Ep. 131: "Sandy Soil"

The Truth About Vintage Amps with Skip Simmons

Illustrator/musician/underground comix legend Robert Armstrong (Mickey Rat, Couch Potato, the Cheap Suit Serenaders!) joins Skip and Jason this week for a very special installment of the Truth About Vintage Amps.

Want to support our show? Join our Patreon!

Some of the topics discussed:

1:38 NOS military-grade green pilot light jewels from Gary Economy (Instagram); leave us an Apple Podcasts review and take a screenshot to enter to win one!; 5879 tubes

3:03 Where is George? (Danger UXB on eBay)

4:48 Rick Estrin and Dennis Gruenling's harmonica workshop, March 16 (link)

6:43 This week's sponsors: Emerald City Guitars; Amplified Parts; Izotope; Stringjoy Strings; and Grez Guitars. Ordering from StewMac? Use this affiliate link to help us out!

11:26 The 2024 Fretboard Summit, August 23-25 (link)

11:49 What's on Skip's bench: A PA head; blown power transformers

13:44 A discount on Eric Daw's amazing Solid Sound guitar wiring book (use TAVA when you check out): https://www.solidsoundbook.com/

16:19 Taming the bass frequency on your amplifier

23:15 Resistors: What does Skip use?

27:27 Special guest: Illustrator/musician/friend/Mickey Rat & Couch Potato-inventor/record collector Robert Armstong (link)! Early Hawaiian guitar recordings; growing up in Fender country but gravitating towards the banjo; Coulter guitars; Hugo Ernst guitars; John DeLapp guitars; playing saw on the 'One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest' soundtrack; animator Ward Kimball; 'Man in Space' (YouTube link); not working at Disneyland; seeing David Lindley at the Topanga Banjo & Fiddle contest; coining the term "Couch Potato;" Bob's tweed Fender Deluxe; Supro Dual Tones; Pee Wee's Playhouse; playing with Sourdough Slim; sheepherder conventions; touring Japan; Ben Pollack's "Two Tickets to Georgia" (YouTube link); playing 78 records today; Al Dodge

1:38:10 John Sebastian gets his dad's PA head back; a Disneyland tube PA