The Gear We Can't Live Without
Every musician has that one piece of gear… Maybe it’s a battered guitar, a favorite pedal, a vintage synth, or something completely unexpected. We invited a handful of our favorite indie artists to tell us about the gear that means the most to them and, more importantly, the stories behind it.
Justin Sconza
There’s a piece of gear that I’ve had with me ever since I was in seventh grade. It’s a Boss digital reverb/delay pedal called the RV-3. I have an absurd amount of pedals and plenty that are technically “better,” but this is the one that means the most because I got it with my dad at the Guitar Center next to The Alley by Clark and Belmont in Chicago. That area was pretty gritty once upon a time, and now everything is a lot different. Anyway, this pedal has been with me the whole time.
Devlin McCluskey
I’m honestly not the biggest gear person. Give me a cheap guitar or anything I can write a song with and I’m happy. But I absolutely love going to a studio and making use of their crazy gear or hearing the fun backstories.
For my new album, Alex Newport at Tiny Creatures in Yucca Valley had Conny Plank’s Muff pedal that he came by through an estate sale, and it was the very last item available. He also had a big, heavy synthesizer that belonged to Huey Lewis and the News, which had all these very new wave-y sounds pre-loaded, and a pretty great organ sound that we used on my record. He also had this old custom sixties fuzz pedal without any markings on it that we used on just about every song.
To me, the Roland Space Echo is always going to be the best piece of gear, but they’re so temperamental that I can’t justify buying my own, and have to settle for the pedal version. I love the pedal, but it’s not the same.
One of my favorite little toys is this Critter and Guitari Pocket Piano. It’s a little lo-fi analog portable synthesizer with a 1/4" out. There are no markings on it; you just hold down different combinations of buttons or turn the knobs, and it repeats different arpeggios or intervals or harmonies. When you plug it into an amp or throw a bunch of reverb or delay on it, it does sound cool.
My old band was at a studio years ago, and the engineer had one sitting around. Our producer Brendan Canning (Broken Social Scene) spent all his free time during the session playing with it and making weird beats.
After the session, I scoured the internet and bought him one as a gift, and then my band went on tour. Months went by, I didn’t get around to sending it, then it got lost in a pile of unread New Yorkers or something. One day I found it again, started playing with it, and got hooked. Shipping it to Canada was crazy expensive, and it’s awful to say, but I just ended up keeping it.
If Brendan Canning somehow ends up reading this, I’m sorry. I promise you can have it someday.
Eva Cassel
I would definitely say my Strymon Deco pedal. I had a friend see me play with my rubber bridge guitar and my Strymon Flint, and he insisted I borrow his Deco because the tape simulation really fit my sound. I immediately fell in love and bought one of my own. It felt like the missing piece, and now I don’t ever play without that pedal combo.
Luna Keller
This is my traveling guitar, Nick. I called her Nick because she’s nearly headless. I’ve had loads of fun over the years taking off the neck at the end of shows and seeing audience reactions. She’s been all over Europe with me, and when I’m short on luggage space, I have put clothes in the soundhole.
The Upsides
A piece of gear we recently acquired and have been putting to good use is singer Matt Fullam’s Gibson Les Paul Standard ‘60s. Our latest single, “Pretending It Fades,” previously had an old Squier Telecaster that belongs to our keys player, Pat Freeman.
The demo version of these chords had a unique drop C tuning, which immediately spoke to us as having a ton of emotion versus the standard voicing of the chords, and there was no way we were going back to standard tuning for this song.
We brought Pat’s guitar up to The Building in Marlboro, NY, for album tracking last summer, but when we listened back to the initial mix, we realized that Pat’s trusty old Telecaster was not liking the drop C tuning. It was kind of like going back to one of your favorite restaurants in your hometown but realizing the place is a little bit dirtier and grimier than what it is in your memory.
Anyway, fast forward to a September 2025 tracking attempt on one of our lead guitarist Hart Mechlin’s Telecasters, for which we purchased not one but TWO Telecasters and had them set up specifically for this tuning. Sadly, these beauties were also defeated by the weird tuning, so we finally gave up on the Telecaster and went the Les Paul route.
For overdubs this time, we actually rented a Joe Walsh Les Paul Standard that was supposedly signed by Joe Walsh, which feels like a pretty wild thing to be renting out. We did not have anyone verify its authenticity.
Chris Williams
I’d say my Ome Wizard banjo is the most interesting gear I own due to the journey taken to find it.
It was the result of a long search for an open-back banjo that I saw in a video, “Time Will Tell” by Gregory Alan Isakov. I absolutely love that song! In the video, Steve Varney was playing the sweetest-sounding open-back. Beautiful workmanship! That sent me on a mission to figure out who the manufacturer was. I have a cool resonator that I love, but it lacks the warm tones I had been looking for.
My first thought was that it looked kind of like an Ome, a great company out of Boulder, CO. I searched their site and didn’t see it, but did come across a couple of stunners from their lines!
I continued my search for weeks online through videos and articles and ran across a write-up that led me to a boutique instrument builder named Aaron Keim, who owns Beansprout out of Hood River, OR.
I visited his site and saw that, indeed, he had built a couple of models for Steve. I emailed back and forth, and he gave me great info on the models. He also said to contact Steve via his website and ask any questions.
I landed on Steve’s music site and saw that he gave lessons. I thought, rather than bothering him with an email, I’d just sign up for a lesson and get the scoop.
That led to a year-and-a-half-long writing session for an album that Steve co-wrote, produced, and mixed during COVID. Quite the serendipitous encounter!
I ended up going with the Ome banjo as I needed it quickly for recording demos. And, strangely enough, the Ome facility was literally within eyesight of Steve and Greg’s farm! I still intend on grabbing one of Aaron’s beautiful Beansprout banjos one of these days!
Jeff Kolhede
When it comes to my environment, my philosophy is pretty simple: less is more.
I’d say the most interesting piece of gear for me is the Sebatron VMP Quad Plus. After years of working out of large studios with all kinds of amazing vintage and modern gear, I learned the hard way how easy it is to get caught up chasing familiar name brands. At my home studio in the redwood-lined hills of Oakland, Mystic Canyon, I’ve stripped all of that back to focus on boutique equipment that matches or exceeds that build quality in an honest, affordable package.
The Sebatron VMP Quad Plus gives you four tube preamps with the ability to shape harmonic tone in a really musical way, going from warm clarity to massive saturation and distortion. It is a true workhorse in my space that I rely on for everything from vocals and bass to electric guitars and master bus tone shaping.
An honorable mention goes to all things Seventh Circle Audio. The quality of their circuitry, mimicking classic Neve and API topologies, to name a few, stands right alongside the originals while offering a level of reliable build quality you can completely trust.
While certain high-profile pieces of gear certainly have their place, I have found that great results ultimately come down to knowing your tools, trusting your ears, and following your own taste. I couldn’t recommend these pieces enough.
Bad Flamingo
This duo has made secrecy part of their allure, but when we asked them about their favorite gear, they told us that they liked “Anything that sounds good when you hit it, drop it, or crunch it. And we like dancing with our theremin for hours. Cause that’s what it takes.”
Theremin can be found in “The House Is on Fire,” “Bees Making Honey,” and “Parked in the Lot.”