JOHN 5 GHOST TELECASTER

John 5 is somewhat of an anomaly. A Telecaster devotee in the world of Heavy Metal is a rarity, but that hasn't stopped him from sticking to his guns. Having first fallen in love with guitars watching the famed country music program ‘Hee Haw’ with his Dad, John 5 spent his childhood under the rather understandable impression that Telecasters were in fact the only electric guitars in existence. Despite the inevitable broadening of his horizons in later life, in John 5’s eyes, there is still only one guitar.

After blistering turns as the resident shredder for David Lee Roth, Marilyn Manson, Rob Zombie and countless others, John 5 has since enjoyed a fruitful solo career and is currently the lead guitarist of Motley Crue. Throughout his journey across this impressive resume, John kept a trusty Telecaster by his side; landing his first Fender signature model in 2003.

Now, John 5 and Fender have collaborated to create a signature Telecaster as striking as the whitehot playing of its creator: The Ghost. Featuring a stunning Arctic White finish that encompasses the whole instrument including the fretboard, the Ghost Telecaster is punctuated by eye-catching red accents and a chrome mirror pickguard. This simple yet ostentatious design is the perfect match for John 5’s unique aesthetic and is absolutely certain to turn heads.

Despite its modern aesthetic, the raw components of this guitar do not stray far from the traditional

Telecaster recipe. The all-white maple neck has an incredibly comfortable medium C shape that will be familiar to Fender players, a 9.5” radius for maximum playability and narrow tall frets. A white fretboard with no inlays may be daunting to a traditionalist at first, but at its core, this is a guitar that will sit perfectly comfortably in the hands of any Tele player.

The chrome mirror pickguard on this model strays from the traditional Fender look not only in its material but also its shape. Rather than the two piece pickguard/control plate design of a standard Telecaster, this model features a one piece pickguard that engulfs the control section and sits flush with the body of the instrument. John 5 requested this innovation due to the raised metal plate on a traditional Telecaster interfering with his low-slung picking style. The resulting design may not affect the average player as profoundly as the man himself, but it certainly looks cool.

The singular balance between flash and minimalism that defines this guitar’s look is also reflected in its inner workings. A three way toggle switch, master volume and kill switch, all a vibrant red, match with a set of humbuckers that jump right off the guitar’s snowy white canvas. This simple circuit is perfectly restrained yet full of potential power, offering a straightforward path to the blistering tones that John 5 is known for.

Featuring a dual set of Dimarzio D Activator pickups, the sound of this model is Heavy Metal heaven. D Activators were originally designed to compete with and remove the need for active pickups, which are favoured by many metal players for their perceived increased power. The unfortunate reality of active pickups however are that they often entail a rather sterile edginess and whilst they do generally have a strong focused attack, their perceived loudness is somewhat of an illusion due to their ultra-compressed sound.

In contrast, D Activator pickups are wired to replicate the punchy attack of an active pickup without all the drawbacks, and have enough headroom to avoid flattening out when the guitar is picked hard. Featuring incredibly rich overtones and a warm, prominent midrange, these pickups are capable of searing lead tones when pushed into overdrive but, as they are passive, clean up nicely when rolled off.

The absence of a tone knob on this guitar, to say the least, is not particularly felt. This will not come as a surprise to any Fender fanatics out there. The master volume, featuring a rather dandy 70s style speed knob (red of course) provides a nice linear roll off that interacts well with the humbucking pickups. Rather more interesting however is the addition of the arcade-style kill switch, which allows players to momentarily cut their signal off rapidly and repetitively. This creates the cool stuttering effect made famous by players like Jack White and John 5 himself, a modern appointment that gives this guitar a special flair.

To cap it all off, the Ghost features a 6-saddle tele bridge with block steel saddles and deluxe locking tuners. These additions ensure spot on intonation and ultra stable tuning at all times, an absolute necessity for the adventurous and dynamic playing of a shredder like John 5. On top of all this, this limited run of guitars also comes with a matching white hard case with a beautiful crushed red interior, a super-fan’s dream.

The John 5 Ghost Telecaster is an expertly crafted and incredibly ambitious signature model. As well as this, it manages to perfectly balance the old with the new. The traditional Fender tone woods of Alder and Maple remain as true to form as ever under their glossy new arctic white sheath, and the Telecaster shape remains timeless even when draped in John 5’s unique modern aesthetic. Whilst this is certainly a uniquely high-octane iteration of this classic instrument, the core elements remain.

In saying that, I don’t think the Ghost would have gone down so well on the set of Hee Haw, but then this ain’t your granddaddy's Telecaster. It’s John 5’s Telecaster, and like him, it’s one of a kind.

