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The know youw gear podcast. Hey, everyone. Welcome to the Know youw gear podcast for February 27th. I'm like, why am I yelling in the mic? February 27th, 2026. Hope you guys all had a fantastic week and are ready for a new episode of the show so we can go over things you want to talk about, things you're interested in, maybe things you're not interested in. We have a lot. There's some stuff that's going to come up, and I thought we would talk about it. Some viewers reached out to me, but I had actually already talked to a couple employees that are friends of mine, and they kind of mentioned it, too. And so let's just. Let's start with that. So we've been talking about Fender for a lot of years on the channel, especially on the podcast. As you guys know, I'm a huge fan of Fender. You're a huge fan of Fender. They're the largest guitar company in the world. So obviously we're all fans. There's some stuff going on that I think it's worth talking about, and I'm going to give some opinions on it once I give it. So the first thing is. So Fender looks like they're about to do another round of layoffs again. And this is. This is. I think this is all circumstantially bad for a lot of reasons. Obviously, anytime we talk about layoffs, we're talking about people losing their jobs. Things that they. That they pay their bills with, they feed their families with. This is their livelihoods. It's always a sad topic and it's always a delicate topic. I just hope you understand. So when you're making comments, please keep in mind that these are people that are affected by this, you know, not just whimsical comments to our. To our will. The layoffs, I understand, are going to be in April. So now things could change. I don't know if it's 100% going to happen, and there's no way around that. Let me go to it and share it with you. So the. I talked to an employee who said they were kind of told or they kind of know. So I'm hoping all the employees have been told. And, um, let's go to the webs, shall we? The websites. Okay, so this is a website called the Warn Tracker. It tells you of potential companies that have over 100 employees that are going to be laying off. And on here it says, I'm just giving you the information that Fender is planning to do a layoff in April. 7th 20, 26. And it looks like for about. Let's move this way. It looks like they're going to do about 100 to 250 people laid off. And this looks like it's listed as a permanent layoff. Okay, so that's just where I'm giving you that. There's a link down below for those that want to check that out. If you're curious where I was getting the information. Now, like I said, I was given the information first from an employee that told me. And they don't know if they're included in this or not. So you understand, this is why it's a delicate subject. Why are we talking about it? Well, it's guitar news for sure, but that's not why we're actually talking about it. We're talking about a couple things now. The one thing I want to tell you is I don't know if this is. I just don't know. Okay? So I'm just going to tell you. I don't know if the new CEO, Bud Cole, is coming in and this is him cleaning house. I don't know if this was decided before they got the new CEO, but either way, we know Fender's got a new CEO. I, I personally think with no information more than what I just told you and what I know for here, it could be he just walked into this and this was already kind of something that had happened, but who knows? But you know, it's an interesting thing. For the last five years on this podcast, if there was one continuous thing we talk about, there's two, actually. Let's talk about two continuous things to talk about. Gibson always in the news for some kind of lawsuit, and Fender always in the news for some kind of quality issue. And I just don't think that Fender, in my opinion, and that's what I'm sticking to, for the last five years, Fender has let the quality drop. It happened during COVID it got really bad in Covid, and I don't think it's come back. In fact, many friends of mine, some Fender dealers, some people at the guitar centers, have consistently told me, which is more important, that they don't talk to each other. And they're in different parts of the country to have the same stories like the Fender quality. They're constantly dealing with a lack of Fender quality of quality in the Fender guitars and the products. Somebody mentioned their price hikes. Their price hikes are astronomically crazy. And now we can talk about some of the economical issues that are causing price hikes. But I've said this during COVID Fender was the first always, in my opinion, to. To jack up the prices as soon as there was like, oh, there's a supply issue. Oh, prices skyrocket. Oh, wait, there might be a supply issue. Prices skyrocket. Oh, wait, demand's high. Price, skyrocket. Oh, wait, demand might be high. Price, skyrocket. You know, I was looking. I'm going on sidetrack here. I was looking at something the other day, and it almost. It just literally took the breath out of my. Out of my chest. I'm going to show you something. If you remember, I feel like now, in their defense, it could be two years now. Okay. It feels like it was less than a year or a year ish, that I mentioned that I was in the market for a Fender Tone Master amp. And I just didn't want to spend fifteen hundred dollars for a digital type product, you know, when you can get a used fender basement for $1,000. Now what I'm going to show you is, is that the Fender basement right here is $2,199. $2,200. By the way, you can still find them all day for $1,000. So, you know, I just got one for 1,000 bucks. 1,050 shipped, done in mint condition. So that's half of new. Now, what's the Tone Master digital version going for? $1,839. And what's funny is I would have swore I saw one that's $1900. I wonder if I go into this if it's one of those tricks. Oh, look, it literally, I was right. I was losing my mind. I was in here two days ago when I made the purchase for the real one. I was like, let me look at the Tone Master again. And I was like, $2,000. No way. Look at that. Already dropped it 160 bucks. Okay, so obviously no one's paying $2,000 for the tone Master stuff. I think this is a bad idea. And I understand prices are not always to the discretion of the company. Like I said, we have external prices problems. We have labor costs, you have regulation, you have taxes, you have tariffs, you name it. It's coming at everybody in all directions. Like I said, my stance on the political sense is that there's always a nightmare, there's always a catastrophe. There's always a reason why something's going to happen. And it seems like it's more and more often now, and it's just. And the pick says $1,000 where first of all you could go. Let's take a look. Let's take a look to see where you can find one right now for a good price. Let's. This wasn't going to be about Fender basements, but I feel like now it has to be a little bit fender baseman 59. Okay, go here. Oh, look at this right here. First one I pull up. Look at that. Here's a use one at guitar center for 1000 bucks. Here's a use at one guitar center for 1200 bucks. Here's a used one at guitar center for 13. Here's another use one at guitar center for 1,029 in great condition listed. Here's one at guitar center for 12. So here's one for 15, but that's a little bit more. Here's another one for 1,099. This is without even trying, guys. I just did this in minutes. So not even trying, you can find one for a thousand bucks. So. So, you know, I think there's even a better deal. Hold on a second, Hold on a second. I'm gonna try this real quick. Sadly enough, if it's sold, there's no history, so there's no way to show you. But let me try. Vendor basement 59. Okay, so I found one of my local Craigslist for 1250 here. This is in Tucson, but hold on, I just want to make sure. And so here I'll open it so you guys see it. This one's in. In Tucson for 1250. But so you know, just a couple, I think a week ago, I can't remember a week or two weeks ago there was one for 750. I wasn't interested in it. I was thinking about it and then I talked myself out of it and then it disappeared. So I didn't know if he pulled it or if it's not there anymore. Let's just see if I can find it real quick. Like if it still exists. It doesn't. So anyways, so yeah, that wasn't hard. Searching for a deal when you can find something for half off immediately is not. It doesn't mean it's hard to find. So back to that. What does that mean? I mean, obviously somebody saying that basically this is all to allude that somebody mentioned in the comments right now so that vendors has hiked their prices up too high. I. I think that's part of their problem too. You know, I think, I think they've been too eager to keep hiking prices up, but they have a plan. And when I say they Have a plan. I have a theory that they have a plan. Let me tell you, if you guys have been on Instagram or YouTube recently or Facebook or TikTok, you have probably seen some somebody saying something like, hey, everyone, Fender sent me an exclusive model. Hey everyone, I just got the exclusive Fender model. Hey everyone, I just got a Fender only available on fender.com. hey everyone, I just got a model only sold@fender.com. you're seeing a lot of that. I was able, in fact, I shared with my patrons. I was able to find a. I don't know, half a dozen, six, which isn't a whole lot. But very quickly, by the way, I did that in like 10 minutes. Just like I was looking for basements. And then of course, I was approached by Fender to basically do a marketing push, right? In other words, hey, like highlight a product and talk about product. And of course, send people not to the local Fender dealer, not to Sweetwater, our guitar center, or anywhere you choose to purchase. The money only comes, and this is the important part. If I send you to fender.com I gotta send you to fender.com I get a piece of the sale. Now that's an affiliate link. And as you know, like all influencers, I do affiliate links. However, I've been clear about this. The only real exclusive affiliate link I generally will push is Stu Mac. And the reason being I use their tools and have for over 20 years. And as you guys know, they were in my videos. And also in true transparency, I helped Stumac set up that affiliate link so that they don't have to pay me to make videos to. Cause that's how it usually works, right? They pay you to do a video. My logic was, let me do whatever video I want and I'll put my links to the tools I use. And if they buy something that helps my channel, that's where I was motivated to do that. But mostly, if I'm promoting a affiliate link, it's usually to Sweetwater or Guitar center or someone or Reverb, where you make the choice of what you want to buy. There I don't really have to worry about. You have to buy the thing I'm specifically pushing, right? The reason why that's important to me is this is a side note, is I learned this the hard way when I do the deep dives. If I do a deep dive and all of a sudden I find a problem in the guitar, the amount of guitars that would convert for sale is dramatically affected. And you can imagine that could mean thousands of dollars in a Period of time, over time for me, any content creator. So what happens is it really kills your motivation to find the flaws in the guitars. When that is specifically connected. It's not like a company telling me to not say anything negative. It's specifically connected to my sales. For example, I constantly, as you know, I buy a guitar and then I do. I find a flaw in it when I go to resell that guitar, you can imagine it really tanks the value. No one's really super excited to buy a guitar. That was on Phil McKnight's channel that he didn't give 100%. You know, this is the greatest guitar ever. No one really wants to own that. Usually if somebody wants to buy a guitar, it's because that was in a video so they can show their friends, like, hey, this was on this channel. And look. Look at how well it did. And look how much praise this person gave it. So that's why we don't generally sell a lot of guitars straight to the public. I just churn them off to, you know, local dealers or the guitar center and just take the hit. So I don't have to think about, you know, that when I'm making the video. I don't have to think like, oh, if I point out this other defect among the other three defects, now this guitar is really worth a lot less. I don't want to think like that. So my point is not to. Not to talk about this. I'm just talking about the. I think the strategy here is clear in my opinion. Again, I gotta say my opinion that