For over 35 years, my main No.1 Strat has been a Fender 1962 Reissue which over the years has had very few mods done. The first thing I did, though, was to have the three tone colouring stripped off and taken back to wood, then stained. I was going through a Nils Lofgren/Bonnie Raitt phase! It's been fitted with Texas Special pick-ups and a 5 way selector switch and is pretty beaten up after the years of gigs and tours.
I love my 1952 Reissue Butterscotch Fender Tele. It's from 2001. No mods whatsoever. Just a workhorse guitar and plays like a dream. Regular overseas touring meant that I was always a bit hesitant about taking certain instruments with me, so I got a Mexican Roadhouse Strat that, again, I've had Texas Specials fitted. I also have a couple of brilliant Squier Classic Vibe Teles and Strats. These are incredibly well built guitars. They play really well and are straight out of the box. Can take a knock and look like the real deal without the wallet punch!
My Gibson Les Paul is a standard from 2005. It's a classic guitar. In Iced Tea, it looks and plays beautifully. A sustain to die for!
The last electric I knew I needed for a different tone was a Gretsch G5230T Electromatic Jet. Very different. A fairly straight ahead bit of kit fitted with a Bigsby for those rockabilly twang licks!
For acoustic work, I either use my trusty Gibson J-45. No frills, just plug in and play or I have a 1995 Takamine EN-10C. Like my No.1 Strat, this guitar has been with me all my professional life. It sounds brilliant straight into any desk. It's not such a good naturally acoustic guitar but I know that if it's needed on a gig, it'll sound great whatever the PA is doing.
My pedalboard is pretty basic. I've never been a fan of spending a gig tap dancing! The pedal that changed my life, though, was The SlideRig from Origin Effects. It's the first compressor I've connected with. It's constantly "on". Next in line is the Hudson Dual Broadcast PreAmp for some vintage tones. Then comes the classic Ibanez TS808 Tube Screamer. Just because! Then the Dunlop Echoplex delay that captures a truly vintage "tape" echo and lastly the Fender Tre-Verb tremolo/reverb combo.
From 2005, my main touring amp was a Fender 1957 Twin Tweed. An absolute classic rock'n'roll amp. If it was good enough for Buddy Holly, it was good enough for me! Nothing fancy in the way of knobs and switches. I run it via a THD attenuator to help break up the valves without the need of shattering eardrums. In recent years, I've downscaled to the much more portable Fender Blues Junior. A great sounding amp that has all the tones I need.
If I'm playing acoustic, I run it through an LR Baggs Venue DI. I find it useful having more control over EQ settings and boost capabilities.
I've recently discovered https://charlieandjohns.com/ strings. They're a dream string! They stay in tune, they last ages (even with my sweaty hands!), the tones and sustain are exactly what I've been looking for. I dig them! Check them out....
Copyright © 2025 Jim Maving - All Rights Reserved. Thank you to all those who've taken the pictures used on this site including Allan Mckay, nick carter, john morgan, rick owens, martin tyler, sally newhouse and alex hughes. I can't remember all your names but I appreciate you pointing your lens at me.