The Moog Guitar is a reality.
One model available, the Paul Vo Collector Edition, at $6,495.00.
The Moog Guitar puts revolutionary new technology in the hands of the guitarist. Moog Music is known for building the finest instruments and the Moog Guitar is first and foremost a very fine guitar; designed to be played by the best musicians as their primary axe. Its AAAAA maple top, mahogany body and ebony finger board bespeak the quality that musicians have come to expect from a Moog instrument.
The addition of Moog Guitar Electronics opens guitarists to a whole new musical vocabulary: Not a guitar synthesizer, not a MIDI guitar or an effects processor; players are intimately connected to The Moog Guitar because it works its magic on the strings themselves.
The Moog Guitar can function as a regular guitar, of course, but beyond that, there are different options for controlling sustain, and a mute mode.
Pickups
2 custom-designed, noise canceling, single coil Moog pickups (neck / bridge)
Piezo saddles on Bridge
The piezo is blended in with the normal output of the Moog Guitar or it can be output separately thru the 1/4 in. jack.
The piezo does not require external power; it receives auxiliary power from an on board 9V battery.Electronics
Moog patented Guitar Electronics including Moog Ladder Filter / LFO subsystem.
The way I understand it, you can sustain all strings or, any combination. You can set the two pickups with different variations and blend them.
There is a custom Wilkinson-style bridge with a whammy bar.
If you go to the Moog site, you can see a video of well known guitarists demonstrating the Moog Guitar. Lou Reed seems particularly impressed and Vernon Reid plays some very banjo-like things in the mute mode. Go watch the video and you will have a much clearer picture of what this guitar is about.
Related posts
Tags: Guitar, Lou Reed, Moog, Moog Guitar, Paul Vo, Vernon Reid
Sans Direction wrote,
OK. I want one.
I had wanted the Fernandes Sustainer. But sustain plus sustain killing? And all that MoogerFooging goodness? Gotta be a win.
Sans Direction’s last blog post..Not musical?
Link | June 6th, 2008 at 1:54 pm
Pribek wrote,
I’m with you on that, Sans. You know the old saying; “MoogerFooging goodness doesn’t grow on trees”. But, at these prices, you can’t afford not to MoogerFoog. Do you realize that the asking price is roughly only one percent of a mortgage payment (if you are Ed McMahon).
Well known guitarist, not on the promo video, most likely to be seen toting a Moog Guitar: Robert Fripp.
Least likely: Jimmie Vaughan
Link | June 6th, 2008 at 2:55 pm
T-Bone Darnell and Friends wrote,
I am but a Tree…
T-Bone Darnell and Friends’s last blog post..A Ticket, and P J for Obama, a mamma, and a tasket too…
Link | June 6th, 2008 at 5:17 pm
Ovidiu - GuitarFlame.com wrote,
Very interesting, Jack! I am into Variax guitars these days, so I am open to experimenting. This guitar sounds interesting, especially because they say that the sounds are not post-processed, but from regular strings. Is it me or the technology in guitars can change any day now? I ask myself if the current technology with regular pickups and strings would go on much longer. I mean, if you look at a Variax for ex, the possibilities are endless and in a couple of years I guess they will be even better than today. Now this guitar…I’d say let’s get ready for a change :-)
Ovidiu - GuitarFlame.com’s last blog post..Again about Variax guitars, this time live from my city
Link | June 7th, 2008 at 6:42 am
Sans Direction wrote,
Is it me or the technology in guitars can change any day now?
It isn’t just you. It’s just where? More and more production guitars come with piezo bridges, I’m hearing good things about the work on optical pickups, you’re seeing MIDI pickups all over and even on Bo Diddley’s guitar, robot tuning, Gibson’s been looking at moving from 1/4″ phone jacks to RJ45 ethernet jacks. (pros: they lock in. cons: they’re much more fragile, trust me.)
But I’m not seeing a lot of support from the players for instruments that vary far from the gifts that Les Paul, Leo Fender, Seth Lover, etc. have given us over the years. Guitars that look different? Sure. Guitars that play different? Not so much.
Sans Direction’s last blog post..Not musical?
Link | June 7th, 2008 at 9:46 am
Pat Darnell and Flood Gauge Fusion wrote,
I’ll wait 12 years till this git-fiddle is $64.95, then I will pick one up at the pawn shop.