Fender's definitely not only selling direct. This seems to be an active movement to go direct. And it's probably to. Not so much. So you guys know, so not so much in an evil, like to circumvent their dealers in the. Hey, screw the dealers. Let's, you know, let's keep all the money. I think it's because the dealers aren't moving enough product and they're in a bad way because I think they have like $186 million in DEB. That could be a factor of that. But the biggest factor is, you know, they gotta. They gotta move product. And so if the. If the small dealers can't move it, the influencers can. I want to let you know, this is something I had private discussion with my wife and I was confirming some numbers with her. As you know, I was a Fender dealer for over a decade in a store in Arizona. And my store was one of the premium Fender dealers. Now, that doesn't mean against Guitar Center. I can't compete with that as a small dealer. But I'm talking about when you take the other Fender dealers in the state of Arizona. We were always top one or two in the state and there's about 10, I think so. So we're always number one, number two in sales. Without a doubt as a YouTube personality having a channel just looking at affiliate clicks for what you guys buy at Sweetwater and Guitar Center, Reverb, you name it. I sell way more per year here than I ever did at the store as a dealer. And I would assume I'm getting. Assuming that a lot of influencers are flipping gear to us die hard gear freaks. More so than some of the dealers are now or is at the rate. And think about this. They're cutting in the influencer at 10%. But the dealer has to get at least a 30 to 40% margin. You know, it could be. It could be a way for Fender to really see an opening in the problem, in other words, and just go for that. And I could be coincidence. I find it. You know, you see them kind of saying, hey, we have to lay off some. Some people make some changes. And then also the direct marketing got really aggressive. I've. They've been doing direct marketing for years. I've been a Fender affiliate for I feel like a year or two now, maybe longer. And this is the most aggressive I've seen it. I don't know. And so you know, unfortunately when I sign up for these things. Cause it's through your affiliate networks. I don't know if in that rhetoric of contract that there's any kind of disclosure laws like no, you know, like they put in there. I can't disclose. So I'm not going to disclose any of the personal information that they send to me about those things. Just so you guys know, I can try and figure it out. But I would bet, I don't want to read 20 pages just to tell you guys, oh, this is what they said in my last email. So I just want to let you know I'm kind of not talking about that particular. But what, what they did send me does seem to line up with what I'm seeing out there and what you could obviously see out there, which is a ton of influencers really pushing fender.com and the idea that I, I think it's because they, they see that as the. Either the next way to get revenue coming or they're trying to fix a problem where there's revenue not coming from their dealer networks. And, and this really is disappointing for one reason, one reason only, I really think. And I, you know, what do I know? Just like a lot of you guys, we're all just talking here on a Friday. I really feel like they could just focus on the quality, you know, just focus on the quality. And so, you know, I can kind of tell you this, I can tell you that for sure they know they have a quality issue because I was given privileged information internally from employees who are no longer there. And I don't mean they left and they're like disgruntled. I mean just they are no longer there now. So. Because they're no longer there now, I don't know that, you know, if they figure out who told me, I don't think there'll be any repercussion to them that they were in meetings just within the last two years with executive team or the, you know, their management at Fender discussing how bad the quality assurance reject rates were and how much money it was costing Fender. And I think we even talked about that. You'd have to go back in a back episode. So like I said, my point is Fender knows that there is some quality issues. And I think last year, if you think about last year, this time last year, Fender January Fender Fender January or February Fenderary, we'll call January February Fenderary from now on. In Fenderary of 2025, you know, I independently bought some of the new features Fender made in Cortex factory standards. And at that time, like I said, they were fine. I just wasn't excited about them. It didn't prompt me to get any, you know, like, wow, this is what a great future in mind. But again, it felt like again, Fender just trying to, you know, constantly cash in on an idea and not just focus on, hey, you could probably get somebody to pay 800 for a made in Mexico Telecaster if it didn't have issues. You much easier than just getting him a $600 one made in Indonesia or China. That's just my opinion. Some of you are going to say no because some of you are definitely focused on the price always. And it's like, oh, I know, I just want to be cheap and cheap, cheap, cheap. But I think sometimes you want it cheap is not an affordable affordability issue. Although that is a factor. Some of us, you know, hey, yeah, I don't got the money to pay a thousand dollars for a guitar. So that's just an affordability factor. But I think a lot of people are just, it's not worth that kind of money. So if they make a Lesser expensive option. I don't mind putting in the work to fix the flaws that I'm probably anticipating that one's going to have because the other one above, it's going to have to. And we had just talked about in the last few weeks and I don't remember the episode. I apologize if one of you put it in the comments. Which one? It was where I was just talking about the fact that when I was mentioning Reverend guitars and how I could blindly, almost recommend a Reverend guitar because they don't make cheap junk and they, they don't make any $3,000 guitars. Like, they just make this, you know, right in the middle, meat and potatoes guitar. And yeah, they're not cheap or super affordable, but they're really good. And I used to talk about Fender Mexico the way I now currently talk about Rev. You know, like, hey, Phil, I want to get a guitar that's really good. It don't. I can't spend a lot of money, but I'm not looking for the, you know, the cheapest, you know, Amazon deal out there. And I could say, in fact, I did on this show for at least five years. I would say made Mexico Strat. How many times does somebody say, hey, would you pick a John Mayer Silver Sky Se? Or Mexican Strat? Hey, Phil, would you pick a Schecter Mexican Strat. And every time, Mexican Strat, Mexican Strat, Mexican Telly. And now I'm like, it's hit or miss with Fender every time, hit or miss. And so it'll. It'll be interesting to see how these changes affect. I'm hoping that they, you know, that the people that affected by this, I hope they find new jobs soon or they figure out something. But it's. I thought I would just share the news and talk about this because again, it's something we've talked about. We just keep talking about it. And I feel like the situation doesn't get better, but yet Fender just keeps having issues. So, I don't know. David says, hey, should I buy a Charvel HH or Reverend you know, here's the funny thing about this, and I don't know if it's a joke or being serious, but let me answer it in the craziest way that's gonna really articulate my point. My Charvel DK24 is one of my favorite guitars. It's made in Mexico. I like it so much that, you know, when I was paring down my collection of guitars as you do, you know, it kind of plumes up and you're like, okay, I'm not playing all these. Let's pair it down. I had to choose for the type, for the type of guitar that guitar is between my music man, John Petrucci, you know, six String Guitar usa, or that. And I picked the Charvel over that and I kept the Charvel and I got rid of the Petrucci. And because as great as that guitar was, the music man, I was like, I just think the Charvel is just as good. I like the. And I put some DiMarcios in it. And even though it had Duncan's and I like it, but I gotta tell you, that guitar did not come out of the box that way. It had fret sprout twice. Even though it had a roasted maple neck. It had a couple other issues. I have to. Had to remove one of the string trees because as I. If you go look at that video, I'll show I told you guys that it just would not stay in tune. So I had to remove one of the string trees, make some adjustments, and then ultimately change a. Another couple components in that guitar. That guitar at the time, I don't know what they go for now. A DK24 Charvel made Mexico at the time was $1,000. And so. And that was. I think I've had it for, I mean, since 2020 probably, or 221 at least five years because paint Huffer painted it and I, I right after we did the, the great guitar build off and we, we had him paint a guitar for us. So basically what I'm trying to say is I love my Chevel. I'd recommend it, but I'm going to recommend it much differently than the Reverend. I've had a. I've had my hands on a dozen Reverend guitars on the channel, off the channel, Friends guitars. Much fewer issues consistently than I've seen with Charvel's. So. And that doesn't mean one's better than the other. When it comes to the guitar that you want, how it sounds. We're talking about just out of the box quality. Out of the box quality. It's. I would give it. I would give that to, to the Rev. Okay, let's. Let's see Any, any comments or questions specifically about this topic right now, and then we'll move on. Steve says, hey, only Fender offers the dishwashing sponge. I know you would think that the dishwashing sponges would have saved Fender financially with that decision, but unfortunately it did not. So it's funny, some of you guys are talking about Princeton Sponges. And then again, let's see. You guys are really, really talking about the sponges a lot, I would say. Although the joke of the sponges is funny because it's just a weird, goofy product. But. But. Oh, here's a good one. I was gonna say, you know, really, I think the quality issues, where they focus on salty starfish says, hey, do you think there's a quality difference in Indonesia versus Mexico made vendors? Not really. I think. I think I've been to both factories, although it's been a while since I've been to the Mexico factory. So I've been to, obviously, the Indonesian factory as recent, within less than a year ago. So I have probably dated information mentally from the mademexico factory. And I'm a big proponent for the made Mexico factory. I think it's a. Like I said, I think it was one of the best ideas Fender ever did. You know you have a factory? The Maine, Mexico factory, not only as a dealer, but as a Fender fanatic, was one of the greatest things they ever did, in my opinion, because it was. Did three. A bunch of things. I was going to say three. I'm just going to make up numbers, but whatever the number is, I'll just go through the things first. It allowed them to be close to the manufacturer. So you go, you know, they're in Ensenada. Ensenada is just an hour, two hours away from. I'm sorry, they're not in Ensenada. They're in Corona. Corona is only a few hours away from Ensenada. So they, you know, they can go to that factory. You know, Indonesia, as you know, it took me 36 hours to get there from. 30 hours in total travel from LAX. Okay, so vendors got to travel 30 hours to get to the Cortec factory. It's not an easy, easy trip because it's not like a direct flight to Indonesia from la. So you can understand it gives them more control that way. Secondly, you have a great quality. You have a workforce with a great work ethic and skill set because 1 in 5 people in Mexico play guitar. So you have a likelihood that people in the guitar factory actually play guitar. Trust me, very few people in the Indonesian factory play guitar. Is that a factor? Do you need that? Well, you know, I've had people like Paul Reed Smith and Jeff Kiesel mention that the majority of their workers are guitar players. And that's not necessarily because obviously Leo Fender didn't play guitar. But workers who play guitar, they have our passion. And therefore they look at the Things a little bit differently than just a quality of work as a pass fail system. The other thing is it allows vendor to pull the trigger a lot closer to when they need things. So for instance, let's say they need inventory for. They're trying to figure out fourth quarter