Over the past couple of years I have spent in incredible amount of time, research, sweat, solder, money (and even some blood!) pursuing the unique sound of Jerry Garcia's playing. It has been an intensely fun (yet simultaneously frustrating) never ending process for me and here's some pictures of those components:

Guitars

1 - Resurrection "Lightning Bolt" tribute - (click the pics for a larger image)

- While this guitar is not quite an exact replica of Jerry's Lightning Bolt, it is based on the exact design , woodworking and electronics (with the exception of a MIDI system). It is truly a beauty to play and it is my main guitar.

- Here's some info on Jerry's Lightning Bolt thanks to Dozin.com:

"Garcia's next guitar arrived in the mail at the Grateful Dead office in 1993. Stephen Cripe, a 39-year-old Florida woodworker who spent years building custom interiors for Caribbean yachts, decided to try his hand at making a guitar. Using a few photos and a Dead video, he knocked off Irwin's design of Tiger with a few flourishes of his own, like carving the body out of a piece of East Indian rosewood recycled from a 19th century Asian opium bed.

Garcia was floored. He gave the piece to San Francisco repairman Gary Brawer to fix the electronic guts, but it was a miracle guitar.

"Garcia was amazed when it came around," said band mate Bob Weir, "at the guesswork he had to make -- and got right -- to give that guitar Irwin's look and feel. It was astounding."

He pronounced the piece "the guitar I've always been waiting for" and began playing the instrument exclusively. It came to be called Lightning Bolt. Garcia met with Cripe briefly backstage at a Florida concert and commissioned a second guitar for $6,500, known as Top Hat, although Garcia almost never played it. Cripe, whose hobby was making fireworks, died in May 1996 when his work shed blew up. He used an exploding firecracker as the insignia on his guitars' headstocks.

Lightning Bolt was in the shop on the last tour. In his final show at Soldier Field in Chicago on July 9, 1995, Garcia started out playing Rosebud, but midway through the show, the guitar developed problems. Garcia strapped on the tour's spare guitar -- Tiger, out of mothballs for the occasion -- and finished his final concert on his old trusty axe.

- Now here's the story of Resurrection Guitars - owned and run by father and son Pat and Tim O'Donnell.:

"Resurrection Guitars was attending many guitar shows and that was when Steven Cripe and Pat met. They both had similar backgrounds in the boat and woodworking business. They left the show and weren't seen for the the rest of the day. Pat was amaZed at the woodworking and artistic skill in Cripes guitars and Cripe was amaZed that Pat could make a 5 pound guitar sound so good with massive sustain. They became friends soon after and talked shop often. Unfortunately Steve was killed in an explosion in his shop in Trilby Florida. Pat and son Tim finished some of Steve's guitars and by 98' they were considered the authorities on Steve's work. By studying his instruments first hand and seeing and using many of the jigs and tools that Steve designed they had a massive amount of insight on how Steve built his guitars and the evolution and direction he may have been heading. In addition to building their own model of guitars, Pat and Tim with the permission of Pete Cripe built their first replicas of Steve's instruments for clients that had been in contact with Steve before his death.""

2 - Paul Reed Smith Custom 24 - 10 Top.

PRS guitars has always been my favorite and in 2006 I finally bought one of these. In my obsessive "search for the sound" I had ripped out the electronics and pickups and experimented in "Jerryfying" it. I ended up putting the PRS pickups back in but modified the guitar for an onboard effects loop and EMG JG2 unity gain buffer. If not for my Resurrection this would be the finest guitar I have ever played - let alone owned. It's sound is distinct from the Bolt and I use it sometimes for a certain tone. I also always have it on hand for a backup.

Amp

- I use a modified 73 Fender Twin Silverface. It has been modified to Blackface specs and has the most complete "Jerry mods" that I believe Jerry's amp actually had. There is no definitive specs on the exact mods that Jerry had done to his Twin - among a select group there is a general idea of them. Some folks consulted on the modification of this amp that are "as close as you get" to those that worked on Jerry's gear. I wanted the speaker cabinet separate from the amp so, I cut down the amp section and put it into a head and built a speaker cabinet.

Speakers

- I built a 2 x 12 Hard Truckers style cabinet that houses 2 - JBL E120 speakers. These speakers are the same type that Jerry used as well as the main speaker used in the Dead's "Wall of Sound" in the early 70's. Its a monster of a speaker that can provide a crystal clear tone even at high volumes. It's benefits in tone come at the expense of it's monstrous weight though. All worth it for "the sound".

Effects

- My effects are run in a pre-volume loop configuration directly from my guitar. They are all also mounted on a PedalPad MS9 pedal board. Here's the current list of effects that I use:

Loop I/O breakout box
Boss Tuner
MXR Phase 90 - with R28, C11 and C12 Mods
Boss OC2 Octave
Electro Harmonix Q-Tron
Boss OD2 Turbo Overdrive
Boss OS2 Overdrive/Distortion
Boss GE7 EQ
Boss DD20 Giga Delay
Electro Harmonix Holy Grail Reverb

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