My Favorite Gear of 2022
Check out the gear, courses and more that made my year awesome
How’s it going? Hope you’re enjoying the holiday season, and that life isn’t driving you too crazy lately. I wanted to end the year by rounding up some of my favorite gear, courses and other ideas that I got a lot of value out of in 2022.
Whether you’re shopping for someone else, or want a gift for yourself, these are all fantastic choices that’ll put a smile on any guitarist’s face. These are things I’ve tried out for most of the year, so if you have any questions about anything on the list, just let me know! Just a warning, this is a long one, so if you’re using the SubStack app, you might want to use the audio feature to have the app read it to you.
One other thing really quick before we get started, thank you so much to all the paid subscribers on this list. This email will go out to you first, and then free subscribers a little while after. In the holiday spirit, I thought it’d be nice to have a post like this go out to everyone (rather than to paywall it).
I’m looking forward to making the subscription even better in 2023 - I already have ideas about how it can be even more useful. I'll be back with our regularly scheduled subs only post in January.
For you free subscribers reading this, our typical subs only email has me talking about the things that have pushed my playing along the most each month, along with recommendations and more. I’m really proud of what I’ve been able to publish this year.
Alright, let’s get into it!
PRS Silver Sky SE
In February I went on a mission to find this guitar, and I eventually got one of my friend’s at Sam Ash to hook it up with the DragonFruit color of this awesome, Strat style axe. I didn’t think I needed another Strat guitar, but after hearing how it sounded, and after playing one myself, I fell in love with this guitar.
I love the way the neck feels, I love how it’s Strat-like in tone, but has its own thing going on, and the overall construction of the guitar is great. I’ve been seeing lots of sales for this guitar lately, and I think for the price it’s one of the best options if this is the type of guitar you’re after.
With the success of how well this guitar did, I’m hoping PRS does something similar for Tele style guitars soon.
Fractal Audio FM-3
This is another piece of gear that’s brought me immense joy this year. After selling off my Fractal AX-8, I took the money from that and purchased the FM-3. The sounds of the amps, cabs and effects in this unit are top notch, and I’m never at a loss when it comes to getting a tone I’m looking for.
I thought three footswitches might hinder me, especially when jamming with others, but the way the footswitches respond and how easy it is to understand the menu system, was a sacrifice I was willing to make, especially for the smaller footprint of this modeler.
The reason I stick with Fractal is because of the sheer amount of updates that are always coming out for their devices. It always seems like the team at Fractal really cares about the user base, which is evidenced in the latest promotion they have going on - the Gift of Tone, where they got guitarists and people who are popular in the Fractal community to release patches each day, free of charge.
One thing I’ll mention, which I found out about from someone in our community, is the Cooper Carter classes on all the devices. I’ve become a big fan of his videos over the last year, and it seems he’s doing work with some of the biggest guitarists out there, in helping to make their presets with Fractal gear. Check out his courses for a deep dive on each of the Fractal units.
I also want to recommend the protector pieces that I got for the screens. It seems these screens are really prone to scratching, so I spent a couple bucks to get someone to make me a few that are magnetized to the unit. Protect your investment!
Vidami Blue
One thing that’s helped me practice a bunch this year is the Vidami Blue. It’s one of those “why didn’t I think of this?” type of pedals. The Vidami Blue is a bluetooth foot controller for YouTube, and a host of other sites. You can rewind, fast forward, play/pause, and even change the speed of a video, or set a loop, if you’re going over a difficult lick.
It works as a page turner for tabs on a number of sites, and also can work in DAW mode, if you’re doing recording. I actually developed a relationship with the owners of Vidami this year, and have an affiliate code if you’d like to pick one up. You’ll get 10% off your purchase if you do!
Dunlop Jazz III XL
I’ve been a fan of Red Bear picks for what seems like forever, but before that I had used the trusty green Dunlop tortex picks. This year, in looking for a pick I didn’t have to worry about as much, I fell in love with the 1.0mm Jazz III tortex picks, but in the XL size.
I found out about these picks by getting a sample of them after ordering a sheet music book from Sheet Happens. I’m so glad I did, because I have these all over my desk, my side table, and anywhere else I play guitar.
It might sound crazy to care so much about a pick, but it makes a huge difference in how you play, and ultimately the tone you get. If you want to try an experiment for 2023, try and change up your picks, strings, and maybe even your cables.
