1961 Fender Stratocaster
This has been my main guitar since the year 2000. It sees about 70% of my playing time during a gig. A nice light alder body, with a slab Brazilian rosewood fingerboard. It's currently fitted with a set of Lindy Fralin Vintage Hot pickups. I had intended to get the original pickups fixed up and put back in, but it's sounded so good with with Fralins that they're still in there! A five way selector switch has been added, with the bridge pickup wired to the tone control instead of the middle pickup. It's been refretted with 6100 jumbo frets, and is fitted with graphite saddles to prevent string breakage. Strung 11 through 54. Other than that, it's just as it left the factory, and is basically a really killer sounding old Strat!
SVL Sixty Custom
My current number two road guitar, built as touring replacement for Simon Law's 1969 Fender Telecaster that I'd been playing a lot for last few years, both on gigs and on the last few records. This particular guitar is inspired by the early sixties edge bound Tele Customs that I've always loved. While the '69 has an ash body we went for lightweight alder when designing this one, mainly just to see what happened, and luckily it turned out really great! Sounds really meaty for a T-style guitar. Features a Brazilian rosewood slab fingerboard on a big flame maple neck. Frets are 6100 jumbo, and pickups are Lindy Fralin Blues Specials. Complete with a Callaham bridge and steel saddles. Strung 11-54. Often it takes me quite a while to get comfortable with a new guitar, but this one has been on active duty from the moment I received it. And it looks killer too!
Tokai ES-120
Tokai's great take on the classic ES-335 guitar. This is a beautiful instrument, crafted in the Tokai custom shop in Japan. Refretted with 6105 frets, and fitted with Lindy Fralin "Unbucker" pickups wired with a push-pull pot to get that old out phase B.B. "Live at The Regal" tone when required. Strung 11 through 50. I love this guitar and, so far, I actually prefer this guitar to almost all of "real thing" I've tried, with a couple of notable exceptions.
Occasionally, instead of the Tokai, we bring out Simon's original 1962 Cherry Red Gibson ES-335 for a gig. This guitar, complete with it's original P.A.F pickups, sounds absolutely incredible, but it's just too precious to tour with and throw in and out of the bus all the time. I'm pleased to report, however, that the Tokai ES-120 holds it's own very admirably against this prime original example of an ES-335.
Two Rock Custom Reverb Signature Amplifier
For the last few years my main touring amps have been these incredible tone machines by K&M Analog Designs from California. They're the first and only amplifiers I've found so far that have been able to replace my old Fender amps, and allow me to take my idea of tone to the next level. A hand built 6L6 powered amp with an extra switchable overdrive gain stage that allows me to pickup right where the great clean tone ends. Also features a "bypass circuit" that lifts the tone controls out of the signal path to create a lively "tweed" type gain boost. Currently I'm playing a 100 watt "Version 2" Custom Reverb Signature through a custom Two Rock 4x10 cabinet that they built for me. This amp sounds huge, has exceptional clarity and responsiveness to picking dynamics, and is both very revealing and rewarding to play through.
1964 Fender Super Reverb Amplifier
This was my main touring amp from 1998-2006. All stock, with the exception of the tremolo being disconnected, and fitted with Reverend Alltone 1030 speakers. We keep it running with some nice NOS valves, and keep the electrolytic components in good shape, and it's good to go! Other than that, it's just as it left the factory 44 years ago, and basically happens to be an unusually good sounding old Super! These days it's pretty much saved for the studio, and occasional special gig.
Now, when I want to add another amp along with the Two Rock for larger venues and festivals, I take out my Fender Vibroverb "Vibroclone" that SVL guitars put together for me recently. This was built off the platform of a beat up late 60's Fender Bandmaster Reverb head, adding a new combo cabinet, a bassman output transformer, and then totally rewired by blueprinting my Super's circuit exactly. Overall the basic tonality is very similar to my Super, except for the obvious difference of it running through a 15" JBL D130F or a 15" Weber Michigan speaker.
Providence SOV-2 Overdrive or Klon Centaur
For a long time I was known for using a Menatone Red Snapper Overdrive, which served me well for about 7 years. For most of 2007 I was using a Klon Centaur for that little extra push over the cliff. With the gain kept low, which is how prefer to I use it, the Klon manages to be fairly transparent with regards to retaining the tone of your amp and guitar, while simultaneously adding just the right amount of it's own flavour into the mix. Great for taking your basic sound and making it bigger and fatter in a really cool way.