Pat Darnell and Flood Gauge Fusion’s last blog post..A Ticket, and P J for Obama, a mamma, and a tasket too…
Link | June 7th, 2008 at 9:59 am
Pat Darnell and Flood Gauge Fusion wrote,
Although I kinda like the name and inference: “MOOG” I’d like to write their ads for them… MooPigsters everywhere say MOOG Moinjks!!
Speaking of which: this is an infringement by Lego– weren’t you going to begin offering the Pribek Pridak Amp?
Pat Darnell and Flood Gauge Fusion’s last blog post..A Ticket, and P J for Obama, a mamma, and a tasket too…
Link | June 7th, 2008 at 10:11 am
Pribek wrote,
After another night of sweating like a donkey, before a note was played, in a poorly ventilated, corporate chain store franchise simulation of an “authentic roadhouse”, I would be more interested in a robot that could set up the P.A. than one that can tune my guitar.
Speaking as a curmudgeon, it seems that the technological advancement is out pacing the creative advancement. It seems, to me, that people are spending a more time tweezing neat sounds than saying something interesting with the neat sounds. I may be partially influenced by a Teo Macero interview I read after returning from the gig last night.
http://www.furious.com/PERFECT/teomacero.html
I think that same way a lot but, I realize that’s way it is for me, not for you. I don’t feel a burning desire to transcend or redefine the instrument, I just want to play better. And, that goal seems possibly in reach if there are some parameters.
That being said, I like to see innovation in these products. I have no doubt that somebody, somewhere will run with the ball and come up with something totally unique. I saw Ray Kurzweil interviewed the other night and he said something like; “none of this technology is successful until it’s affordable”. And, that’s the thing; if some 14 year old kid could pick up a Moog Guitar at a pawnshop and, use it as a jumping off point, rather than some geezer who applies a half century of ingrained habits and technique (Lou Reed for instance) then you would probably see something great.
Link | June 7th, 2008 at 11:43 am
Sans Direction wrote,
I don’t do that much anymore, but I used to be part of a group that brought in concerts at my school. When we had shows in the gym, we had to put blue mats on the basketball floor, build the stage, load in the PA, put in the PA system, load in the band, enjoy the show, load out the band, load out the PA, disassemble and load out the stage. None of that’s light. So I get you. Robots on the loadout, yay.
Reminds me.
http://www.roadietetris.com/
So many trucks, there’s only one way to load it.
I’m thinking you’re at least partially right about your curmudgeonly side. Or the 14yo side. We had electric lap and table guitars in what? The 30s? We had the electric spanish in the late 1940s. The Stratocaster came out in 1954. The Marshall stack was invented in 1964 or so. But truly electronic guitar came after, with Hendrix. That’s when things exploded. You’re right.
Sans Direction’s last blog post..The Imperfect Country and Western Song
Link | June 7th, 2008 at 3:44 pm
Pat Darnellski and Startsi wrote,
Suppose a moment with me, that in the grander scheme of Theory of Everything, TOE, a reputable futurist has stepped up and said: “After another night of sweating like a donkey, before a note was played, in a poorly ventilated, corporate chain store franchise simulation of an ‘authentic roadhouse,’ I would be more interested in a robot that could set up the P.A. than one that can tune my guitar.”
One has to ask, was the hour-glass replaced by a pendulum? Rather, a clock-work is only an hour glass that does not require twenty-four hour a day human assistance. So the pendulum actually replaced a human stationary-engineer hour-glass gazer.
Unemplyment leads to unscheduled events as:
There was an out of work tea-sipper peasant in Russia turn-of-the 19th century who had no stationary work to perform, but became regular in the Czar’s court– that any futurist could predict led to a song by Boney M…
Ao that Royal Czarette altruisms leads: You see, to endorsements going all the way back to a practice of protecting fabulous and wealthy:
Rasputin was considered the latter, Staret. And– unlike John Lydon,
Sidebar: ..interesting note(s): “Prince Felix Yussupov… claimed he had a record of ‘Yankee Doddle Dandy’ playing over and over on the phonograph when he had Rasputin over to kill him…”
That within confines of starlettes and showman outlined behavior patterns:
This of course leads right into Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland, or was that Shirley and the Temple of Doom… oh well.
So that the adage “as we live in mortal sin; the golden years never end — for the children live out schemes, that were once all their parents’ dreams…” is our final word to Moogsitics… as in the Sans’ summary — “But truly electronic guitar came after, with Hendrix [child of all past and future musicians' dreams]. That’s when things exploded. You’re right.”
Amen.
Pat Darnellski and Startsi’s last blog post..Attrition Begins with Use of language and neologisms
Link | June 7th, 2008 at 8:29 pm