needs or whatever. You know, across the world, you gotta make decisions, you know, not only months advance, sometimes years in advance. Mexico allows them to make that decision a lot, you know, closer to when they make, you know, they need it. They can pull that trigger a little closer. They also don't have to worry about anybody else making any other products in the Mexico factory. So the Mexico factory only makes Fender products. Besides, of course, it makes Charvel evh, which are all Fender branded products. And Jackson. So it's all Fender products. Okay, where Cortec, although Fender has its own building and so does Squire, there is some cross contamination. And more importantly, you are kind of giving your sauce away to a third party. You know, Cortek now knows whatever Fender teaches them. And as you've seen, Cortec is adapting as a factory over the years. It's becoming instead of the. The place where manufacturers go and teach them how to make a thing that they want. They're going there because they already know how to make a thing better than they know how to make. You know, and so I love. So basically that's my way of saying I think Mexico, Fender is a better decision for Fender. I think it's a better decision for us. It's a better decision economically for us. I mean, some people say I'd rather buy usa. Me too. Oh, I mean, heck, I think is every guitar here today made in usa? Guitar. Okay, no one. So I didn't plan that. I have one guitar that Gretsch is made in Japan. Every guitar on this wall that you see behind you. Oh, Ireland. Let's not forget Ireland, guys. Okay, so Ireland, Japan, and the rest is made in usa. So, you know, obviously I'm a fan of USA made products. I'm an American and I'm proud of my country and the workforce that, that I'm part of. But that being said, I like that, you know, when we can work with Canada, I like when we can work with Mexico. There are neighbors, you know, there's some benefits to us on a lot of fronts, just like there is to them. So I kind of really like that. I think Cortek makes a great guitar. But I also think that part of the thing about Cortech is they're not going to allow Cortek to make a better guitar than Mexico. And I'd like to pick on them for that. But when I was there, I didn't really see anything difference in anybody else's philosophy. As we truly know now. Cortek is not making everybody's guitars at the best ability. Cortek can make a guitar. They're making the guitars based on the price points that these manufacturers or these brands want the guitar to be sold at. And that's just how it goes. But, and, and I like the Indonesian made standard Teles Strats basses. They're fine, but I would still rather buy a made mix. Go personally was me and I'm. I'm friends with the Cortech guys. Think about that. I'm really close friends with them. Okay, so let's go ahead. I think we got it. Unless I missed anything anyone's comment. And. And then. Okay, we'll end on this. Because it's the last Fender type subject I see. It says this is from Mard B. Marty B. Says, Phil, what's your overall impressions when comparing Tone Master amps to their two component parts? The Tone Master amps are very good. I actually call them decadent. I feel kind of like, you know, when you look at right now, I have a Boss katana behind me. It's funny. You can't see it. It's not funny. There's no light hitting it that way. But anyways, I love the boss katana. I love those kind of amps too, you know, Right. The rolling cubes, all this stuff. In my personal opinion, I think the Tone Master series is a level above all of those. But they're so much more expensive. Like, I can't, I can't. I, you know, you hear. Keep hearing it in my voice. I, I can't get to $1500 on these things. I can't get to 1200 bucks on these things. Now. I don't have a need for that. See, a need really kind of helps you focus in your price point. Right. A lot of people don't understand. It's like when they look at something and they go, oh, I don't think it's worth 300 bucks. And I'm like, well, you also don't need it, right? So let me give you example of a need. I'm not hauling my 65 Deluxe Reverb to a gig three times a week. Maybe I'd have a different opinion if I was. Where. Not only would if I got the Tone Master 65 Deluxe, it would be a little lighter. Also, I could direct into the PA with an IR that would definitely change my opinion of how much it costs versus how much my amp cost. And I really wanted a tone master baseman 59 for a couple reasons. One, the basement 59 tone master has reverb, something I have to add to the basement. It also is a little lighter, which is always something nice, because the basement's actually pretty heavy because of the four speakers. The basement also has, like, an attenuation thing, so you can crank it. So great. My problem with it and why I don't value it for not only $1,500, but much less than now $2,000. Point is, I could never get my hands on to try one. And so without trying it, I've had an experience with the Tone Masters, all of them. One experience with all of them that I thought was a little negative that I didn't like, which is they don't like all pedals. See, a Fender amp, to me, is the ultimate pedal platform amp. You know, I'm sure there's two rocks, and there's all kinds of great amps out there too. But I'm just saying, when I think of Fender amps, like, that's what you do with them, right? You put your pedals in front of them. You know, they have this ultimate clean. They sound great. You know, they're relatively loud and not super heavy. It's not like you're taking a half stack, but then you run your pedals and all pedals just sound really good for the most part. Where the Tone Master series, I want to say they're bitchy. Like, all of a sudden, one pedal sounds like a beat. I could a be a tone master 65. I'm just picking on 65. And the Princeton can be the same too. You Tone Master 65 against the 65 Deluxe Reverb. I could put take. I could pick 10 pedals if I wanted to. For this challenge, I could pick five where they sound exactly the same through both amps, and you go, oh, yeah, they're the same. And the next five, in every case, the Tone Master sounded fizzier and worse. It's just something it doesn't like about pedals. Fuzz pedals specifically, I didn't have a whole lot of luck with on the Tone Master series. But if you're not using fuzz pedals, who cares, right? I mean, it's not something that affects it. Why do I think that happens? I don't know. I've already, when I did my abing, trying to decide If I was keep which one I was keeping, because that's what happened. I bought a Tone Master. As you guys know, I did a video. I have a 65 deluxe reverb. I ab'd them a bed them, a bed them and eventually decided I like the 65 Deluxe Reverb. And I even said, and I think somewhere in this on the podcast as well, if I didn't already have a 65 Deluxe Reverb, a real one, I probably would have been happy with the Toadmaster. But I'm not getting rid of the real one for the Tone Master just for saving a little weight and then having a direct out. The attenuation was not super important to me as I don't really crank them for overdrive. I'm not running my Fenders for overdrive. So that's my thoughts on that. Although I've heard rumors that the new, the new Hyperdrive EVH Tone Master, essentially series amp sounds really good, but I again couldn't find one physically to try. The EVH guys reached out, I reached out back to them. I got ghosted. That was the end of that. So I'll still try and find one and I'll get one on the channel if I can see. Steve says the Pedal show speaks to this. If I recall, when this Pedal show did a video on the Tone Master, they literally came to the same conclusion I did, which is they liked it. But of the two, they definitely wanted the real thing, whatever that means, the real tubes, and they got real tubes. But like I said, Tone Master stuff, I think it's good, and I don't think it needs to be cheap. I just think it's priced just. Just a little too high. And the reason why not because of an affordability aspect. It's because to me, it's not a forever product. And so it's a lot easier to justify some products like a guitar, certain guitars, certain amps, because you know you're gonna probably have them until you're sick of them, so then you'll sell them off. Tone Master digital products, it's not even about them breaking. A lot of people worry like, oh, when they break, they're gonna break. They're gonna break. You know, Digital products just don't hold value. Perfect example is I've recently decided, which I have not announced, you guys officially, that I am not. I decided I'm not using my Kemper anymore. And guess what? If anyone's interested in a Kemper, you should reach out to me direct, message me. You're gonna get a Kemper a great deal. I have tried to sell the Kemper. I tried to give it away. Not literally, like, donate it, but sell it for dirt cheap. And everywhere I went, which is. I'm gonna say everywhere. It's not like 100 places, like four places. Everywhere I went had way too many Kempers, and they couldn't take any more. Kempers used. It was like. It actually had a flashback to my teenage years when we had. We still do. We had Zia Records here in the Arizona where you trade records and tapes. When I would go and try to trade in certain CDs, and it was like, you know, and they're like, yeah, we have. We have 13 of those. We're not taking those on trade right now. Because everybody had decided they're done with that band. That's what it was like having. I. So, in fact, I did some trading yesterday at Guitar center, and I took a pile of stuff, another pile of stuff. And the only thing they didn't keep or the only thing they didn't take was my Kemper. And I even sarcastically said. They said. Just so you know, they said, phil, we don't want your kemper. I go, okay. And they go, and even if we did, right now, we would probably offer you a low price and insult you. And I said, don't even care. Whatever price you throw, I'd probably take it. And they're like, nah. I'm like, okay, so this is my point. Why is everybody dumping their Kempers right now? I have no idea. I know why I'm doing it, but I'm not announcing it. Why? Because I've switched to another product after having the Kemper for about five years, and I really like my Kemper. It's not. I've not fallen out of love with it for, again, work purpose flow purposes. I found something that work purpose flow is better for me. I can't even argue. Sounds better. Might even technically not sound as good to me. Or at least it sounds as good as the Kemper. But workflow is faster and easier and more practical for my needs. So. Okay, so let's. So let's do the next thing. What do we got? Looking at the clock. Make sure we're on time. Let me grab a couple of these, if you don't mind. And that gives me a little second to sip some water. Antique rocker says, hey, I purchased a beat buddy mini two instead of the beat buddy. 