Varied Axe

Overall, I'm extremely pleased with my Variax 500. As it turned out, I managed to get my glasses repaired FOC, but I don't regret going for the cheaper model. It plays well, no set-up probs, and even from the little time I've spent with it, I can tell that it's going to be very useful.

I love the Strat and Les Paul models, especially the soap bar pickup setting, and I think the resonator sounds, of all the acoustic sounds, are the best. While the standard acoustics (based on a Gibson Jumbo, and couple of Martins and a pair of 12-string examples) sound exactly like acoustic guitars with piezo pickups (which is the Great Leveller as far as acoustic guitars are concerned), the resonators and the banjo, even the sitar, don't suffer from piezo harmonics to quite the same extent.

I'm thinking that to get the best out of each model, a particular playing style is best adopted - a hard plucking attack for the banjo, for example, and the avoidance of too many string bends on 12-string models.

If there's a down side, it's just that I now feel I have too many options, what with all the guitar models on the Variax, and the amp models on the Vox Tonelab, not to mention all the different ways I can effect sound in pro tools or simply by using different recording methods (directly into the MBox, or through the JoeMeek channel etc.). It will take a long time to get to grips with the various sounds and it'll be quite hard to decide what to use on which song, unless I happen upon a sound that inspires a song in the first place, if you know what I mean.

With all these new sounds I feel like I want a whole new me. I want to use different chords and progressions. And change my hair.