HOW I LEARNED TO STOP WORRYING AND LOVE THE RETRO-H
by Jeff Garvin, DaisyRock artist

Studio time is something indie musicians lust for. We eat in, we save up, we hold off on buying the new radiohead album, we put our quarters in coffee cans and pray for the opportunity to live like rock stars for a few days.

I had the divine pleasure to spend this weekend in the studio, laying down tracks with my band, 7k. It was a rock and roll experience in the purest form: junk food, no sleep or daylight, and mountains of glorious, mind-numbing feedback.

Having only recently acquired my shiny new black Daisy Rock Retro-H, I brought it along, fully intending to use it on at least one song. Didn't I owe my fine sponsors that much? Besides, I could test drive it a bit, push it around, and see how it responded. But NO WAY was it going to replace my baby, my main axe, the 'other woman,' the guitar of my dreams: my tobacco-sunburst American Stratocaster. Are you kidding me? I ordered it custom from a mom-and-pop shop in my hometown when I was still a teenager. I waited six months for that thing and spent countless hours conning my father into buying it for me. No way.

But, I would use the Retro on at least one song.

Well, I'm at once sad and invigorated to report that my Strat did a fine job of holding my guitar rack firmly on the floor. I fell so hard for the Retro-H that I used it exclusively on every single song we tracked.

My setup was ridiculously simple - just my Retro-H plugged directly into my amplifier - no reverb, no eq, no digital effects, just the instrument and the amp. That little guitar has so much character that it would be criminal to drown it in processing.

The Retro-H really does deserve this much discussion; I swear it on my haircut. In my rock experience, electric guitars generally fall into one of three categories: #1 "it's trying to be a Fender!" You know what i'm talking about. Everyone makes a Strat copy, or a Strat copy with a humbucker in it, or a Strat copy that sounds more like a Telecaster. #2 "it's trying to be a Gibson!" Do I need to explain this one? #3 "novelty guitar!" This third category covers massive territory: generally novelty guitars are either really cheap or really expensive and have a very specific, exaggerated sound that makes them unique and interesting for sure, but totally unusable as a staple, play-it-every-day guitar. You may pull out your novelty guitar for a song or two, but it's never your baby - it has no hope of becoming the guitar you leave leaning up against the couch to pick up and play whenever you walk by it.

The Retro-H is part of a rare, highly-esteemed fourth category, a category which has no name. This kind of guitar has its own, unique signature sound, but is so versatile and unobtrusive that you can use it as your main axe. I'm no virtuoso, and I was able to coax tones out of that guitar I never would have expected from this kind of instrument - from warm, hollow sustains to crispy, angry chugs, to quirky, palm-muted chirps.

The word is out, my friends. If you strip away the pastel colors, the flower and heart shapes, and the estrogen-driven marketing push, DaisyRock still makes killer, legitimate rock and roll instruments for any gender.