Today I'm taking you through the gear I use when I'm working my other guitar job- as a touring guitar tech. All music by Jayszun Vanderwerff. Temple Guitars on Instagram- / templeguitars
So the modularity of the briefcase on top of the drawers is great, and I've been shifting my gear to move into something almost exactly the same, but now I've discovered a gigbag style version of the briefcase design, so I'm gonna go with the more ehhh traditional flip top workbox design, and just keep a tight kind of "string change and quick setup" bag to take with me to the local music spaces, and the full proper kit would live at home, ready to take anywhere serious enough to warrant it.
That's a great way to do it- the whole vibe as a tech is to be flexible. When I started out, I started quite big, so my whole setup was in one enormous metal case (we called it The Aluminium Falcon). This was fine for local shows in theatres etc, but there was no way I was getting that thing on a plane in New Zealand with local bands with local budgets. I love the sound of your quick deployment setup, especially if you use a battery tuner and light with it, so you are fully self contained.
@@TempleGuitars oh I'm all about self-contained power. The little gig bag will have a section with a foam insert to hold all my files and setup tools, I just picked up a pinecil soldering iron which has been pretty great for the quick odd job and mod, packs crazy small. I've got another small bag with rags and bottles and strings, primarily. Feels good when several slow percolating ideas flash together and become a thing.
Great rundown, Jayszun. I've always wondered what pro techs carry on tour, this was fascinating. Just curious, in your experience, how often do touring guitarists need repairs on their guitars? I imagine some guitars get a beating, but others might make it through an entire leg of a tour with nothing more than string changes. Thanks for sharing!
Great question, Philip... It depends on the artist for sure. Like I mentioned, I've worked for people who literally destroy guitars every night during the show, and expect them all up and running the next night. It also depends on where they go to. If they're from a low humidity place, and tour somewhere with high humidity, that's going to throw the setup off. Every band is different, and every tour presents its own challenges. Some bands request minimal gear (they want to save money), and sometimes that works, other times they end up needing gear they asked me to leave behind. And when that happens, they always blame the tech, and never themselves. Rock and roll!
Stellar setup. Love how you have a mini luthier draw too. Stewmac tools are so good Thank you for inspiring some ideas for my setup, gonna try and order some stuff before our next tour soon, cheers 😎
Dope! How often do you find yourself doing fretwork on guitars throughout a normal tour? I've been thinking about dipping my toes into the guitar tech touring world, but I'm not suuuper confident on my fretwork. Is that something that pops up a lot? All said, that was awesome! Thank you for going through your kit like that, I've been planning out my basic one, but I'm quite a few levels behind you, haha. Appreciate you!
Hmmm... My take on this is it's important as a tech to know as much as you can before putting yourself out there for anything more serious than just helping out friends or doing local shows where you're just tuning and loading. If you sign up for a larger tour situation, it's not so much about whether fretwork pops up a lot, as it is a question of 'Am I ready for whatever may happen?" Minor fretwork fixes do need to be performed for sure. One thing I do that a lot of other techs don't, is whenever possible I spend a day with all the gear before we leave, going over everything, setting up redundancies where needed, and making sure the gear is ready to go, so I won't have to fix a fret that has popped up on the road, etc. One of the biggest things that gets you a reputation in the industry is when you do a great job, that leads to people talking, and more work coming. I hope that helps, and good luck!
Thanks for sitting through it... I warned my Insta followers this episode was going to be boring, but I also remembered when I first started out, and how interesting/helpful a video like this would have been.
Thank you. Here's one: www.circlethreedesigns.com/guitar-tech-briefcase and here's another one: www.circlethreedesigns.com/shop/guitar-tech-briefcases/guitar-tech-briefcase and one more for good luck: gomc.tv/product/brief-case-tech-box/ OK and one more: www.toursupply.com/Ultracase-Tech-Box-p/techbox.htm They also have them on Alibaba and sites like that.
Great Video. thank you! one question: didn't you find that the microfiber cloth does weird things to nitro laquered guitars? i used these once and ended up getting some cloudyness i could only get rid of by buffing it out
Good question- There are different abrasive grades of microfibre cloths. To avoid fine scratches on nitro you can use the type for cleaning eyeglasses, or if money is no object, Fender sell their own 'nitro safe' ones as well. Thanks for watching!
To be honest, 'making it' as a tech is generally as hard as making it as a musician- so much of it is 'right place, right time'. I think most techs aren't born 'fully formed' and ready to tour. I think most start out by learning as much as they can about setting up guitars and practicing on their own instruments, then doing small shows for free to help out their friends. There are 3 main things that get you tech work- 1. Knowing what you're doing and proactively doing it, 2. Being in the scene socially, so people know who you are already, and 3. Being a cool person to be around on tour (and I can't stress this enough). If you've got friends in bands, you're helping them out locally, and you know your stuff; it all comes crashing down if people don't enjoy having you around. If you tick all the boxes, you help out in your local scene until one of the bands you look after starts touring (and hopefully paying), or one of the bigger bands coming through your town sees you working for one of their local supports and likes what they see. Or if there's a tech in your orbit that is getting work, ask if you can assist them, and learn that way. Being good at live tech work is a skill in itself, and you either have it or you don't. There are plenty of killer repair techs working in music stores etc that couldn't tech live to save their life. So my advice is get your skills up (RU-vid and StewMac sites are a great start), work your scene, and be a cool person. Good luck in your quest!
Hey man Enjoyed the tour through your tech rig. All contingencies covered! I have those same vernier callipers. Same battery issue. How did you work around it? Dean
Thanks Dean! I think the issue is the cover isn't thick enough, so I put some tape between the battery and the cover to push the battery against the terminals. You'd think the tape would get in the way, but one battery terminal is on the front, and the other is actually on the side. I thought it would be one on each side, but luckily it isn't. #verniercrew
Guitars live in this case the whole tour. It's designed to protect them during transportation, and to allow loaders to easily move all the guitars at once from the trucks to the guitar tech area and vice versa.
Right now I'm in Melbourne with a month off, so technically no-one. If you would like to know who I've toured with, there's a list on the bands page of my website.
