ToneQuest Report: December 2023 – Vol. 25, No. 2

What's Inside This Issue:

INTERVIEW BILL ASHER – Asher-Irwin And The Story Of Wolf 2.0 – In life, sometimes things simply fall right into place. What you dream, happens. Creativity can manifest results in ways that reveal the universe working with you when you listen, lean towards the flow, and don’t fight the currents. Bill Asher has been at his craft as a luthier for more than thirty years, building and restoring electric and acoustic guitars, and over that time he has chosen to focus on a guitar that would help him differentiate his offerings. We’re talkin’ electric and acoustic lap steels and looking into Ben Harper’s stash, you’ll find that his piano black finished signature Asher with Dumble knobs “sits in the pole position on most nights.” Bill also builds kick ass electrics for players like Gary Clark Jr., David Hidalgo and Marc Ford. We talk about the early days of Bill’s career in combination with his most recent endeavor, a collaboration with Doug Irwin, who famously built Jerry Garcia’s Wolf, Tiger and Rosebud guitars. Join us on the fun ride of Bill’s dream and how the universe aligns when John Mayer got up on stage in Mexico this past January with Dead & Company and played the first of what is now affectionately known as the Asher-Wolf 2.0. Build it and they will come…

FEATURE INTERVIEW – Waldtronics Buffers Key Component Of Jerry Garcia’s Sound – We were fortunate that Bill Asher mentioned Mike Wald’s name during our conversation and so we reached out and found one of us—another serious tone seeker. “The Jerry nerds are out there, and the argument still rages on that it really was all in Jerry’s hands and his phrasing created his sound for the most part,” says Mike. Like everyone else, he was determined to cop that Jerry sound but there wasn’t much information coming from the Grateful Dead and often it was inaccurate. Mike would wire his rig up as suggested, and coming from an electrical background, he didn’t see the truth and began his personal deep dive with those who actually knew, firing emails to the insiders including Colts owner, Jim Irsay who owns Jerry’s Tiger for pictures of the electronics cavity. Read about the incredible difficulties Mike encountered cracking that egg, being ridiculed and called a fanboy for his passionate efforts in getting to the bottom of the real deal Tiger Cutler board and all the details of the Tiger’s buffer. In checking all the boxes, the Spud I is built and later the Spud II buffer. The devil is in the details and in the small stuff, Waldronics has reaped big rewards in the key component of Jerry sound.

INTERVIEW JANNIS ANASTASAKIS  – Jam Pedals-The Real Grecian Formula – In our November 2023 issue, Ryan Wariner mentioned his love of JAM pedals and while TQ has danced with a couple JAM creations in previous issues, with that endorsement we decided to go deeper. Built and painted by hand, vintage inspired, and sound driven, these Greek tone explorers at JAM have found their way to an exceptional number of player’s boards, Nels Cline, Bill Frisell, Joey Landreth, John Scofield and Andy Timmons to name only a few. There’s no shortage of pedal makers on the planet and more and more are internationally based. Jannis Anastasakis, Founder, Ilias Pantoleon, Emmanuel Vourakis and team, design, build, and tune pedals that serve tradition, but with twists and angles to their offerings to keep their clients and prospective customers intrigued, like the Pink Flow, a Gilmour inspired combination of seven JAM pedals housed in a single enclosure. Find out how you can dream up any combination of pedals and house them in one personally custom designed unit. You can’t go wrong exploring JAM pedal creations with their attention to detail and obsessive build quality. We think you’ll agree…JAM goes the distance in pursuit of perfect tone.