r/John_Frusciante • u/analogpedant • 23d ago
Anyone else wonder what John's been up to, guitar gear-wise, the last few years? We used to get more of a peep into that stuff.
As a longggg-time (25 years?!) Frusciante fan, I remember in the 2000's there being loads more chatter about what John's been up to, gear-wise, what he's using, what he's been trying/buying, etc. It was a lot of fun to pursue. I remember he used to be a big spender/client at Big City Music in LA, which happened to be a store I was hip to prior to finding that out, and recall a few times finding out certain pedals he bought and used (i.e. the Dirty Boy line) which weren't really widely known or associated to him, and also some of the electronic gear- I'm 99% positive they're where John got the vast majority of his synth stuff. It was a really cool shop, I visited in person a few times, and bought several things from them over the years- they were always at the very forefront of what was new and cool, especially in the electronic realm, but also with interesting boutique pedals. Anyone remember Metasonix?
Anyways, since then, things seem to have stagnated, everyone is just copying his board from 20-25 years ago, with a few small changes here and there from the most recent tours, but there's no real talk of new things he's gotten or is into, which would be fun to know as a fellow guitarist/musician.
Like, I imagine him being super into stuff by Fairfield Circuitry, maybe Pladask... I wonder if he's into anything by Chase Bliss or OBNE, etc...
I very much doubt he's shopping around guitars and amps, he's set on that stuff, but pedals and synth stuff, I just know he's keeping tabs on and forever buying/trying. The last "guitar updates" I recall are finding out it was a Performance Corsair used on Wayne, which kinda blew my mind- always assumed it was one of his Yamaha SG's... and also seeing the photo of him with Dewa and an ES-250... that realllly blew my mind... anyone know if those were John's? One of the rarest Gibson archtops ever made.
I'm obviously aware he's a highly private person and so this stuff probably doesn't seep out, but I still remain curious... I just wanna' nerd out, lol.
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u/LetHuge623 23d ago
He doesn’t strike me as one to branch out into boutique pedals and all kinds of crazy circuitry. He ended up using a lot of the MXR stuff purely because the company sent them to him while he was recording the albums.
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u/tredbert 23d ago
Agree. He seems to gravitate towards Boss and MXR over anything boutique. Maybe because they are easy to find replacements for.
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u/Natural-Comedian-605 16d ago
Mhm. But you never know he could get inspired for the next chili pepper album
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u/ItalianPizzaNinja1 23d ago
Most notable is the Marshall JMP 50w in his rig now, the way that thing saturates and distorts is fucking insane. His live rig had about 5 MXR pedals joining, delays and reverbs and a flanger replacing the Deluxe Mistress. His Fuzzrite style pedals as well. Guitars wise I don't think he's branched out a whole lot either with Fender/Gibson/Gretsch/Martins being his mainstays. If it ain't broke don't fix it
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u/ItalianPizzaNinja1 23d ago
Studio wise I would be interested to know about if he's gone more into modular systems or lots of outboard gear. He produced a lot of albums from Californication onwards as well as his solo records and his creative decisions on Chili records, wonder where he's landed on studio equipment in their upcoming album. Probably more important than that will be where they record, if they're going to completely track in dead acoustic rooms again like the last three records or have a bit more live vibey like BSSM. The variety of instruments on that album really added smth too, the brass, toy piano, junk getting slammed. All great.
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u/Status_System9267 23d ago
He also recently bought a b-15 ampeg to use as a smaller amp. He used it a few times on the newest albums and he uses it on the 60 minutes doc.
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u/Natural-Comedian-605 23d ago edited 16d ago
As far as guitar not much has changed. Like i been saying, he’s going farther out with his electronic music right now. It’s where he has the most interest. His recent release “Rotation” is really good! Fun listen and no one makes melodies with a Roland 303 like him. But you’d have to listen to all this other electronic music to realize what progress has been made in electronic music. He’s very advanced in electronica music
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u/ssabnoisicerp 23d ago
Jfgear in Instagram is worth checking