5 - Paul McCarthy
Paul is 39, from Manchester England, now settled in Nottingham.
He's been playing guitar since he was around 15 when he got his first guitar, an Epiphone SG400 Korina'62, which he still owns today, albeit a little road worn.
Paul studied Music Tech at Derby University and although a career in music didn't pan out, he found himself being introduced to new genres, and enjoys making and playing music.
Predominantly a fan of Alt Rock, Classic Rock and Indie, he remembers some of the 1st songs he learned to play. "I made a cassette compilation of around 15 songs that I played along to every day. It must have sounded horrendous at first, but after a year or so, I was playing along to songs like Plug in Baby by Muse, Thunderstruck by ACDC and Sweet Child O' Mine by Guns 'n' Roses (although I took some liberties on the solos, and still do today 😁)"
Paul has been in several bands over the years, from original rock indie bands to acoustic covers bands. Paul admits he can be flighty and can get bored easily, but jumping from one band to another has given him an excuse to build his guitar collection.
He is currently working with a drummer, Dom.
"Dom may not be the best drummer in the world, or even the room, but he has a studio" quipped Paul.
Along with Dom's brother Al (guitar/keys/Vox) and Dave (Bass/synth) they meet up in Dom's studio to jam and record randomly themed music, one sesh might be Zombie Film Score, another might be Hillbilly Disco. "We like to start with a theme rather than an end goal, it keeps things interesting and we never know what we're going to end up with, you win some, you lose some"
Although they've no plans to gig as they live too far apart, Paul is pulling together a covers set to start getting out to open mics with.
Paul's guitars:
Epiphone SG
Yamaha APX700
Gibson Les Paul Junior
Ibanez AF75G (Artcore)
Squier Affinity Telecaster
Squier Deluxe Jazzmaster
Aston Bass guitar (unsure on model, was just bought for recording)
Brunswick Ukulele
"I usually go for the lower range guitars, Epiphone/Squier over Gibson/Fender. I have a limited budget, so I'd rather have more guitars, than fewer, more expensive ones. I'm also terrible at taking care of them, I literally can't have nice things, they'll get broken 😁. I often use quiet a lot of effects too, so I wouldn't see much benefit to a higher end guitar in terms of tone"
Paul plays through a Peavy Bandit 112 amp, and a Pod HD500 multi FX pedal.
At the moment Paul's mostly playing the Jazzmaster, "it's one of the best Squiers out there, feels like a Fender, I'm enjoying playing around with the circuit switch and tone dials, getting some nostalgic grungy/shoe-gazey tones"
As for the future, Paul is currently looking at purchasing some sort of Jag and maybe a Firebird.