160 bucks versus $500. What am I missing by not getting the big boy? Do you use the foot switch? So I use the foot switch. I have the external foot switch. I had the Beat Buddy Mini. I liked it. So, you know, totally fine. What are you missing? I don't know. I don't use 90% of the functions on the B Buddy 2, but I like the way it sounds. I think to my ear, the Beat Buddy, the new Beat Buddy, the one I have, sounds better than the old Beat Buddies. I think they are some rhetoric in their marketing about how they resampled and stuff. It just sounds a little better. But is it worth the 160 versus the $500? I don't. I don't know. Not. Not that I like said I know of. I just know I like the new B Buddy. I use it on the regular and. And that's about the end of that. But B Buddy Mini, I think especially you paid 160 bucks. That's great. I sometimes see them used for 99 bucks too. Same thing, 160 bucks, 99 bucks. I don't think you can go wrong. I don't think you made a bad decision. How about that anti rocker? I don't think you made a bad decision. I think if anything, maybe stick with the Beat Buddy Mini for a while, and then if you start feeling like, wow, I wish it had more features, then maybe start looking in the features of the newer model to see what it adds. Chris says can you recommend a good humidifier? I tried the Varnado, and it doesn't get above 30%. Are you talking about, like, to place into a guitar? So, as I've said, I really don't use a whole lot of humidification. We use some humidifiers here only when, like, right now, humidity is 49%. So I'm okay with that. I don't keep optimum humidity in the house or even around the guitars. I don't optimize to 50 or 60%. What I do is. I told you guys, if in my experience, if your humidity goes below, I'm gonna say 40%. So once you're in the 30s, like, if I once a couple weeks ago, the shop was at 32 and I was like, oh, no. And I knew it. And I knew something was gonna happen, and it did. One of my guitars fret sprouted. And I was like, I knew it was gonna. Just because I'd left it in there for two days. It was too dry. A little too dry. So I don't really have a whole lot of recommendations for that. Humidifiers. I like the d' Addario ones and I like the. What is it the music Nomad ones are pretty good, but. And then for a unit I have a Home EC is where it's one you buy at Costco. That's what I use. Some people say it's not the one you should use. I've been using it for years. I have no problems. So Hoff custom guitars says, hey, new amp day. All right, what'd you get? He says, I just got the high tone custom low watt combo. I've never heard of it. What are your thoughts on the high watts? Oh, so high watt. Like the brand high watt. So it's the high tone custom low watt combo. But is that a high watt thoughts on high watt and hi watt style amps? I have played one or two hi watt amps. I know very little about them. When I said I played them, they would come in like one came in and trade or maybe two came in trade or I've found them in a music store here and there and I plugged in generally understanding at least I think that they're like a Marshall type product or they're a Marshall variant, right. You know, in my life, amps have really come down to like the three grandfathers of amps for me. So there's Marshalls, so everything's like a Marshall. So like there's a Freedman, right? There's, in my opinion, like a high watt, obviously there's the, the Royalists from Tone King, there's the, the Badger, you know, some of the sir amps, some of the Bogner amps are Marshallesque, just a bunch of Marshall esque amps. And then the next is the Fender amps. So then there's all the fence Fenders and then all the Fender variants, right? And then it gets confusing because I sometimes I feel like some app builders are kind of like pickup builders where they just kind of throw all this marketing jargon that confuses me like voice like a Vox and this into this. And I'm like, I don't know. And then even though Vox should be the third, right? So there's Vox and then all the Vox variants. So then you would have like Matchless or Bad Cat. But then again they all start shooting off the different directions right after a while. Like Bad Cat's got stuff that sounds like a Marshall and they got stuff that sounds like a Vox. And I was. So those are the three. But then sometimes I always go the Mesa Boogie and I don't really consider like to me the Saldano and the EVH and all this stuff. That's an Outlier, because I know just enough to know that saldano is a thing. And then they kind of vary it off that. I kind of think of those as somehow modified Marshalls in some way, too. And again, generally speaking, not as like a, you know. Oh, no, let me tell you how the circuit works. This is what they're based off. I'm not talking like that. I'm just talking about, like, to my ears, to my usage when I'm using stuff. And then the rarest concept of all is dumbles. But see dumbles again, I feel like all modified things for modified things to me. And that's why I said some amps just feel like they're modified versions of stuff. So that's what I know about, like, high watts and I don't know. So I don't know. Haven't tried many. Maybe I'll have to try more. That's a good way to segue into a topic. I was actually talking funny. Michael Nielsen's in the chat. I was talking to Michael Nielsen about this, but I was talking about a bunch of other people. And then again on it today, and this subject came up. This is a good time, and this is perfect because we'll do this, and then we'll go into guitar of the Week. So somebody asked me, did I see Dr. Z, the owner of Dr. Z, say the death. It's the death of guitar amps. It's the death. The guitar amps. I did not. I went to go look for it, but also, I was trying to get ready for the show today, and so I started laughing. Now, I gotta tell you, I, I, I don't want to talk about this. Like, I saw whatever he had to say, and I'm gonna react to it. I'm not reacting to what he said. I actually don't care. So I'm reacting to that statement as this thing seems to keep coming up. Wampler says it's the death of petals, right? Dr. Z's like, it's the death of amps. And I think as a content creator, look, you got to have a snazzy title, right? You got to get somebody's interest in. You got to give them something like, you know, hey, to bite on. Hey, here's what I'm gonna talk about, and here's what's gonna happen. But I think the problem with those, although they're great, is as a, as a title grab, I think there's this reality that I sometimes. I know you guys know that that's just a title to grab your Attention and then maybe there's some context in it. But I want to tell you that one of the things that I think about every time I see a pedal builder or an amp builder, because you can almost argue, and I would argue that right now. What do I know that you know, what do I know about the amp market more than Dr. Z, he's an app builder, right? How should some random YouTube guy in his bedroom talk about what he thinks? And I think the problem is because I think even though that's a good argument, I'm going to argue a different argument today when it comes to a pedal builder talking about the pedal market versus an amp builder talking about the amp market and a guitar builder versus someone like me. I like to point out I'm not vested or interested in anybody's products. In other words, I work with all kinds of people and I wish them the best because they're some of them my friends and some of them are just good companies and I want to support their products. But I don't make any of my money off of products being sold. It's not how I make my money. So I really don't have any skin in that game. I have skin in the make YouTube content that you guys are interested in. And so that's my thing. So if we want to talk about the death of YouTube, sure, I might have a differently biased opinion of that versus thing. But here's what I think. I want to react to the statement the death of guitar amps. I would rather change that every time when you guys hear them say the death of guitar amps. The death of guitar, hey, it's the death of electric guitar. Hey, it's the death of pedals. It's no just goodbye to the bad companies. That's what it is. There is no absolute zero. There's not even absolute zero when there's technology that comes in and takes out something, right? They still print maps. That's a fact. You have GPS on your phone. 12 year old children have phones that have GPS all day. They still print maps. You can buy a book of maps. They still make them. There's technology never absolutely kills anything. Cars still go, right? Everything goes. You can argue, I'm sure somebody's going to find an outlier. Please do right? Throw it in there and tell me why I'm wrong. Because you found one thing that it's not correct in this or 10 things which still are not gonna be enough. My point is whatever's happening to amps, cause it is. Amps are declining At a. At an epic rate right now. And so is Pedals. And is that death? No, it just means. It just means that some of the bad companies. And when I mean bad, I don't mean mean a crappy, just the companies that aren't the top. And I'm. And I'm kind of sound. You know, I kind of like mad at myself for saying bad companies. But I just think it illustrates the point better than being super, super fluffy right now. The best survive. The best amp companies will survive. I was talking about Michael Nielsen. I was telling him a story yesterday, and the story was two things, so I want to go to it. One, I was saying, when they say grunge killed heavy metal, I say no. I say they're wrong. Let's argue. You guys are gonna get flared up right now. It didn't. Here's how I know it didn't. Pantera was a metal,'80s metal band first. Before they were Pantera. Alice in Change was a 80s style metal band. There were tons of bands. Slash was 80s style, hair metal stuff. What happens when grunge came? Yes, grunge came and there was some. Tom Morello is a shredder. Billy Corrigan from Smashing Pumpkins is a shredder. He can shred. He can 80 shred. He was an 80s shredder. A lot of them were. What they did is they adapted. They said, hey, kids aren't listening to Guitar Hero style music that are about the girl they want to have sex with. What? What's going on? Oh, they're listening to these bands. These bands who are not wearing. They're not teasing their hair there. And they adapted. Some adapted badly and didn't do well. Okay? Some adapted so well we confused them with the actual genre themselves. Alice in Change is not a grunge metal band right now. When I said Alice in Change adapted, some of you guys are like, oh, but Phil, Alice in Chains is not a grunge band. They're not. But they are definitely held in that era as a band that didn't get killed by grunge. They adapted in it. You're like, you think they just started that week and they were already in the market. They were making music and then they changed things. Adapt. The market adapts. Let me tell you why amp companies are hurting right now. And I again, Dr. Z, by the way, I think Dr. Z makes some of the best amps. Okay? And I think, by the way, if you watch his videos, I love some of his most to the point comments and his videos. So I want to let you know, this isn't about Dr. Z in any way. Okay? And I'm going to watch what he has to say because I'm curious, but I actually didn't want to for this a little bit. Like I said, I didn't have time. And I was like, oh, it kind of works out better. I was explaining to again, Michael Nielsen, this is funny because it just happened yesterday. A theory I have, and it was about the boss Katana. And it was like, I just did a video this week on the second channel about one of the Amplified nation amps, which are, in my opinion, a more obtainable, not affordable, more obtainable version of two Rock. So if you're looking at like a two rock style amp, that's five grand, you can get yourself an Amplified nation for about four grand. To you, you're like, that's insane and insane. But to some people, man, that makes it from, you know, hey, $3,600, I got a shot at this. $5,200, there's no shot, okay? So my point, though is, is that some people put in the comments, oh, my boss Katana does this. In fact, every channel that makes content can tell you very easily every video they do about any amp that's expensive, somebody says, oh, my boss Katana can do that. And so here's what I was explaining to Michael. I play very lightly or quietly. Okay? None of my family thinks that. Like, if you ask my wife, she's not going to tell you I play quietly. None of my neighbors probably think I play quietly. I don't know if they can even hear me. But all of my guitar player friends do not think I play loud. In fact, they think they're always. I set my amps very quiet. I don't crank the amps. I used to a long time ago. I don't anymore. I probably stopped 10 years ago. Maybe even longer than that. Maybe 15 years ago. I don't play very loud. When you have amps, let's pick on the Amplified nation amp because it's right here, just like the Katana is right here. I'll use these two as examples. When you play that amp, as beautiful as I think that amp is, I actually think it's a work of art. So you understand. I think an amp like that, that's handmade, you know, with the blue suede and stuff, this is just an art piece to me. This is a thing that I truly love. Do I need it? No. I could totally gig anywhere with a katana. I'm not against that. Argument. I just think that this makes me feel a certain way. Right? I think maybe this is how people who buy like a thousand, not a thousand, you know, whatever, $25,000 watch, maybe that's how they makes them feel. I don't understand that concept. So, you know, I don't go, oh, I want a $25,000 watch. I go, maybe it helps their self esteem. They're walking around and like, hey, what time is it? You're right. To me, this is what makes me feel good. So that's why I have this. But my point is, when I turn this amp down, one of the best attributes of this amp, like a lot of tube amps, is the power section. I've taken that out of the equation. Okay? And then because I'm not using the power section to even not only its fullest ability, but just to any ability, the speakers are taken out of the equation because they're not really moving like they're supposed to. So I make adjustments and I'm using pedals and all kinds of things to make things sound good at lower volumes. And I