks, solid build, great twang from the blacktop Filtertrons. Now with proper thumbnail inlays and yes, it DOES have to be Orange!

The Baja is top quality MIM Fender. The Broadcaster in the bridge is amazing and gives you as much twang as you're gonna need. T-switch adds options but takes nothing away. The black plate on black body looks proper Johnny Cash.

I'd like to say get one, but they only made them for a year, so check out Ebay. Awesome sound, sick looks. Only downside is they saved production costs by leaving slightly sharp fret ends - nothing a fret file won't fix. I love, love, love it!

Be in no doubt, this is a full fat AC30. Hook it up to a cab with Greenbacks or Alnico Blues and you have the whole deal. The added benefit with the AC30 head is the attenuator. I don't know how they did it, but it doesn't suck tone like so many attenuators do - it works. Plus, you get an effects loop, in case you need such a thing!

This is the cab you need for the AC30 or 15 head, or as an extension to make your AC30/15 sound bigger (like the AC doesn't sound big enough!). Two Greenbacks sound great once you break them in.

The best feature on the B65 Bass State is the 5-band graphic which gives some real tone shaping. I've never got much out of the compressor - you're probably better off with a pedal for that. This is certainly loud enough for gigging, and rehearsing so long as your drummer isn't too much of an animal.

True quality full frequency flat response does not come cheap most of the time, so it's a relief to find Laney have put int within the reach of mere mortals. You can shape the sound with high frequency trim, and it has built in emulation for 2X12 or 4X12, but you can bypass all this. Has link out (1/4" jack)and DI out (XLR). 200W solid state is plenty loud enough for any circumstance you're realistically going to find yourself in. Handles bass just as well so you can use all your profiles. Would make a great keyboard amp too.

This needs no introduction, if you know what it is you know why you need it! The neck is thin like a dream. Probably not for the metal player, but does just about everything else fantastically. I used to have a Ricky 4001 but I prefer the Jazz by a mile.

This is the Epiphone 335 style guitar. It's typical Epiphone in being very good value for the money. On the plus side, the neck is fabulous and the resonance is lovely (play it acoustic and you'll know what I mean It's weakness is the slightly muddy pickups, which is OK when you use the bridge or both together, but in the neck position you definitely have a bit of a mudbucker. Less significant, the finish can be slightly lazy, but nothing affecting the playability. Epis have terrible resale value but they are better than people think. As Josh Homme ably demonstrated, you can sound great on one of these if you have the chops. And besides, it looks awesome.

These things have been going for silly money lately - don't do it! A novelty at best.

The Elektron Analog Drive boast 8 totally separate drive circuits ranging from clean boost through lovely crunch up to full on filthy drive sounds. lots of tweakabilty and all your settings can be saved in 100 patches and recalled with MIDI functionality. Check out Mick and Dan's review.