However, just recently I've been enjoying a brand new overdrive pedal from my friends at Pacifix Ltd in Japan called the Providence SOV-2. This is a fantastic overdrive pedal! Very rich and thick, but at the same time it remains exceptionally clear and open, with a really great responsive and dynamic feel to pick attack.
Mad Professor Deep Blue Delay
Over the last couple of years I've been preferring to use less reverb and a little tiny bit of echo instead for my live sound. My favourite echo unit is the Fulltone TTE, which modern take on the old echoplex. A real tape loop with a valve preamp, it adds a wonderful 3 dimensional quality to the tone which is hard to beat. However, I find the unit is rather high maintenance for touring. After a long search for something else that could even come close, I've finally settled on the Mad Professor Deep Blue Delay. Out of about a dozen high end and exotic analogue and digital delay units that we assembled to compare, the smallest and simplest little box sounded best for my needs. It doesn't mess with my basic tone at all, which is very important, and using the pedal into the front of the amp (I don't like using FX loops) the delay doesn't get in the way or "smear" the tone, which is also what made the TTE so special. Just subtle, spacious ambiance with the right overall character.
All the guitars are strung with D'Addario strings, courtesy of Summerfield Music Distribution. The rig is wired exclusively with cable from Pacifx Ltd in Japan. Matt always uses 1mm Tortex picks. He's currently tuning up perfectly using a Peterson Strobostomp tuner. Guitar tech Simon Law uses a Peterson VS-II.
When Matt runs two amps simultaneously to get a blend of tones, and a wider spread of sound on larger stages, he splits the signal from the guitar using a GigRig Humdinger isolated splitter box, to avoid ground loops and adjust for correct phase. Sometimes he adds a tiny delay between the amps with an old Boss DD3 for stereo spread.
The equipment listed above forms the basis of Matt's rig 99% of the time. However, in addition to this core setup, Matt often employs the following equipment live and in the studio.
SVL Custom Deluxe
This one is the original prototype for the Custom Deluxe model, this guitar features a one piece ash body, quarter-sawn maple neck and Brazilian rosewood fingerboard, and a pair of custom wound Jason Lollar mini-humbuckers, configured with a special wiring method. Strung 11 through 52. A very unique sounding instrument which can be seen and heard on the DVD release of the Ian Siegal Band Live at The North Sea Jazz Festival.
SVL Sixty-One
Another creation from SVL guitars, this Strat style guitar was built by closely studying the details, weight and dimensions of my original '61 Strat - so the specs are pretty much the same! Again, a unique finishing technique is employed, particularly effective on the neck which already has that broken in feel of my old Strat. For this guitar we've recently been really digging some killer sounding pickups made in Texas by Jerry Amalfitano.
Stampede SOV-1 overdrive pedal
Another great sounding overdrive pedal from the fantastic company in Japan who also make my cables. I use this pedal when I want a bit more drive and singing sustain than the guitar, usual overdrive pedal and amp alone will give me. This pedal can be heard in several places on both Siftin' Thru Ashes and Ear To The Ground, and is my go-to pedal for gigs where I'm not using my Two Rock. It has become totally indispensable to me for fly in gigs where I have to play through the backline provided amps.
Taylor 414 Acoustic
When those "unplugged" moments arise I turn to my Taylor 414, which was a wonderful gift from my girlfriend. I often use it for writing new material, and it can be heard on "The Letter" on Siftin' Thru Ashes, and on "Searchin'" on Ear To The Ground. Hard to go wrong with a Taylor acoustic.
1997 Matchless Cheiftain
A modern classic, which again belongs to Simon Law, I used this great Matchless head in tandem with my Super Reverb quite a lot before I got the Two Rock. Run through a Bruno 2x12, it can be heard in a couple of places on Siftin' Thru Ashes, as well as on much of Ian Siegal's album "Meat & Potatoes". For Ear To The Ground it was used to run my leslie speaker cabinet.
1969 Fender Vibratone Leslie cabinet
Only dragged out for recording these days, there's no way to beat the sound of a real leslie cab for an organic chorus or tremolo effect. I like to use it in the studio in the background for rhythm tracks.