obtained this. I'm very happy when somebody says, oh, I can get my boss katana to like it. Yeah, you can. As long as we're playing fair, which is putting these tube amps at a handicap by not using their full power. The reality is, I don't care what boss. I don't care if you have the artist boss. I think there's 100 watt artist boss. There is. No one is ever going to convince me that any, any boss product. I don't care. Cranked on a stage which sounds as good as a Marshall amp cranked on a stage. There's just no way. I, I, I, I'm not saying it sounds bad. I'm not saying I couldn't use it. I'm not saying you're crazy if you like it. I'm just saying there's no one. You're like, if I ab them, I'm. And I play them both. I'm gonna, I'm gonna go, yeah, the, the Marshall I think is better. And then I would probably tell you, can we turn this stupid thing down? And then I would probably then go, well, the katana works for me. Or the, the artist katana. Whatever. So my point is, this is why I'm talking about adapting. I talk to app builders all the time. They, they don't listen to anything I say. And I don't mean because I'm a YouTuber. I mean because when I'm speaking, I'm speaking to them for. I'm you, right? We're all here on a Friday talking about crap that doesn't matter. This is who we are. People are so fanatical. We're so fanatical about the thing. We love music and guitars and amps that we just want to talk about them, play them, talk about them, look at them, right? Right. I mean, I look at guitars and magazines the way I think some guys look at, like, Playboy sports models or whatever, right? They're just staring at girls all the time. I'm like, just, oh, look at this guitar. So my point is, when I talk to amp builders about the future, hey, we need more lower wattage amps because the power section is not really relevant to a lot of us. You know, we need amps that are good, but not. We don't need $5,000amps that literally are 100 watt amps. And the amp builders are stuck with the rock stars. They're still also. They're also talking to professional musicians. And the professional musicians are giving them the opposite, hey, this is what I need. But that's the minority. None of us are rock stars. In fact, even if you're gigging on the regular, you're being told to turn down. I just told you, I don't play that loud. I haven't played a gig in the last 20 years that I wasn't told to turn down. And I don't crank that loud. It's because they always just want the volume down. So I guess my point is, is that whenever I see, like, pedals are dead or the death of pedals or the death of guitars or the death of amps, it's really just, hey, it's the survival of the fittest. And the ones that figure out where the market's going, they're going to do fine. They'll do great. And the ones that don't, they're going to be in trouble. We see it all the time. You know, we saw it with G and L. They made great products, but they just didn't adapt. Not only in their marketing, but they didn't adapt in their pricing, their design, their delivery strategy with their dealers. And so that's my $0.02 on this subject. And every time this subject comes up, because I just want to say, every time I hear the death of something, I kind of always chuckle a little bit like, yeah, it doesn't die. Okay? That's not what happens to it. It just. It's changing. And the change means somebody goes away. And maybe that means they Die. I don't know. There it is. There. I just contradicted my whole statement. For fun. Matt says, hey, any reason why you can't Download episodes on YouTube Premium? I did not know that. Let me check. Actually, no. Let me check right now. I will check. After tonight, I will look. As far as I know, there is no setting that allows me to. To stop you from that. But if there is and I've clicked it somehow, I'll fix it. You know, last week I got it. I get this every. About. I don't know, I want to say 10 episodes. So every three, three months. Let's call it 12 episodes every three months. About once a quarter. Once a quarter, I get a couple comments going. Hey, you've turned off your closed captions. Hey, turn on the closed captions. That's not me. There is a setting that you can turn off closed captions. In other words, so your video doesn't have closed captions. I think I heard or read once that that's even illegal to do. So it's weird that it's an option. Maybe it's made an option for certain countries or something, but I don't do that at all. But if you notice, it's never happened once, ever on an actual video I made, but always on the podcast. It's because sometimes there's a backlog on YouTube. I'm not sure the official answer, but they don't get to it. They don't do it. And then eventually they update it and they do it. It's always them. And I've. In the past, I've sent them a message and every time they send me a response a day or two later saying, oh, it's fixed. But they didn't fix it. It just caught up. And then they just tell me. So I stopped emailing them. So I'm just letting you guys know. I'll figure out the download thing and. And if there's a problem, I'll fix that. And on the closed captions, I appreciate you guys putting comments. I said, I used to answer you guys. If I'm not answering now, it's not for any reason, then there's nothing I can do about it. So that's my official statement. There's nothing I can do about it. I always check it, though. So anytime, anywhere, you guys put the, hey, there's no closed captions. I load to check to make sure I haven't accidentally hit any kind of weird setting. So. And I also think that part of the problem. So you know, on the closed caption thing is because I don't monetize the show until after it, it starts replay. And you've probably heard this before when you don't monetize and you're a channel like me with this kind. There's 1500 of you live. YouTube's like punishing you a little bit so they, they'll throttle down. So not only do I not get the monetization for the first two hours of the show which is on approximately 6,000 views. Just so you guys know, you guys think it's 1500 views because there's 1500 you, there's 1500 of you at any one minute or one second here right now. But through the two hours we're going to cycle apparently four, four times your number because there's about, sometimes about four or 5000 people. So I lose out on the four or 5000 views that we do because we're not monetizing. And then they throttle down the sharing it afterwards because it wasn't monetized yet. It's so you know, just for, because it's sponsored by patrons. So I guess it doesn't really matter anyways. But it's about $150 per episode is what we lose. There's 52 episodes. You do the math. That's what we lose a year by doing ad free at the beginning. That's you'll hear a lot of channels say hey I don't make much. Well that's probably because they had like 30 people live and they get 200 views. 6,000 views on a two hour stream like this. It's about 150 bucks to, to the channel that we are skipping. So I'm just letting you know and, and, but the not to tell you like on the money side. I just want you to explain that. That's why I think YouTube is also not worried about closed captions and also messing with the, some of the features. They, they put us as a back burner. We're no different than if you have a new channel at that point and you're not monetized. They don't care about it because there's no money for them to make. So okay. And then cigar dad saying YouTube also let us stop letting us use the playback speed. Yeah, I don't know what that is. I mean I know what it is but I don't, I don't know why it would affect that. There shouldn't be anything affects that. There's nothing in the settings we can do to, to prevent you or have that or anything like that. Let's grab this one. This one was from Amanda. This is from Amanda. She said she grabbed this and it says, hey, Phil, read that. Reversing the saddles on a tune o Matic bridge can improve intonation on wound strings. Is this true? I would argue. Whether it's true or not would probably be irrelevant as I don't think that's why anyone does it. When you top wrap a string on a tune bridge tailpiece, it is generally been used for attention change, to change the way that it feels when you're doing bins. And I've talked about this before, that one of the things I always thought was funny was I think Greg Allman from the Allman Brothers did it and Zach Wilde did it. And I always thought that was funny because these are probably two dudes that never crossed paths and said, hey, that's how I do it. And Meg, me too. So it's funny to me when different musicians. Kind of like when I was saying about the story about Fender with different people, when different people who are playing different things that are in different places can come across the same ideas, sure they could have heard them the same, but for them to adopt them to me kind of solidifies them as being more of true thing than so much just a wives tale or a myth. I have top wrapped my tailpieces on my guitars and I have noticed the exact same thing. You, when you wrap over the top, your tension is decreased, the feel of it decreases. And, and so if you're playing 10 to 46, they feel a little bit looser. It's so I've heard that there is sustain increase, you know, increase, sustain intonation. I could see that as an argument. I don't know why intonation would. So here's my point. As, as, as someone who's worked on these guitars for so many years, I don't know what it'd be physically changing because the intonation is from the, the saddle, from the bridge saddle to the nut, right? That's where, that's where intonation is affected. Intonation is not affected by anything past those two points. So it's from that tip to that tip. So it's like really where the string rests into the saddle from. So in this, continue this part. My God, I was going to use a sharpie. It doesn't matter. You get the point. This is a string, this is the string, this is the saddle. The intonation would be affected from when the string is contacting this point forward. If this is the bridge. And then on the nut. The same thing would be before the end of the nut, by the way. So you guys know in your screen I'm probably doing this weird holding it this way because I have something in front of me. So I had to turn that this around. Reading your question. So my point is intonation being affected. Is it possible there is another factor in intonation, which is tension? Guitars, what I mean by that is you could hit a note. Cause remember, people think of intonation as just being distance where sometimes it can physically be tension because we, you know, hitting an open string lightly, you go, oh, it's perfectly intonated. Let's say take an A, A for 40. You know, that's not really going to be your intonation. A hundred percent. Your intonation is really affected. More you're going to notice it more the more you go up the neck. So maybe with tension it will get different. So maybe by changing tension you can improve the intonation. There may be an argument there, but I'm going to stick with my original statement, which is whether it is or isn't a factor in intonation. I would say that's not why anybody's doing it. That could be a byproduct that they notice. The function of it is to change the tension on a Les Paul to make it easier to play. Especially players who play really thin, thick strings is what I noticed too. So if you haven't done it, you can try. You can try it. You just top wrap it. I have a video. I'm pretty sure it's either the. I think it's the Guitar Myths video, which is like a million view video. And I discussed that in detail, why they do it and why, why all that stuff. But so pop, pop at something says you can just use a guitar to demonstrate it. I could, but then I have to hold the guitar awkwardly in front of the camera and then point. It's not set up that way. Not how it works, unfortunately. You got to set up your rig the way it's set up. So in the other. In the other rig I can show you guys in detail anything. But here I. It's. The more. The second I go and grab a guitar and just start push pointing at things, it gets a little more difficult. Plus, because so many people consume the podcast as audio only, I have to describe it verbally more than I have to show you anyways because otherwise people listening in the car right now are going to. I don't know what he's talking about because he's not saying anything. Triple. This is Also from Amanda, triple trains, triplet trains. 