Price is ¥3,500, and there’s still no word about that Fuzz Universe DVD, which is kinda odd. Hopefully it’ll be available during the tour so we don’t have to order it

The other Fuzz Universe news is a little old now, but it’s yet another effect pedal, this time produced by Majik Box. It’s called… you guessed it, the Fuzz Universe

Here’s a list of features from the Majik Box website:

• Specialized overdrive and boost in one box – Individual on / off footswitches
• Custom taper tone control for easy access to all of Paul’s favorite overdrive tones.
• Paul’s preferred bass cut off frequency, optimized for pure shred.
• True Bypass

Retail priced at $279.99, which I think makes it dearer than the Airplane Flanger.

Head over to the Majik Box website for more information and a sound demo

Anyway, we then spent some time looking at phrasing. I think this might have been a consequence of my rather poorly phrased Blue Noize entry but who knows. Anyway, Mark’s got that awesome amp on loan (can’t recall the brand) and it gives this nice clean sound but also sharp and cutting like a razor for more heavier metal sounds. So needless to say it was a joy playing with a sound like this. And you know, even practicing 6 little notes while focusing on phrasing was enough to really give me a kick. Gotta do that again sometime with a sound setting I’m really happy with at home.

Finally, testing my practice on Parisienne Walkways showed that my technique is getting there, and again, maybe it was the sound but I really enjoyed bending those strings. Make’em cry baby Gotta go back to previously studied Satch tunes and figure out if I can play them more easily.

On a slightly different note, I’m starting to eye those VOX amPlugs already released, as they could come in really handy (though I’m not convinced my headphones are capable of reproducing good sound) and at around £32 a pop, they don’t really break the bank. I’m looking forward to the pricing tag on the Satch signature one.

Mostly it’s because I now know the sequence of particular licks I want to practice so I can just get them under my fingers and for the sake of clarity, I don’t always bother turning on the amp. The main things I’ve been practicing are the “swing” lick from GT, which I’m still to analyse for further development, and the fast section of Parisienne Walkways‘ solo. That’s all I did yesterday.

Today though, I remembered some of the various scales which are in use in the Blues Turnarounds section of GT and started just playing randomly in Am6 Pentatonic. It sounds kinda cool, or it would do if I could play more variations than the ups and downs I seem to be stuck on. Still something to keep in mind, though I’m not entirely sure which chord it works best with. Something else to ponder. I’ve also gone back to All Alone as I was inspired to return to it earlier after listening to it with an analytical ear earlier this afternoon. Sadly, I seem to have forgotten most of it, but with a bit more time it should come back easily enough… at least the short sections should.

Still if this sort of gadget appeals to you, VOX has just released their Joe Satriani amPlug signature edition. It comes with two signature sounds approved by Satch himself and the sounds are directly inspired by other signature devices such as the Satchurator or the Time Machine. There’s even an AUX channel so you can plug in your CD / MP3 player and jam along tracks, how cool is that? On second thought, it might have been helpful for me when learning the Satch songs I’ve been learning.

Watch a short demo by Joe Satriani himself:

I can’t see any pricing details yet but based on the prices advertised on gear4music.com for similar devices, it should hopefully not excess £35/£40.

Thanks to iheartguitar for the heads up

Light Years Away by joesatriani

Anyway, back to practice, not only did I did some more Gary Moore, with a little bit more ease than last time, I found the “one minute lick” to a great little thing to practice. It’s played over A7 and uses all 12 notes but in a very cool choppy rhythm (“Swing feel”). I picked this one up surprisingly quickly, and I think the rhythm helped a lot. They recommend you analyse it and try to come up with similar ideas. I might try that if I ever find the time later.

One more thing about GT though is that I’m definitely not gonna be able to practice everything in it. The George Lynch stuff in there is insane and while I’d love to play like this, there’s no point my wasting my time trying to work it out at the minute. I may as well try to learn the whole of Fuzz Universe (the song). Still lots of tidbits to pick at so definitely worth it

I’m not exactly chuffed with the sound either but you can hear it, it’s all that matters. To be honest, I don’t know that I’d be able to play anything else over that backing track, every time I play, it’s more or less the same tune that comes out with little differences of course. I’m just not really happy with the phrasing, which was the main point but it’ll have to do for now.

Afterwards, I just kept noodling along E minor with no particular reference point, then I switched to a little bit of chord change practice. I was gonna play along a backing track but it started getting late and I didn’t really want my little girl to wake up so I’ll leave it ’till (hopefully) tomorrow.

On a different note, I’ve now subscribed to Guitar Techniques and should be getting a free Drive pedal as a bonus. I was hesitating between a Fuzz and a Drive pedal and went through quite a few reviews on YouTube, some better than others. In the end I opted for the Drive as something about the Fuzz didn’t quite sound like a sound I’d be after. The idea is roughly trying to find licks and exercises to focus on each month to strengthen a particular technique or simply learn something short and new (So not Cliffs of Dover like I have in one of the few copies I’ve managed to find in store over the years ). We’ll see if the idea will work out in the long term.

Well despite the latter movie being rather hard to find nowadays (I have a LOVEFiLM subscription, and it’s not part of their catalogue), now you can watch it for FREE, all thanks to YouTube new streaming movie service.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1iJHJ3BaAB0

A must-see for any fan of Steve Vai out there

Jeb: I love the names of the [Fuzz Universe] tunes.  Usually people name instrumentals after people, places or things that mean something to them or they name them after what the music reminds them of.  How do you do it?

Paul: Since I do my demos in ProTools, I have to think of a new title every time I make a new session. I just go with whatever pops into my head, and that title will stick about 50% of the time. “Fuzz Universe” was that way. It just came into my head immediately. “Batter Up”, “Olympic,” “Propeller,” and “Mantra the Lawn” were all titles that came to me quickly. It took me much longer to think of “Plastic Dracula.” I had been playing with the name “Juan Chutrifo” for a while. It’s an approximation of how it sounds if you count, “1-2-3-4,” so I put “Count” at the beginning of the title. It makes it sound like the name of some ancient Spanish aristocrat but it’s actually just what you say when you want to start a rock and roll song.

Head over to Classic Rock Revisited for the whole interview