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I've noticed that a lot of pedals are built to clone some vintage pedals' tone. A lot of pickups are made to replicate the way some vintage guitar. A lot of speakers are built as a clone of some speaker that was discontinued, but used by a legendary player. The heads are a clone of the exact circuit, with the exact components, and the same materials as the original made in the mid 20th century.

Stop!

Why are some people so obsessed with replicate something that has already happened? I feel that in thirty years, the 80s and on could be summed up by the title, "Attack of the clones". New ideas are so great. Hence my love for this board and the pedal makers.

people like their tonez i guess.

VFM?

Part of it is not all the improvements have been all that improving, once the general fad/Ooo shiny wears off and people listen to what they actually sound like vs what came before there is that what the fuck moment.

I’m all for new ideas but most things that seem to take are things I hate like hi-fi sounding SS bass amps in tinny “metal” guitar pickups, and fucking digital chorus.

Then there are the things that are real improvements and or great ideas but because they are new they cost $$$$$ like the moog guitar..... So almost no one ever gets one, and therefore it dies out. I don't know if this will actually happen to the Moog guitar... yet...

The one thing I am finding refreshing is in pedals, synths and amps lately where people are going back and picking up where things dropped off when the newer tech came along and took over, like analog synths and FX and tube amps and then they are taking it all and blending it back in with newer stuff which then also helps improve the newer tech. It might seem slow but I think we are actually moving forward of late in terms of gear and sounds.

I think they got it right the first time, especially with guitars and amps. With pedals, I think there is a new wave of sounds and a new way of using them that is being embraced by musicians. I suspect a big chunk of the clone and reissue market is baby boomers who are in their peak earning years and want the looks and sounds on which they cut their teetn.

I think the biggest laugh is the "aged" guitars being marketed by Fender and Gibson. I went to my local music store once and remarked to a salesman that they must love hanging those on the wall because they aren't worried about dings. He knocked 2 Strat Relics together and joked he just added a few hundred dollars to their value.

cheesecats wrote: I went to my local music store once and remarked to a salesman that they must love hanging those on the wall because they aren't worried about dings. He knocked 2 Strat Relics together and joked he just added a few hundred dollars to their value.

cheesecats wrote:I think the biggest laugh is the "aged" guitars being marketed by Fender and Gibson. I went to my local music store once and remarked to a salesman that they must love hanging those on the wall because they aren't worried about dings. He knocked 2 Strat Relics together and joked he just added a few hundred dollars to their value.

I agree, "a laugh" is a good word for them IMOP. I think they are lame, the Joe Strummer Telecaster in particular thta is just sad.

Mudfuzz wrote:
I agree, "a laugh" is a good word for them IMOP. I think they are lame, the Joe Strummer Telecaster in particular thta is just sad.

i think one of the most admirable things about punk is that they took old guitars (& older ideas that had become out-of-fashion) & gave them neu life. & the Jazzmaster thing. too. w/ like Sonic Youth et alia taking less-popular Fender guitars & literally constructing whole genres around that and like now every hipster wants a Jazzmaster or a Jag. i have two cheap guitars & the thought of even trying to buy a neu Jagmaster or a used Fender Jag HH kind of makes me nervous.

i think the thing w/ this decade is that a lot of bar-band garage rock revivalism & lo-fi "analogy" type stuff became popular & there really wasn't a need to innovate that much. actually innovation was a bad thing in that regard. the stuff that really interests me sound & idea-wise now like Bats for Lashes & M83 other kind of dark-wave dream-pop stuff succeeds where i think electro-clash & dance-punk fail is becuz it takes teh best ideas from that & takes up a notch. really the stuff that interests me the most doesn't involve guitars at all or it is really hard to tell if a guitar is being used or not.

I like new ideas as well, but if it works, it works. I would much rather have a continuous '60s analogue technology revival than more '80s digitized rackmountable keytars running amok throughout society.

I think the biggest laugh is the "aged" guitars being marketed by Fender and Gibson. I went to my local music store once and remarked to a salesman that they must love hanging those on the wall because they aren't worried about dings. He knocked 2 Strat Relics together and joked he just added a few hundred dollars to their value.

hahaha awesome. I fucking hate poseur relic shite.

in many cases, the neu ideas come once the neu gear/technologie hit. case in point: Moog. mega-expensive at 1st but musicians embraced those synths & then Moog makes cheaper stuff for consumers. but it takes that (R&D) risk on teh part of the gear manufacturer (or musicians becoming fed up w/ a certain product) to make these products.

i think the Korg Kaoss Pad is another good example. i mean even w/ all the hate on Multi-fx now teh thought of making something like that still seems revolutionary. but having something like that, which is both interactive & tactile. et cetera. Ableton Live is another good example. a product that appeals to & is used by a lot of different genres: an interdiscplinary cross-pollination of genres. & more gear made w/ that in mind--

(okay enough of my half-baked incoherent rambling...peace...)

cheesecats wrote:I think they got it right the first time,

this here sums up exactly where the hole in peoples misconceptions of older gear.

there used to be LOTS of gear that sucked. really shitty amps. really shitty guitars. really shitty pedals.
but no one talks about shitty old gear.
we only talk about the gear that was great, that great artists used and popularized with their skill.

there's a ton of new pedal makers that are making new exciting effects. and they'll be remembered.
the copy cats and the shitty pedal makers are obviously gonna be forgotten.