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  2006 Saturn Deluxe (S/N 05022) If you haven’t heard of Jack Briggs then let me be the first to share with you. Jack Briggs is an extremely talented guitar luthier living and working in Raleigh, North Carolina. Jack hand-builds each guitar out of his home studio. These guitars are beautifully designed and hand crafted. I had the pleasure of ordering mine last year. It took a year to arrive but it was well worth the wait when I finally received my beautiful Saturn Deluxe in October, 2006. I am so excited about this guitar I can hardly contain it. This is the finest guitar I have every owned! Check out the JSpoon Photography Website for a stunning slide show of Jack’s latest work. My Saturn Deluxe is the 4th guitar featured! Also, visit my Gear Review page for an exclusive review of this guitar. Check out Jason Barker’s Steelbender.com or the IndoorStorm.com website (Eddie Berman) for great reviews and sound samples on these guitars.     2000 Music Man “Luke” This Music Man Steve Lukather “Luke” signature model has been my main guitar for the last five years (before I received my Briggs). This guitar is incredibly well made, easy to play and extremely versatile. With this guitar, you can get a very funky single-coil Strat sound and then switch immediately to that fat humbucker EMG sound. The neck has a nice hard “V” carve which is surprisingly comfortable. I believe that the body is Alder with a rosewood neck. It includes the Music Man designed tremolo bridge with locking tuners. The humbucker, an EMG-85 is fitted in the bridge and there are two EMG-SLV Steve Lukather model single coils (these are fantastic by the way) in the middle and neck position. I added the EMG mid-range boost (SPC) circuit for soloing. See the Music Man guitar website for further details.   2006 American Stratocaster I purchased this guitar in summer 2006. In all my years of playing guitar, I have never owned a Fender Stratocaster before and I often ask myself why not. This is a very well made instrument. It feels good, it plays well and of course it sounds great! I can see now why other guitarists get “hooked on Strats”; it is a pleasure to play. In truth, it is much different than my other guitars so it has taken some getting used to. I did not like the factory pickups. So, in typical Chris Conte fashion, I stripped it and rebuilt it with John Suhr pickups and his silent system. See my Gear Modifications page for details on that project. It is now fitted with John Suhr V60 pickups and his magical BPSSC single coil silent system. John Suhr is a pretty interesting guy!   1987 Custom Built John Carruthers Super Strat This wonderfully hand-made guitar was built custom to my specifications by John himself. It was built as a heavy rock guitar with an alder body, maple neck, ebony fret board, and a Floyd Rose tremolo (vibrato bar). The electronics include a EMG-81 in both the neck and bridge positions and an EMG-SA single coil PUP in the middle position. Click here for EMGs main website. Active electronics include a John Carruthers mid-range boost, a 12db gain boost and a custom phase inverter preamp.   1991 Custom Built (by me) Super Strat This guitar I “assembled” and set up myself. The body was made by Performance Guitars in Hollywood. The neck is an old ESP neck given to me by Jack Mandell, an old high-school buddy. I picked up a used Floyd Rose tremolo and EMG pickups from the Recycler. The body is Alder with a green “lamp-shade” finish. The neck is maple with a rosewood fret board. The PUPs include an EMG-89 in the bridge with two EMG-SAs in the middle and neck position. The electronics incorporate an EMG mid-range booster (SPC) and a 20db gain boost switch designed and built by me.    2007 Fender 52’ Reissue Telecaster I always wanted a Tele....this had a big ding in the body and it was a steel. So, now I own a Tele.....not sure what to do with it though. Update Aug-09: OK, I’ve been playing this guitar for about a year now and I must say that I am really growing to love it. I’m now used to the neck and I recently installed DiMarzio Area T’s into it. It sounds great! (It’s quiet too!).   2005 OLP (Music Man Axis Model) Last year I wanted a cheap guitar to torture. I’ve been experimenting with different pickups and electronics and I wanted something I could cut, drill, route and fit different pickups and electronics. I purchased this Korean-made Music Man-style guitar made by OLP (Officially Licensed Product). It plays surprisingly well. I think it has an Ash body with a one-piece maple neck and fret board. I recently changed the pick ups with Gibson BurstBuckers and added a tone control.   1988 Giannini Acoustic I don’t own or play any other acoustic guitar accept this one. I have always loved the sound of a “nylon string” guitar. One of these days I will experiment with steel string acoustic guitars but for now, this nylon string acoustic guitar is all that I need. This guitar was made by Giannini, a “factory-made” guitar in Australia. It includes surprisingly good craftsmanship with a nice tone. The back of the guitar is particularly attractive. It incorporates an on-board bridge pickup with tone and volume controls. I use it mostly for recording and sometimes live gigs with my good friend Stephen Scott, ”The Rhythm King from Trinidad”!    1973 Martin D-28 I ran across this classic guitar in 2007 as I was vacationing in Hawaii. I walked into a small music shop in Kona and was blown away by the valuable guitars (and Ukuleles) hanging on their wall. This Martin D-28 was priced to sell so I almost had to buy it. It’s wonderfully aged and sounds just as good as it looks!    2000 Precision Bass “Lyte” For a guitar player, this Fender Precision Base “Lyte” is an easy bass to play. It’s very comfortable, well balanced and the neck is very thin and easy to play. It has been perfect for me to play when laying down bass tracks and just jamming with friends. By the way, I just learned why it is called a “Precision” base.....because of the frets! Duh! http://www.briggsguitars.com/swf/index.htmlhttp://www.jnwphotography.com/gallery/briggsbest/Reviews.htmlhttp://www.steelbender.com/spotlightbriggs.htmlhttp://www.indoorstorm.com/store.php?cPath=2_72http://www.music-man.com/instruments/guitars/luke.htmlhttp://www.emginc.com/http://www.fender.com/products/search.php?section=guitars&cat=stratocasterhttp://www.fender.com/products/search.php?section=guitars&cat=stratocasterhttp://www.suhrguitars.com/http://www.suhrguitars.com/pickups.aspxhttp://www.suhrguitars.com/pickups.aspxhttp://www.suhrguitars.com/press.aspx#JShttp://www.emginc.com/http://www.carruthersguitars.com/http://www.performanceguitar.com/http://www.espguitars.com/http://www.emginc.com/http://www.olpguitars.com/http://www.guitarplaza.com/newgigu.htmlhttp://www.c-breeze.com/lampostmusic.htmhttp://www.fender.com/products/search.php?section=Bassesshapeimage_4_link_0shapeimage_4_link_1shapeimage_4_link_2shapeimage_4_link_3shapeimage_4_link_4shapeimage_4_link_5shapeimage_4_link_6shapeimage_4_link_7shapeimage_4_link_8shapeimage_4_link_9shapeimage_4_link_10shapeimage_4_link_11shapeimage_4_link_12shapeimage_4_link_13shapeimage_4_link_14shapeimage_4_link_15shapeimage_4_link_16shapeimage_4_link_17shapeimage_4_link_18shapeimage_4_link_19shapeimage_4_link_20shapeimage_4_link_21

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