| Solar System: The Gear Behind Space Ace Frehley's Heavenly Live Sound by Jeff Kitts Guitar World, September 1996 With the possible exception of Les Paul himself, few Rock guitarists are as loyal to the crown jewel of the Gibson solidbody line as Ace Frehley. On Kiss' current world tour, Frehley's three-pickup, cherry sunburst Les Paul Custom is his weapon of choice. When asked to explain his devotion to his Custom, which houses DiMarzio Super Distortion pickups, Frehley responds, "You ever play a Les Paul? Enough said. If you plug into a Marshall or any good English tube amp like a Laney and crank it to 10, the sound is there. The Les Paul is the ultimate rock guitar." The only guitar in Frehley's arsenal of axes that is not a Les Paul is a Gibson Custom Shop SG double-neck with a one-of-a-kind cherry sunburst finish. No discussion of the Spaceman's stage gear would be complete without revealing some of the details of his trademark special effects. A staple of every Kiss concert during the Seventies as well as Frehley's recent solo outings is the extended spotlight solo during "Shock Me" that Frehley concludes with his cherry sunburst Custom erupting in a volcano of pea soup smoke. "Anybody who has seen me playing smaller places with my solo band will now see that I use a lot more smoke," says Frehley. "But the effect pretty much looks the same. Except that since we're now in big arenas, when the guitar is done smoking , it flies out of my hands and into the light truss and explodes." Frehley's use of smoke bombs originated during Kiss' early days. "We were on our first tour of Canada, and I got some fireworks and said to myself, 'I wonder what would happen if I put a smoke bomb inside my Les Paul?' I put it in the control cavity. It was just a regular, store-bought smoke bomb with a fuse that I lit with a cigarette lighter. Smoke just started pouring out of the cracks of the pickups--and it looked great. But I had to keep changing the volume and tone pots because the smoke kept destroying them. Eventually, I got together with a designer and we figured that it would be better to modify the guitar and isolate the effect in the rhythm pickup, which I don't use anyway." Those trial-and-error days long gone, Frehley now has his smoke bombs specially made for him. "They're basically cylinders filled with smoke bits. No smoke is good for the human body, but this is the safest smoke you can use -it's not sulfur-based like fireworks." Still, accidents have been known to happen. "Once, on my last solo tour, the people who make my smoke bombs sent me the wrong bomb and it blew up, giving me a mild concussion. Once I realized it was the wrong effect, I took the guitar off and just threw it across the stage. But it didn't break--those fucking Les Pauls are built like a brick shithouse." [laughs] In terms of strings, Frehley arms his collection of touring guitars -which includes two that light up, two smokers, the double-neck, a black custom that shoots rockets from the headstock, and a pair of primary cherry Customs--with Gibson Ace Frehley model strings, gauged .009 to .046. Though he's been a devout Laney user for most of his solo career, for this tour Frehley returned to Marshall. "Kiss always used Marshall amps--it's kind of a tradition," says Frehley. And don't try scanning Frehley's side of the monstrous Kiss stage for effects pedals--he's got those tucked neatly out of harm's way. "As for any delay or harmonizer or doubling of guitar effects, that's all done pretty much right through the board. I can't handle pedals and shit on the floor--I just end up tripping over them! |