At this year’s Bloodstock Open Air festival at Catton Park, Walton-on-Trent, United Kingdom, former VENOM and current VENOM INC. guitarist Jeff “Mantas” Dunn spoke to Bloodstock TV’s Oran O’Beirne about the 40th anniversary of VENOM’s classic “Black Metal” album. Regarding VENOM’s early musical and…

“It is not my intention to be fulsome, but I confess that I covet your skull.”—Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, The Hound of the BaskervillesGreetings to all my fellow guitar brethren! My name is Cary and I’m a guitar addict. I was bitten and smitten with the “guitar bug” as a kid, and the fascination has remained constant, even getting stronger over time.Like many, I found I couldn’t stop tinkering about with gear and guitars, trying to personalize and tweak them to my satisfaction. So, in dreaming up my next project (my wife would say scheming up), I thought about various finishes and patterns that might be fun. What could be more iconic and rock ’n’ roll than the ubiquitous image of the skull? I thought of the classic hot rod and motorcycle painting technique of using lace as a template. Why not try it on a guitar body? If only there was a lace material with skulls as the main theme. Luckily, it turns out there is! I set out to give it a go.“If only there was a lace material with skulls as the main theme. Luckily, it turns out there is! I set out to give it a go.”An old basswood 2003 Squire ’51 body was my victim. I drilled it to make it string-through, stripped the original finish and rattle-canned on a good coat of primer, and finished in white. Doing first the front (no guts, no glory), then the back, I sprayed black through the lace to create a glorious pattern of skulls. I sealed the pattern in with 20-plus coats of wipe-on poly.I added a custom Warmoth Tele neck with rosewood fretboard, boatneck carve, 6100 nickel frets, and finished it with wipe-on poly. Doug Shepherd, at Doug’s Custom Neck Plates out of Texas, designed a skull neck plate for me. While waiting for various parts to arrive, I decided the skulls would look sinister if they had eyeballs. I inlaid yellow 3 mm crystal rhinestones into each socket so the guitar could stare down its audience. I selected a skull-approved DiMarzio Super Distortion for the bridge and a Duncan Hot Stack for the neck and kept it simple with a 3-way switch and volume. It sounds downright “skullduggerous” played through a TC Electronic Fangs into a cranked Quilter Aviator Mach 3. My neighbors seem to love it!While this could be viewed as a Halloween guitar, I think of it more as a skull guitar for your everyday skull guitar needs. As we approach October, the power of the skull only increases!Rock on all! I will keep an eye out for you. In guitars we trust.Send your guitar story to submissions@premierguitar.com.

A DAY TO REMEMBER has announced details of its “Reassembled: Acoustic Theater Tour”, which will see the band performing catalog-spanning acoustic sets each night from iconic theaters around the U.S. The new dates, which will feature special guests WAGE WAR also performing acoustically, are set to g…

The Tilt is a new collaboration between Revv and session ace Shawn Tubbs that combines a robust medium-gain overdrive with a nuanced clean boost. Around Nashville, Tubbs has a reputation for burning lead lines and immaculately crafted tones. Designed to emulate the feel and response of a cranked single-channel amp, the Tilt absolutely nails the mission at hand. The overdrive circuit is based on LED clipping and features a rather simple control setup with volume, gain, bass, and treble. On the other side you have a 12 dB clean boost with two rather interesting controls: tilteq and a three-way tight toggle switch. I tested the Tilt with my HSS Fender Stratocaster and a T-style Schroeder Chopper TL into a clean Fender Hot Rod Deluxe. Starting with the overdrive, I was quite impressed with how accurate and clear the EQ controls were. There were useful settings throughout the different frequency ranges. The drive was softer in the midrange than I was expecting but allowed for richer harmonics as I moved through different pickup positions. Not surprisingly, the sound of a dirty, cranked Princeton came to mind as I was exploring the width of the gain control. Mike Campbell tones for days. It’s not likely that anyone would mistake the Tilt for a high-gain monster, but with the gain cranked it does an admiral job of emulating Marshall-style tones—especially when you kick in the boost. The standout feature on the boost side is the tilteq, which simultaneously affects the lows and highs depending on which direction you turn it. My setup with the Schroeder was a bit bright, so I was able to surgically slice out some high end with ease with both the EQ and toggle switch, which affects the overall voicing of the boost. While none of us will get the exact same tone that Tubbs is famous for, the Tilt can shine a brighter light on the best parts of what you sound like. Tilt Overdrive Pedal

Collaboration between session/stage/YouTube guitarist extraordinaire Shawn Tubbs and Revv found Dan TrudeauExceptionally natural amp-like OD tones that are highly responsive to your playing2-band drive EQ and tilt boost EQ for exceptional tone shaping capabilities3-position tight switch to cut out the mud on higher boost settingsRoad-worthy construction, with a blue sparkle finish and custom Shawn Tubbs graphicTop-mounted 1/4-inch inputs to save room on your pedalboard