Michael Gerber
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The best part? Ringo’s wearing a goddamn tie.

As an unabashed Pepper-supremacist — a surprisingly contested position these days — I’m always trying to figure out why I like listening to that LP so much more than Revolver (which has better songs), or White (which is so much more musically varied). To me, Revolver is still the new sound in-process; and as I’ve said many times, White to me is the sound of the group breaking up. All I can say for sure is that, of the three, Pepper is simply the place I like to be most.

This evening, the below video crawled across my algorithm. While watching it, I wondered: is it the guitar sound that attracts me to Pepper? Is it…brighter somehow? Listening to the guitar solo for “Fixing A Hole,” something I’ve heard countless times before, I was just knocked out. And the opening track, what a beautiful snarl to open an album!

Can any musicians or other trained-ear folk help me out? I know there are actually pedals designed to mimic the VOX UL730 amps the group used in 1966-67, but Pepper‘s guitars just hit like a Mack truck.

Perhaps this video has some clues? It’s over three hours long, so I’ll be watching it in pieces.

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