Magtabay . We were doing a ‘ live on Instagram ’ and I said , " Let ' s just go through the drawer and start plugging stuff in .” So I was doing that with all these old pedals and I got to that one and I went , " Actually , Jemm , I really liked that ." And I used it on a record right after that and just fell in love with it . So it stayed on my board . So that ' s all the drives that I ' m using . I do leave a Cali76 compressor set very lightly ‘ on ’ all the time . And so that ' s kind of the essence , I guess , of my guitar tone .
[ WM ] I ran a music store all through the 80 ’ s . I sold the first Rats , the very first ones that came out . I also wish I had bought a whole box of Ibanez Tube Screamers back then and just stuffed them away .
[ Spence ] No lie . Or even the Marshall Blues Breaker pedal that I bought for $ 70 from American Musical Supply . I now look on Reverb and they ' re bringing upwards of $ 700- $ 800 .
[ WM ] So let ' s talk about Kyser capos and your relationship with them ?
[ Spence ] When I first started playing guitar there weren ' t nearly the options for capos like there are now . They make every different shape and size you could want . But I ' ve always liked the Kysers ’ just because of the trigger , it made it really easy to put on a headstock if you need to . Also , because you have so many guitars with varying fretboard radiuses , some capos will knock them out of tune . And I ' ve always found that with my Charis , the Kyser just seems to work better as far as intonation . So , I ' ve just always kept it simple , use a Kyser full capo and the Kyser cut capo too .
[ WM ] The cut capo is still popular . Changing topics here … what advice do you have for our worship guitar players and / our just guitarists in general ? What ' s your advice these days when guys come up to you at church and say , " How should I pursue this ?"
[ Spence ] That is a great question because one thing I think I ' ve had to adjust in my own
life is not finding my identity in music .
To pursue it and to be as good as I can at the craft . And tone ' s a big deal to me . I want the tone to be as great so that I can worry about the parts and not be focused on the minutiae of the sounds not being right .
But I also draw a line that I don ' t identify with the instrument . I don ' t . If I lose the ability to play tomorrow , then I haven ' t put my worth and my value into what I do on stage . Because really , especially in churches , it ' s a tool to bring people to worship with the Lord . And you could do that in many different ways . You don ' t have to be holding a guitar to do that
So , I always tell people to balance it . It ' s great to really love the instrument and to dive in headfirst , but don ' t do it at the expense of everything else .
SpencePeppard . com