1373 says, hey, have you ever had two guitars sound alike? And what would you change to make them sound different? I would say that's the rarest thing I've ever come across. Two, even identical guitars sounding the exact same and feeling the same is probably the hardest thing to achieve. I've probably spent more time in my life trying to get two guitars to sound alike than I've ever found two guitars sounding alike. To the point where it's almost like I think it's a futile effort. I don't know if I would ever, you know, somebody's like, I got two identical Strats, same wood, same pickup, same height, same this, same measurement, same string, same setup, same frets, and they don't sound alike. I'm like, yep, that sounds more like it to me. I think it's because the variables are so much that it's too hard to get all of them exactly. Have I. Have I ever played or had two guitars that sound exactly alike? Maybe I don't remember. I don't think it's ever happened. I don't think. I mean, generally speaking, like, could I convince you on a YouTube video by strumming a couple generic chords and saying through the microphones going, oh, they sound the same, don't they? It's funny about the one dimensional kind of concept of showing things on a platform like YouTube, you can really convince people of some bullshit real easy. You can go like, hey, look, this sounds like this ling. And if you haven't figured out why honesty is so important on YouTube is really the real thing. You need is somebody to explain the personal experience to you. And although that can be tainted with their bias, which is why knowing their bias is important, and it can also be tainted with their experience or lack of, or, you know, maybe too much experience, at least if you have an idea, if somebody's telling you, like, hey, you know, regardless of what you're hearing, this is what's really happening, right? That's where it really happens. But yeah, in a YouTube video, you could. I can make two guitars sound exactly alike because you just stop doing anything that's going to increase the variable of that. So like I said, a perfect example is like, strum the strings open on one guitar and then strum the strings open on another guitar and go, look, they're the same and they're going to sound generally the same. But will all the other things that are really important to you be the same? Same? Probably not so much so. And, and I didn't really get too much in that to my channel, but in the beginning, I did a lot of comparison stuff. And then over time, you do comparison because people like it. But then what you realize is, is that it's almost impossible to give them a real good comparison. You just have to tell them the difference. And then the skeptics come in. It's like, it's weird that the guitar community has the same skeptics as every other community, but we do have them. Like, whoa. You know, when you didn't show us the proof of that, like, the proof of it telling you what I think. So that's my thought on that. Two guitars sounding alike is very difficult, which is why I think so, you know, and I think a lot of sane people, we'll call them sane guitar players, think that tone wood, not that it exists or doesn't exist. It's where tone would debate came from, where tone would comes from. The concept is two guitars never sound the same. Usually say never is a hard word. Right. Generally don't sound the same. And so then the argument becomes, oh, well, it's because they're different woods. And if they're not different woods, it's just different, you know, densities of wood or different grains or different, you know. You know, Right. And so that's the. That becomes. I think where the argument comes from. The reality is, you know, the best I've ever heard it put is, is this when somebody says, oh, everything sounds the same. Like, oh, if that's true, then it'd be a lot easier to make money in this business. If I could make every guitar sound the exact same, that would be the easiest thing to do, right? Is I could sell them. The problem is, is, is that guitar players go in a music store and they pick up seven of the same guitar, and yet six of them they don't like. And one of them they love. If you can convert all of those seven to being the one they love, you would make a lot more money. And I. And I told you guys that I've learned this the hard way. As someone who had to sell guitars for a long time in a store, that was my money tied up in those guitars. When guitars just could not sell. I don't mean one person didn't like it. I mean, every guitar player came in, they. They just didn't like it. They didn't like this guitar. And you do a full setup on it. They didn't like it. Just there's something about the guitar. It just didn't appeal to anybody. You just learn like, you know, just not everything's going to be great. Some guitars are just not great or even good even. Let's see. Guitar sample. No guitars, Amps and Coffee. Oh, see, that's good. I like that name. I And so Guitars, Amps and coffee says hey, I found a Jackson X series Kelly for $100 at a thrift store. That's awesome. Especially the thrift store because I hear all the time that they're gouging now and stuff says any suggestions for a pickup upgrade? That would be for that guitar. That would kind of 80s rock, Van Halen kind of vibe. Definitely go with the JB Jazz. But dude, find a used one stick used JB's in there. So somebody's always yanking out a JB in the. In the guitar. JB Jazz, you know, get yourself a used set of Seymour Duncan's. That would definitely do it. Or get yourself some used DiMaggios or some copy of those kind of pickups. A lot of good copies out there. Mighty Mite makes good copies. What's it. Why am I having trouble with that? They make the SLS guitars. Why can't I think of the name of them? Guitar Fetish. They make some good copy pickups. So you can always get copies if you want the real deal. I totally understand that. So just. But buy used pickup. Used is sometimes a great deal. So. And a JB is a great pickup. Especially for the 80s. I think it's the. The for me it's the JB and the super distortion. It's the DiMargio. Seymour Duncan like they. They owned the 80s. Paul says, hey Phil, what are some good rule of thumb to maintain gold plated hardware? Don't sweat on it. Wipe it down all the time. That's first of all they usually. It's plated like crap, you know. As we all know it's usually cheap. But. But the biggest problem you're gonna have is your sweat destroys it. And it. Getting sweat like wet on it isn't what destroys it. It's just the. When your sweat dries the salt and the acids in your skin, the corrosive stuff that's in the. Not in the skin, in your liquid, in your sweat. Stay behind. They dry out and they eat at the bridge. So I would say the best thing you can do is wipe it down constantly. Have a nice cloth. I would say a hundred percent CO cotton. You can do flannel or microfiber. Have that dry. Don't. You don't need chemicals. You don't need to spray anything on it. You don't need anything. Just dry it all off. And that's great. You don't need to wet it. Don't worry about, you know, just wipe it off. If you wipe it off when it's wet, if you're. If you wipe off your sweat when it's wet, you should be fine. You just wipe it off. If your sweat has dried, you're going to need something to clean it. That's up to you. You could use a guitar polish. You can probably use. Use Windex. Whatever it is, just keep in mind that any thing that you pick, you know, just make sure it doesn't get on the screws too. Because the screws can rust and stuff. But that's not really what you're worried about. You're worried about the gold plating kind of stuff. But definitely keep it dry. That's the biggest thing you can do. One trick that I saw a guy do, and he did it for years and I used to think it was crazy. And I kind of think now it worked was he would use sweat bands. And I remember thinking it was so weird that he would play on stage with sweat bands, you know. And I used to do his repairs, his work. And he told me cause he sweat so much that it got on his guitar and it ruined his guitars. It destroyed like the finish on his chrome, on his hardware. It ate through his strings. And so he would put sweat bands on and that way it would soak up the sweat. Plus he could use them to. To wipe off any of the wet, you know, the wet of his guitar. So I don't know, man. Maybe sweatbands is the key. I don't know. Just passing the information. Frank says, hey Phil, he's in the market for an attenuator. Would you recommend something like the Tone King? I love the Tone King Iron Man. It's one of my top favorite attenuators for moving up more expensive oxbox solution. The Oxbox is the worst attenuator ever in the history of attenuators. I'm going to call it that. Michael Nielsen and I were talking yesterday. It seems to be a drop today a lot. But we were talking for a little bit and he said, the five way switch on. I hope I don't get in trouble for this. Michael says he's called the five way switch on the oxbox. The blankets, it's like how many blankets do you want on your sound? 1, 2, 3. I said, actually, I don't think that's accurate. I think it's the blankets, pillow. So if the Oxbox, it's one blanket, two blanket, then two blankets and a pillow. Then it's two blankets and two pillows. Oxbox has the worst attenuator, but the Oxbox has one of the best direct sounds. I absolutely love it. So I love my Oxbox. If I was. I'm working on this as maybe as an idea for a video. The 10 pieces of gear that I can't live without. I don't mean right now or the company sent me. I'm talking about like just in my whole life, this is what I've had. If I. If this was gone, I would change. It would change me for the worst. The Oxbox is definitely in that top 10, no problem. But not as an attenuator. I use it sometimes, an attenuator, but it just darkens the amp up a lot and it's just not something I like. But I love it for direct. In fact, I like it better than most attenuators. I've owned a lot. I have a lot currently. Right now, there's a lot. Somebody says the Fry Power Station. The Fry Power Station, like the Boss Waza, which I think the Fry, it's way better than the Boss Waza, but like that they're a different kind of animal, right? Because now what they're doing is they're putting themselves in place of your power section. And that's really cool and a unique feature. But to me, if you're looking at the Iron man, one of the things I like about Tone King Iron man is you're just, you know, like, if you're like me and you have like a little 12 watt combo or a 20 watt amp and you just want to, you know, put something in front of it. I would highly suggest the smaller version of the Iron man, the more affordable ones, like $500 versus the bigger one. I have both. But if your amps under 30 watts, go with the smaller one, I don't think you'll ever regret it. It's really good sounding, you know, attenuator. So think about something like that. There's a bunch of others I have like the sir one I have. Look there. And somebody always does. Anytime you say anything good about attenuator, somebody's always got to mention their attenuator. There are. There are a lot of good ones, very few to know, bad ones. And any. If they are any bad ones, they're just. Because they're old outdated stuff and they just have gotten better at it now, but I would say Ironman is one of my favorites, especially for the price points. But also the sir one's really good too. But I'm talking about just, if you just straight up just need attenuation, no other frills, you don't need it to be a power section. So you have an effects loop in the thing. You don't need it, you know, option, you know, you don't need the other options, but the Auxbox, like I said, I recommend the auxbox only if you're going to use it for either direct recording or you're going to use it on stage to run it to front house. Oxbox, I think, is one of the best choices you can get out there. Nella says Oxbox is expensive. It's super expensive. And I've sold this story so many times. And I just want to be very clear. The Oxbox, I don't have a thing with UA audio. I don't have a, a relationship with them. So when the Oxbox came out, every YouTuber was like, it's the greatest thing since everything. And that's what, you know, happens when it all comes out, right? And I'm like, you guys, I'm skeptical. You should be skeptical. Hey, be skeptical of me, you know, you know, you don't know why. Like I said, sometimes I'm like, hey, this company worked with me and they're, they're, they're, they're sponsoring the video. Even knowing that maybe you're skeptical, it's fine. I try to be as transparent as I can. But still, you can have honeymoon not only with a piece of gear, and then, you know, you don't trust everything because they're in love with it. But also, I could have a honeymoon ratio with the company, maybe. I like the company