Credits: Vicente Cabello
This article series is about the tools of popular guitarists. What are their favorite guitars and how is it related to them? This time with Espen Elverum Jakobsen (Pristine).
Credits: Grazegorz Galuba
When you start guitar playing and do you remember your first guitar?
I started at the age of 6. My dad was a guitar player when he was young and he showed me the G chord and it was so difficult. My dad worked in the supply department in the Norwegian army and manage to save an nylon acoustic guitar that had a broken neck. He fixed it with some glue and that became my first guitar. I actually had a lot of instruments going up. All the instruments that the army in Northern Norway was trowing away he took home and fixed it.
What are your influences and which guitar players are your faves?
My influences are many. I started listening to my dads music, Chet Atkins, Hank Marvin (The Shadows), Hank Williams, Mark Knopfler and many more in that genere. In my teens all my friends was listening to Metallica, Halloween and Iron Maiden to name a few. I was listening to Chet Atkins, Hank Marvin, Mark Knopfler and David Gilmore. Then I discovered Jimi Hendrix, Jimi Page, Steve Ray Vaughan, Eric Clapton and started to listen heavily to those guys. And then a bit later I started listening to Scott Henderson, John Scofield, Michael Landau, Allan Holdsworth and Allan Hinds. My favorite has always been Jimi Hendrix.
Credits: Sverre Simonsen
How many guitars do you own and what are your favorite models?
I had to sell a lot of instruments and equipment during the pandemic just to pay my bills, unfortunately. So now I have 12 guitars left. My favorite is my Gibson Firebird VII CS from 1999 in kerry green.
What do you think makes the perfect guitar and amp?
The perfect guitar amp for me is an amp that takes pedals great and especially fuzz pedals. The amp does’t have a lot of bells and whistles like effect loop and different inputs and channels. Volume and Treble, mid and bass is all it needs. The mid control is an important thing. And when it comes to watt I really like playing on a 100 watt amp but I rarely do this anymore so a nice 30 of 50 watt amp is nice.
Credits: Sverre Simonsen
How do you feel about the question of modeler or tube amp?
I see the convenience if you play in a pop band where everything is midi controlled and you play the song exactly the same every concert and you need a lot of different sounds of different amps and pedals. But for me its absolutely useless. To my ears it doesn’t sound any good and if your like me and appreciate the dynamic of a tube amp then the real deal is the only thing that works. There is also the fact that digital guitar sound doesn’t cut through in a live situation the same way as an tube amp does.
Which guitars and amps were used on the new album or for recordings?
On the new album «The Lines We Cross» I used four different amps, but the two main amps that I used on the whole record is a Hound Dog Redbone made by George Alessandro in 1996 and a Velcro Supro Supreme from 1948. The two other amps are my heavily modified Fender Deluxe Reverb and a Vox AC15HW1. When it comes to guitars I used my Firebird VII CS, Gibson Les Paul CS R8, Gibson Les Paul CS R6 Gold Top, Gibson CS EDS-1275, Gibson Les Paul Studio 70’s Tribute Gold Top and Fender Stratocaster CS Limited edition 1959. Almost all of my Gibson guitars have Jason Lollar pickups.
Credits: Sven-Erik Hagen
When you only can choose one guitar, which one will you take?
I will choose my Firebird VII CS 1999. It’s the most versatile guitar of them all. I could say the same about my Fender Strat but there is something about that Firebird that is just fantastic.