BY CHRISTOPHER HOCKEY

The Yamaha CS01 is something of an under-the-radar cult classic, with its entry-level price and toy-like appearance belying a fat analogue sound which has featured in all sorts of genres across the decades since its 1982 release, from 80s pop to 90s dancehall and 2000s indie electronica. A simple beast, the CS01 was aimed at the novice musician, as such featuring halfsized keys, a single oscillator, paired back controls, battery power, and even a keytar strap (how good was the 80s?!)

It’s perhaps fitting, then, that the first software recreation of this synth “toy” is by Baby Audio. In keeping with their motto “it’s an evolution, not an emulation”, they’ve meticulously modelled the original hardware and then upgraded the feature set with stacks of useful additions that drastically increase the versatility of this instrument and bring it up to spec with the demands of modern production without compromising its simplicity or fun factor.

The BA-1 doubles the oscillator count of the original hardware (to two oscillators), each capable of triangle, sawtooth, and square waveforms, with the first also having a pulse width modulation setting and the second a white noise setting, useful for creating percussive sounds. A cross fader allows simple blending of the two oscillators, and an FM fader enables frequency modulation between them, a new feature not present in the CS01 but which is still very much in keeping with its 80s roots.

The original release of the CS01 featured a 12dB lowpass filter and lacked the ability to adjust resonance. The filter section of the BA-1 models that of the MK2 version, released in 1984, with a 24db lowpass filter and the ability to adjust resonance. Like the hardware, when pushed to the upper limits of the slider, the filter will begin to self-oscillate, creating some wild sounds.

A fairly typical envelope generator follows, with controls for attack, decay, sustain and release, plus a new feature allowing the synchronisation of these settings to your DAW’s tempo.

The LFO section is similarly simplistic, with controls for LFO speed and depth plus a toggle switch designating the target as either the pitch of Oscillator 1 or the filter cutoff frequency. A sneaky hidden function is accessible by clicking the word ‘target’ on the UI, which enables you to target the X-fade slider and modulate the blend of the two oscillators.

Next up is the side-chain; by default, increasing the ‘amount’ slider introduces a 4/4 ducking pattern synced to the host tempo. By clicking on the word ‘routing’, you can switch to an external side-chain, allowing you to duck the signal according to an external input – a common application is to sidechain the kick when using the synth as a bass, ducking the bass whenever the kick plays to avoid masking.

The effects section is simple but effective, inspired by the low-cost rack and pedal effects ubiquitous in the 80s. The tone control is comprised of two shelving filters, and the analogue-modelled drive control has two switchable modes, one based on an overdrive pedal which adds musicality and thickness, and one decidedly more lo-fi effect inspired by circuit bending the original hardware (for the uninitiated, check out this video on circuit bending). We’re also treated with some cheap and cheerful time-based effects: a delay with tempo sync, a shimmering digital reverb, and a chorus styled after Roland’s famous Juno synths.

One thing that Baby Audio have absolutely succeeded in with this soft synth is making it incredibly fun and simple to use. The effects section sounds fantastic; it’s difficult to make either drive circuit sound bad, and the time-based effects take any patch from mundane to Stranger Things soundtrack in a matter of seconds. There’s 500 presets loaded by default, and though I’ve by no means tested all of them, each one that I played around with was wellcrafted and clearly imaginable in a track. Pretty much everything is covered, from 80s synth strings to 303-style acid house leads, spacey pads, and lo-fi organ sounds. If this is not inspiration enough, simply hit the Re-Gen button and a the BA-1 will spit out a randomised patch –great for when you’re really stuck for ideas.

There are two rather unique features which you’re unlikely to find on many other soft synths. The first is an emulation of the CS01’s speaker, instantly imbuing your patch with lo-fi goodness. The second is the Battery fader, which models the effect of the audio degradation caused by operating the CS01 with dying batteries, introducing some pitch variation, distortion, fizz and filtering to the sound with excellent results reminiscent of a half-dead tape machine.

The BA-1 is not a workstation synth. You’re not going to be able to recreate every analogue sound on your favourite Kraftwerk record or produce an entire dubstep track from the ground up. However, it’s also not a one-trick pony or a novelty plugin, despite the fun features and the multiple options for the colour of the UI. Baby Audio have struck a delicate balance between being tweakable and programmable enough that you won’t get bored with the sounds it’s capable of whilst keeping the interface sufficiently simple that it’s instantly accessible without hours of tutorials on YouTube, and also having a distinct sonic footprint which renders it a unique option in your arsenal of synths.

If you’re producing any sort of retro or lo-fi synth based music, the BA-1 may just be your new best friend. For everyone else, downloading the free trial might just cause you to have enough fun that you wind up in the previous category.

BY JARRAH SAUNDERS