a little bit. That's why I try to tell you who's my friend and who's not. You know, on. Not as a brag, but as a, hey, I have a relationship with this person. I like them. So I'm kind of probably talk about them like I don't, you know, a little bit nicer is what I'm trying to say. I try not to, but I try to pick friends that can take a little abuse. But, you know, it goes on the way it goes. My point is oxbox, I was skeptical and so I was going to buy one, but I was really afraid to buy one because everyone got one for free. And I was like, everyone got one for free. Which means it might, it's probably not good if they say, like, when company sends every YouTuber or something, I'm always like, oh, that's the trigger for me as a YouTuber. If I see, you know, a channel, get some piece of gear sent to my company, I don't think anything of it. That's just the company wants to get it advertised. They probably worked out a thing like, hey, they like it and does it. When I see almost half the channels that I'm watching with the same piece of gear, I know it's a marketing push. But then I'm a little skeptical. Not because it's a marketing push, because I'm like, everyone likes it. That's a lot of people to like something, you know, in a very short period of time of having access to it. But anyways, back to the Oxbox. I was skeptical, skeptical, skeptical. And I, I did not. It's hard to say. How do you look at this? Okay, I did not buy my Oxbox, but Oxbox, but UA Audio did not give me the Oxbox. I was very upfront about this when I, on many podcasts before Sweetwater reached out to me and asked me to do a video for them in which they offered to pay me. And I said I actually would really want an Oxbox. Will you send me an Oxbox and. Because I want to try one. And I did that as the compensation for. So instead of payment, which is dumb because I could have just got the money and just bought an Oxbox, I don't know why I didn't do it. You know, I could do it either way. I guess it didn't matter. But I took it as compensation. And then I made a video of the Oxbox, but I was just not, I think in the video, so you guys know, it says product provided, which implies that it's sponsored. I was not required to do a video of the product in any way. It's just the way I do product provided is if I know somebody, to the company, it's product provided. If a company loaned it to me, but they're getting it back, it's product provided. If a company's paying me it's product, I just tell, like, kind of like I tell everybody it's sponsored, even if it's not even remotely sponsored. Even if I just. I worked with them five years ago and I haven't worked with them since, and I bought a product, I'm going to put product sponsored. So just so you guys know, because I, you know, why not? So anyways, Nello, the reason I'm telling you that is I'M telling you, as someone who's had an oxbox now for three, four years, I absolutely love it. And it's a super crazy expensive. And you can find deals on them. So if you're interested, find a deal on one. But it's worth it to me. Like I said, I couldn't live without it. Let's see. Oh, I'm not old. Vanished, says the blitzcreen. Marketing on the Acoustasonic made me decide would never buy one. Yeah, it's probably where I got a lot of my skepticism for the Acoustasonic. And I'm different. So you guys know. You guys are looking at it like, oh, it's a. It's the YouTube community and the. And the corporations against me. I have a little bit of paranoia baked in that you guys wouldn't have. Which means when I see. When I see, like, you know, some great channels, right? Some channels that are way better than mine, and I don't. I don't mean more viewers. I'm not talking about that at all. That's. That's irrelevant. In fact, doesn't even usually factor in anymore. When I see a channel that I go, oh, that's a really good channel. And they were sent this product, and I go, okay, I don't think anything of it. When I see a couple more channels, I go, okay, I don't think any of it. When I see, like, 90% of the guitar community and they're all promoting a product, and yet that company's not reaching out to me, I get a little paranoid. Not because I'm like, they should be talking to me. It's more like, oh, they don't. That's like, specifically, they don't want to talk to me. So I go, what does that mean? I should take it as. They just don't like my content, which is probably all it is. But sometimes I'm like, you know, sometimes I'm like, oh, maybe they don't. So acoustic sonic and that. And, you know, the perfect example, acoustic sonic, it was promoted by everyone. One of my favorite bands in the world, Bowling for Soup. He's got one. He plays it. He loves it. Some people, Dovidos got sent one. He's a friend of mine, and he still plays his. See, I look at that way. Are they still keeping it? Do they keep it? Because sometimes that tells you a lot too. In fact, it tells you. I think it tells you the most. And sometimes. But what's my point? My point is, is. But then they tanked as a product. So by the Time I thought I'd buy one and pull it on the channel, maybe do a deep dive. They had tanked. So I'm like, why do it? None of you guys want one? Because it tanked. Okay, we gotta get back to guitar stuff. Let's finish it up. Let's finish up the show. What are we gonna talk about something? Let me refresh this. And go here. Oh, oh, that was that one. The pick. 5663 says, Phil, if you reopen your store now, do you think you would have made a killing? I don't know. I was doing really well then. So, you know, we did not, you know, we weren't not huge. But as a business we were doing fine. I mean I started my store. We started a store in a like 1400 square foot, not even 1400 square foot store front. And within the first two years we moved it to 3500 square feet. We moved our lesson, we built our lesson rooms from 2 to 10. And then I think at one point 12, I'd have to ask Shauna. 12 lesson rooms at some point. And then of course repair was always backlogged. Now does that mean like, you know, you're killing it and you're making millions of dollars? No, but as a business, if you can open a business and do well, I mean, the bills were all paid, you know, employees were paid, everything's fine. We weren't really having issues. And then when I started doing YouTube, it was kind of helping a little bit, but it wasn't the goal. So if I open it today, I guess the answer your question. Let me ask your question. What? I made a killing. If I open a store today, it would be nothing like my store. My store was a dated platform that is now dead. It is not why I closed it, but it is now currently a dated platform that is dead. I was a top tier for an independent small store. I was a top tier Fender dealer. I wouldn't be a Fender dealer now. Has nothing to do with Fenders problems. It's just, you know, there's. You can be. There's so much better ways to make money in the music industry as a dealer now I would probably had changed about five different things with the store. So, you know, so to. To modernize it. I see lots of stores. The reason I know this is I see lots of stores and I know friends that have stores and I go in and so, you know, I have to worry. I don't have to worry about them paranoid going, is he talking to me? They all know If I've told them all what I think, everybody that I'm a friend with the store knows what I think. A lot of them have what I like. I go in there and I go, yes, like my store, this is dated, you need to change this. So, so if I opened a store I wouldn't be anything like that, but I would do a totally different business model. But if your question is more tying into the YouTube, would YouTube being a YouTube channel help me? It could, I guess. I mean obviously it puts you on the radar. I'd have a social media following to pursue. But in that regards I could probably just promote anything at that point, couldn't I could just be like, you know, you know, as you guys, you can tell. And when I make my decisions, how I keep adjusting. I'm trying to focus mostly on the YouTube platform and not so much the outside lingering monetary platforms. So I hope that kind of answers that question. Let's see. Trivial nonsense. 95 says, hey Phil, how often do you see Tom style bridges with a collapsing radius? Recently got a boutique 24 model where the 12 inch radius bridge has already flattened to 220. Huh, collapsing. So what he's talking about is like those, the bridge sinking. So in other words, it was radiused at I think what he's saying is 12 and it's flattened out to 20. I would say, you know, I don't have any real memories of seeing it on the regular. I would imagine it happens if the bridge is too soft. A lot of the bridges are not as good built as well as others. So maybe that's a problem with it. Maybe it's stronger tension strings that can flat it out. It's not something because again when I come across guitars now they're usually new guitars so we're focusing on how they were built, not the issues they would have like a repair issue. When I was doing repair issues, it's a problem business. So if somebody has a problem with it, my guess is that most people that that happens to, they don't notice so they didn't bring it in to be fixed. So generally speaking when you do repair, you know, usually you're dealing with what they see. Sometimes like they bring it in and you find other additional problems. But I don't know if I would necessarily can think of any time where I've noticed that problem more than maybe once or twice. And again I always give myself a caveat for that because I could say I haven't seen it, but I've definitely probably seen it a couple times. It just didn't stick in my head as being something to think about. And remember, Bruce on the coast says, hey, are strings mostly made by a few OEM suppliers? Or do most of the many companies selling strings manufacturing their own? You know, when I started in this business, I was told there was only three string manufacturers, and. And they make all the strings. Everybody said that everywhere they went, everywhere you would go into the store, and they would all say that everywhere they went, and it was not true. When we started the store, we had multiple accounts. We had ghs. And I know you're talking about builders versus, you know, making the strings, but. But there was actually, GHS was making their strings, and then there was. D' Addario was definitely making strings. Ernie Ball was definitely making their strings. Doctor was definitely making their strings. Arcoco was at that time definitely making their strings. Labella, Thomastic. Trying to think, who else? A couple others. Right. So different accounts. And generally speaking, everybody was kind of making their own strings. Not in every case, but in most of the cases. And then over time, it kept dwindling and dwindling and dwindling down. And yes, you know, Fender was making its strings in Ensenada in Mexico. And then one day, Fender stopped making its own strings. By the way, when Fender bought Squire, Squier was a string manufacturer, and that's why they bought them. They got all the string equipment and they were making strings. So they were making their own strings. And now D' Addario makes Fender strings, and D'Daro makes a lot of strings. Elixir doesn't make their own strings. As far as I know, nothing's changed. But that could be a little dated because, you know, I can only tell you up to about two, three years ago, so sometimes they OEM their strings, but. But yeah, there's a lot of companies now that oem strings for a lot of companies, but there are still. Not quite a few, but there's still a good amount of string manufacturers out there making their own strings. So if the concern you have, and this is the answer, the question you didn't ask, but I think it's the intent of that question. Are you being duped or am I buying? And I'm not saying you asked that, but I mean, that's really the core of a question like that. Whether you realize or not, you know, am I really buying the thing I'm buying? Because that's, you know, it's your money. You worked hard for it, and you want to get the thing that you. You want. You're like, hey, I want to buy this brand, and I don't want to be buying the brand I just walked away from. Right? Believe it or not, even if a manufacturer oem strings for other manufacturers, they have other requirements, like in how the string is constructed, the metallurgy in it, the construction style, whether or not it's a hex core, a round core, the thickness of the wrap wire versus the thickness of the core wire, the makeup of those two wires, the wrap style, all of that stuff, right? Gets factored in. And when they make strings. So what I'm