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The Latest Breaking News from Guitar World

“I asked him to get me four bass strings because I only had a $29 guitar from Sears”: Bootsy Collins is one of the all-time bass greats, but he started out on guitar. Here’s the sole reason why he switched

Before he became ‘the’ Bootsy Collins, William Collins was a young guitarist who desperately wanted to join his brother's band

Guitar World

“This isn’t just a makeover. It’s a full-on glow-up”: Martin’s Junior Series Dreadnought is the best all-round acoustic electric guitar on the market – now the entire range has been given its most significant upgrade yet

Updated electronics, solid tonewoods and new models make up the 2025 edition of Martin's humble Junior series, which starts from $699

Guitar World

“I was reluctant, even in Rush, towards the end – I was not playing nearly as many solos. I just wanted to get away from that”: Alex Lifeson on his complicated relationship with guitar solos – and why he cut down on leads in Rush's later years

Lifeson explains why solos aren't a priority for him anymore

Guitar World

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“I got that bass for $50 off this coke dealer. I don’t know what Jaco did to it, but he totally messed up the insides!” How Cro-Mags’ Harley Flanagan went from buying a Jaco Pastorius bass on the street to fronting one of hardcore’s most influential bands

The Cro-Mags founder on the reason he plays Fenders despite loving Rickenbackers, learning from Lemmy and the new documentary about his struggle for survival

Guitar World

“I don’t only think in barre chords – that’s a slightly arrogant statement to make”: Brian May and Roger Taylor disagree about their guitar contributions to Taylor’s Queen tracks

The pair have offered a fresh insight into their songwriting partnership

Guitar World

“He didn’t sound like any other previous Whitesnake guitarist. His thumbprint is an indelible part of that record”: Remembering John Sykes, the journeyman virtuoso who made his mark on both Thin Lizzy and Whitesnake

Cruel timing and clashes with David Coverdale kept Sykes from rock’s super-league but he was a top-tier player with a sound all his own

Guitar World

“My worst case of buyer’s remorse? An impulse-buy banjo. I was third-wheeling on a date, and I felt awkward”: Yvette Young on how to buy a guitar, and why – maybe – you should think twice before lending anyone a beloved acoustic

The sometime teacher and modern-day math-rocker recounts the gear that’s made an impact – and gives us a rundown on her most-loved rig

Guitar World

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“It’s the guitar I’ve dreamed of making for years”: Jackson and Bring Me the Horizon’s Lee Malia champion the rise of the metal offset with new signature Surfcaster

Featuring old looks, modern features, and pickups voiced to Malia’s aggressive-but-open specifications, the LM-87 is one of 2025’s finest new signature guitars

Guitar World

“The ‘Destruct’ button really sets it apart from just about any other Tele”: Fender and Mike Campbell recreate the Red Dog – The Heartbreaker’s heavily modded 1972 Telecaster, which he played with Tom Petty and Fleetwood Mac

Campbell bought the Red Dog from one of his students, and used it across his career on some of his most notable works

Guitar World

“What’s going through our mind is ‘What the…?’ And if you see Bob’s face, you could see he’s thinking the same thing”: When Bob Dylan played with an LA punk band to promote the album he made with Mark Knopfler

1983's Infidels, Dylan's first secular album in half a decade, was graced with a bounty of sweetly tasteful leads from the Dire Straits man. To recreate two of its songs on Late Night with David Letterman, Dylan hired LA punks the Plugz

Guitar World

“Trent Reznor told me, ‘You’re by far the best guy that we’ve tried. I would love to have you in the band’”: Richie Kotzen came close to joining Nine Inch Nails – but one detail stopped him getting the gig

The former Poison guitarist aced his surprise audition but never got a call back

Guitar World

“It’s become a bad habit. I bought a 1955 Tele and turned it over to carve my initials into the back. My friend screamed, ’Don’t do that!’” Kirk Hammett on his favorite Metallica solo and tone – and his most prized purchases from other guitar heroes

The Metallica great is celebrating his remarkable guitar collection in a new Gibson book. He explains how he came to own prized guitars from John Frusciante and Michael Schenker – and why he doesn’t cut cash deals anymore

Guitar World

“In the beginning, I was a terrible rhythm player. I avoided it like the plague”: Martin Barre once distanced himself from rhythm playing – but some Steve Lukather wisdom changed his mind