TrueFire & PickUp Music
I think at this point, I’ve been a member of nearly every online guitar course, at least for a few months at a time. I seem to always come back to a select few, and it’s because of how great their educators are. I’ve talked for years about JTC Guitar, but for this year, I really focused on TrueFire courses and PickUp Music.
PickUp Music is great, because there’s a number of great courses on their platform, but the one they knock it out of the park with, is Molly Miller’s CAGED boot camp. A student was looking to learn CAGED, and while I was mainly a 3NPS guy, I wanted to brush up on the system myself. I’m happy I did, because over the last year I’ve begun to combine CAGED with what I already know, to learn the fretboard much better. From understanding where every note is, to seeing how these movable patterns can inform other chords, scales and more, it’s a great system to learn. The cost of admission is covered by that course, but also check out their song lessons, neo soul lessons, and much more.
On TrueFire this year, I studied 3 main guitar player’s courses - Ariel Posen, Greg Koch, and Josh Smith. The two courses that Ariel has on triads - one for rhythm playing and one for leads are must watches in my opinion. I learned so much from both, and I’m still working on them throughout the year. For Greg Koch, I signed up for his Gristleman and Solo Gristelman guitar courses - I love how Gregh breaks down techniques by showing us songs he’s written. The guy has written SO many things for guitar at this point, not only with his band, but with all the gear demos he does, that it’s a joy to learn from him. He’s doing things that no other guitarist is. And finally, I signed up for Josh Smith’s Blues Highways course. While I’ll admit this one is a little more do-it-yourself, I feel like Josh is making blues exciting again, and I love the way he plays. If his style is up your alley, this is a great course to check out.
I didn’t even mention the few In The Jams I picked up from TrueFire this year. These are great, because you learn from various TrueFire teachers, and have the ability to lower certain parts of the mix. There’s also some great commentary tracks on each song, so you can hear what the guitarist was thinking when they made their rhythm or lead parts.
I finally picked up TrueFire All Access, so I’l be going through a lot more of their courses in 2023. I’ll let this list know what I find useful!
Melodic Cells for Jazz Guitar
Because of all the online lessons, I actually bought less guitar books than usual in 2022. But one that I found really great, was Oz Noy’s Melodic Cells for Jazz Guitar. If you’re into jazz at all, or simply if you want to understand Oz’s methodology of playing more effective phrases over something like a 2, 5, 1, then this book is for you.
Oz presents us with so many different “cell” ideas to target just the right notes inside and outside of a scale, so that each one of them makes a difference when playing over changes. I’ve long been a big fan of the Fundamental Changes series of books. Each one is typically only $20 for the print book, and most times $10 for the Kindle version, plus you always get a free download of the audio examples. A truly awesome deal, for some of the best guitar education out there.
Marvis, MusicBox, MusicSmart and Last.FM
Wanted to end my suggestions this year, with some of my favorite apps/services that I got a lot out of in regards to listening to music.
Let’s start with MusicBox and MusicSmart, both made by developer Marcos Tanaka. MusicBox is a great app to save albums for later. Every Friday so much new music comes out, it’s easy to lose track of all the new stuff you’d like to listen to. MusicBox solves that, by letting you tag releases, make playlists out of them, and much more. Similar to al the read-it-later apps, this is like read-it-later but for music. And in this day and age where it’s more difficult to find out who played on what, who produced, recorded and mixed and album, that’s where Marcos’ other app, MusicSmart comes in. This is a simple utility that you can use in your favorite streaming app of choice, which pulls up credits, reviews, and more. These are the liner notes we need!
Moving on, I wanted to talk about Last.FM. Over the past couple of years, I got back into ‘scrobbling’ my music. Last.FM does this for you with a number of apps for your phone, tablet or computer. Not only does it capture everything you’re listening to, it also gives you stats on what you listened to, recommendations and more. I find it really valuable to go back to what I was listening to a few months ago, check out trends, and get good recommendations based on everything I listen to.
Which is where Marvis Pro comes in - which is my music streaming app of choice, which utilizes my Apple Music subscription. But in many ways Marvis is way better than the stock Apple Music app - it has Last.FM scrobbling built into it, it is extremely customizable, the gestures you can use to control it are great, and it allows you to make playl-ists, filters and more that will surface new and forgotten music to you. It is truly the music streaming app of my wildest dreams. If you love using Apple Music, but wish it could be something more, I'd recommend either Marvis Pro or Soor, which are both fantastic options.
That’s pretty much it for this year! I hope you found my little trek down memory lane helpful. What did you pick up this year that has made a big difference in your guitar playing or music listening? Let me know in the comments section!