getting at is, even if, let's say in theory and not all cases, I'm just saying in theory, that d' Addario makes strings, and you go, I don't want to buy d'. Addario. I want to buy somebody else's strings. And you go to another manufacturer and you find out that D'Dario is making their strings. Like in the case of Fender. I'm not saying this is true in the case of Fender. I'm saying it can be true with some manufacturers where you're like, I'm just buying D'Dario String. It's not entirely true because they could have a different specification for that wire and the string construction, and therefore, it's a different string, even if it's made by the same people. And so there you have it. If you're concerned, I can tell you that d' Addario makes their strings, so you can trust that. Ernie Ball makes their strings. You can trust that string. Joy makes their strings, so you can trust that. I'm assuming so. Notice how I said yes. Yes, yes. These are things confirmed. Yes. I assume the Dr. Strings is still making their strings. At least I'm still buying them from Dr. Because I don't believe they're made by somebody else. I just. I think they still are. And then I thought I heard JHS is no longer making its strings. And again, if that's not true, I don't want to spread that rumor. I'm just saying I heard that. Like, I'm heard a rumor. I'm not telling you that so you can spread that rumor. I'm saying that in case somebody can mention it. Like, no, that's not true. Like, I work with ghs and that's not true. That'd be really nice to know and stuff like that. But. But, yeah, the biggies. I stick to mostly the. I do use Dr. Strings a lot. I stick to mostly Ernie Ball, D'Dario and String Joy. Those are the three I use on the regular for Some of you guys love elixirs. I totally understand that because a lot of people are die hard elixirs. I think they have one of the most loyal customer followings out there. Strings, I just don't use them because I don't use coded strings very often. So when I use coded strings I'll use elixir. And I've tried a bunch of brands. Like some brands sent me stuff and I even did some videos for them and I've used those. And then I stopped getting access to those so, you know, I couldn't find them to buy. But I use coded strings sometimes. I think I mentioned this before, so I'll mention it right now. If I use coded strings, it's only on guitars that I don't use. The logic being like if I have a guitar, like a perfect example, let's say I have a guitar and I know I don't pick it up very often. It's a once in a while guitar because I'm using it for something or maybe I'm inspired to play that. I'll put coded strings on it that way in six months from when I pick it up, I don't pick it up. Strumming, go. All these strings are dead. And now the one time I want to play it in the last half a year, it's not, you know, so I, I put coded strings. So it's almost like I can tell you right now, if you walk in the room and you pick a guitar and you go this coded strings. Just know that that means I don't play it very often. And. And so that's something to think about. And then this just ties in. We'll end on this note. Although I will have a last thing I saw, a question I want to grab. You know, perfect example was last week this guitar, the keys was supposed to be guitar of the week. I had, I had decided this guitar would be guitar of the week last week. And I was going to share this guitar and story with you. Instead I didn't. I did the, the Ikea caster. The reason I did that is I could not get this guitar to sound or play good. I was just picking it up and it was just, it just was not. It was like, I don't know, something was. Something was off. Like it was brittle and the. I was playing it and I just feel like I needed to change the strings to a different style of string. I have a really light gauge of strings. This is nine to 52. And I was like, I gotta put a 56. I bought a 56 for it. Because I was like, okay, I gotta make this thing play right? I don't know what's wrong with me. And then I picked it up again after, of course, I didn't do Guitar of the Week. And the opposite happened. All of a sudden I was like, oh, man, this thing rings. And I was like, what is going on here? And I just loved it. And it plugged it in and it was sounding great. And the reason I'm sharing this story with you is it's a perfect example of what I'm talking about when I say sometimes I don't play guitar for a while. It's not because I have too many guitars. I don't tell my wife that. So don't. Let's spread. Let's not spread that rumor, right? I don't have too many guitars, but sometimes a guitar just doesn't. I don't know, man. It just doesn't do anything for me. And almost like, ugh, why'd I buy this? Just put this away. Maybe I'll get rid of that. And then you pick it up again, and it's amazing. And that's why sometimes having, you know, a bunch of guitars is good. It's not just a placebo effect. It's not just somebody justifying crap in their head. It actually has real function to it. I told Shana today, I said, it's funny. I never get in my truck and go, man, this truck drives like crap today. And then the next day you get in and go, man, it drives really nice today. I don't feel that way. But guitars. I have an emotional reaction to my guitars all the time. I pick them up, strumming them. I go, just mud. What is this? I need to change the pickups in this thing. It's so bad. And I put it on the wall or I put it in the rack, and then I play something else. And I play that for days and things are fine. And then I go back and try that guitar again, and all of a sudden it's great. So I don't know. So, yeah, so I love talking about that. As I said, my favorite subject to talk about is the emotional aspect of the guitar playing. More so than technical. I think technical helps you guys in making decisions, especially on YouTube. But emotional, to me, is the thing I'm interested in talking about. On that note, somebody asked me, do I still have a Fender Mustang app? I do not. I have converted to the Katana. I am the House of Katana now. I am part of the Katana. Family. And we'll end on this funny joke because it's not a funny joke. This is so funny to tell you. I'd like to tell you that I love the katana. I'm using the katana. I don't work with Boss. I've never worked with Boss. So you guys know Boss has never sponsored an entire video ever since the channel's going. In fact, I've only had one conversation with Boss. And if anyone at Boss hears me tell this story, I have the email. Okay, so I'm just going to say that I keep all my emails with everybody. I have the email. I don't think the person who sent me the email works at Boss anymore. My one and only time. And the reason I tell you that is because I talk about bias all the time. Right. What's your bias? Well, here's the thing. I love the Boss katana. I love Boss pedals. I collect Boss pedals. As you know, not as much as I used to, but still. And this will tell you. And sometimes you're like, oh, he's probably because Boss pays him or Boss gives him free stuff. I've never had a sponsored content with Boss and I've only had one email. And the email to this day makes me laugh. And I can't believe I'm sharing it with you. Once Boss reached out to me and asked me if I would check out a piece of Boss equipment. And I was like, sure, I'd love to. And at the time, I was taught by another YouTube channel that you always respond with what's your budget? Because I didn't know what to say. What do you say? And so you guys know this is not about money, even though you think it is. Because sometimes companies, for some reason, even if you try to be easy and like, hey, we want to send you this new pedal. You want to check it out? You're like, yeah, send it. I'll do the video. It's great. Some companies want you to charge them or have some kind of compensation thing because then it's more like a contract. They know they're going to get their video. Life is good. It just works out great. I'm not saying this is the case. I'm just saying with Boss, I'm just saying something. So what I did back then, I hadn't done this in years. This is years and years ago. Years and years and years ago. So Boss reaches out and says, hey, would you like to check out this piece of gear? And I said, absolutely. I go, I'd love to I love Boss. I collect Boss. I said all this nice stuff because that's what I do. Because I'm like, hey, let him know. Let them know I'm a true fan, you know? Right. That's more motivation to work with me. And I said, sure. What's your. What's your budget? Now, keep in mind, if they would have said nothing, I'd be like, can you. Okay. Send the gear out? Or if they said, hey, our budget's $300 for the video. Whatever it was at the time, I would have took whatever they said. They responded with, oh, we'd love to pay you, but we paid Rob Chapman and Mary Spender too much, and we don't have any money for the rest of the year. Oh, my goodness. Lost my voice. Rest army trading, sir. Apparently. Can't say those two names too fast. I'll lose my. They said, I don't think this is true, but I'm just telling you what the email says again. I have the email. They said, oh, we paid them and we don't have anything left for in our marketing contract. Our marketing department for social media. And I remember thinking, wow, that hurt. I was like, you could have just said, you don't have anything in your budget. You didn't have to tell me, like, yeah, we picked the better channels than you. He didn't say it like that, but that's how I felt that my saying is. I want you to understand when I say I like the Boss Katana, that was my only interaction with Boss. And I still love their stuff. So there. So I love the Mustang. I loved all the amps I've ever tried in the idea that I like them. If Unless I said I hated them specifically the Mustang I really liked. But for some reason, I just go back to the Boss Katana. I was talking about this recently. I think the new Blackstar ID50 is. Sounds better than the Katana. I think the Catalyst sounds better than the Katana. For some reason, I just end up back at the Katana. I think it's because it's just tried and true. It's portable, it's easy. It's great. That's my answer. All right. I hope that makes. That all makes sense. Anyways, on that note, I want to let you guys go. You guys, there was a video today. We released two videos on the second channel. I'll put a link down below to the second channel. If you guys don't know. We have two channels. There's the Know youw Gear channel, which is not this one. It's the other one where you can see clips of the podcast with more context. And by the way, if you saw Guitar the Week last week with the. The. The junk guitar. We call it the junk guitar in the title of the video, but it's called the Ikea Caster. There was some new information discovered that I shared. In fact, PB reached out and gave us the exact not only the neck that's on that guitar, the date who originally bought it, all kinds of stuff. You can check that out. So you can check out the second channel if you'd like to do that. I'd appreciate that. By the way, the second channel is killing it. I want to thank you all for that. It hit 600,000 views this month, almost 700,000 views, which is impressive for a channel, and it's closing up on 40,000 subscribers. I want to thank you for that. On this channel, we hit 462,000 subscribers this week. So I want to say thank you for that also. If you guys want to join Patreon, just keep in mind there are three tiers for $5. You're supporting this podcast and I appreciate you doing that and it means a lot to me. And if you pay for the year, you get a discount. There's a second tier that includes guitar clinics and guitar maintenance and repair clinics, all kinds of clinics. And if you do that, it is. If you want to do it for one month, it's $19 for the one month. But what we did is we raised the price the monthly for per month up, but we decreased the yearly down. So instead of paying 120 bucks for the year, now you just pay one something. 108 or 114, something like that, it's less. So we drop the rate so you can check it out and support the channel that way. And then of course, there's a top tier, if you so inclined to do that. But the main two things we focus on is not the $5 tier supporting the podcast and the $10 tier. If you want to support the podcast and get additional repair and maintenance videos, information, and of course, live clinics where you can ask me questions specifically and we can actually go through your problem with pictures and stuff. So that is the speech. On that note, I want to thank you for your time. Till the next time, Know youw Gear the Know youw Gear Podcast. Sam.