The former Jethro Tull lead guitarist reassessed his playing priorities after hearing some wise words from the Toto legend

Guitar World

“Ibanez and Japanese brands in general were irritating the hell out of Gibson, Fender and other US companies targeted by copyists”: From copies to innovations – the origin and rise of Japanese electric guitars (and the truth about ‘lawsuit’ guitars)

We dig into the Japanese guitar industry of the 1960s and ’70s and find notable brands, mischievous copies, diligent makers and original designs that led to the instrument’s renaissance in the 1980s and beyond

Guitar World

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“One of the most unbelievable things I’ve ever seen in music”: Popular social media guitarist Giacomo Turra accused of stealing other musicians’ songs for content

The funk and R&B guitarist has responded to the accusations

Guitar World

“That is how you make an entrance!” Jack Black mimes on a Minecraft’d Flying V as Kirk Douglas nails the Sweet Child O’ Mine solo on Jimmy Fallon

Black’s epic entrance caught the eye, but Captain Kirk Douglas’ tastefully virtuosic playing caught the ear

Guitar World

“I said, ‘If I could have it my way it would sound like this,’ and I pulled the bass guitar out of the mix”: Why Prince stripped the bassline from one of his biggest hits

From the beginning, Prince had an inkling that Purple Rain’s landmark single would be better without bass guitar

Guitar World

“The original Jordan Boss Tone was probably used by four out of five garage bands in the late ’60s”: Unpacking the gnarly magic of the Jordan Boss Tone – an actual guitar plug-in that delivers Dan Auerbach-approved fuzz

It looks like an adaptor and it kind of is. But this cult fuzz box was a favorite of Norman Greenbaum and Spirit’s Randy California and was on more garage rock records than we’d care to imagine

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Guitar World

“What they do harkens back to classic rock and real musicianship”: Amadou Bagayoko, singer and Malian guitar great, dies at 70

Half of the enormously successful duo Amadou & Mariam, Bagayoko developed a powerful guitar style that blended classic rock influences with more traditional West African sounds, jammed with David Gilmour, and collaborated with Damon Albarn

Guitar World

“They said, ‘The Ace Hotel have you on camera leaving with the guitar.’ I was like, ‘I thought it was a gift!’” Machine Gun Kelly on the time he stole a cheap Martin from a hotel – and was billed $5,000

The damaged instrument is inscribed with a message that echoes MGK’s guitar-playing mantra – and it’s one of his most cherished instruments

Guitar World

“I had never done that before. I thought Jimmy was going to go, ‘Nice one’ – he looks at me and goes, ‘Don’t you ever do that again’”: That time Chrissie Hynde enraged one of her Pretenders bandmates because she stopped playing mid-gig

The guitar icon once decided to spontaneously shake things up on stage, and ended up feeling the wrath of Jimmy Scott

Guitar World

“Dave was the master of some of the most iconic basslines in music history”: Dave Allen, former Gang of Four bassist and post-punk heavyweight, dies aged 69

Allen’s work on Gang of Four’s first two albums would inspire generations and influence the likes of Nirvana, REM, and Flea, who has paid tribute to the late bass icon

Guitar World

“I never met anyone who was his own person as much as Al was”: SSD guitarist and hardcore pioneer Al Barile dies aged 63

Barile was a key player in the Boston hardcore scene in the 1980s

Guitar World

“The main acoustic is a $100 Fender – the strings were super-old and dusty. We hate new strings!” Meet Great Grandpa, the unpredictable indie rockers making epic anthems with cheap acoustics – and recording guitars like a Queens of the Stone Age drummer

The mercurial Seattle indie rockers have returned with their first album in six years, Patience, Moonbeam – they tell us how their lush, multifaceted arrangements all begin on the humble six-string

Guitar World

“We go and look in the garage – it was there. It hadn’t been looked at for 20 years and was sad and falling apart. It was like, ‘Help me!’” James Dean Bradfield on unearthing his rare “birthright” guitar, gear epiphanies and why Robert Smith is underrated

Manic Street Preachers' new album, Critical Thinking, had Bradfield reconnecting with guitars new and old, Nicky Wire unleashing on the title track, and it is a typically unique work from the Welsh rock institution

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