Doug Rice
Guitarist

Gear

Here's the standard gear I gig with most often. I've never been the type of guitarist who owned 5 different Strats, a few Les Pauls, 3 or 4 Jazz boxes, and a half dozen acoustics. If you're a guitar player, you're probably thinking..."What's wrong with you?!!" I know...I know. I just never could justify spending the bucks unless I was really going to use a particular guitar a lot. However, I am concerned about the quality of the instruments and I like to have good guitars that are well-suited to each style and musical situation I find myself in, whether it's strumming on the worship team, playing a Jazz gig, rocking out in a cover band, whatever.

Gibson ES-175D
This is my 1978 Gibson ES-175D. It's a great Jazz guitar. It was the first pro guitar I owned. Right before my Junior year in high school, I sold a pro-model trumpet that I played, and bought this guitar from my local guitar shop. Great tone and so versatile. It's suitable for many styles of music. The 175 has served me through many, many performances over the years and it's holding up very well. It's still my main Jazz box.
Fender Stratocaster
This is my Fender Strat. It's a remake of the 1960's Strat, in Olympic White. I replaced the factory pickups with a set of Fender Vintage Noiseless pickups. They work great. I also mounted a Roland GK-2A divided pickup on it so that I can connect to my GR-33 guitar synth and control other MIDI instruments (I love playing steel drums on guitar!).

Taylor 414CE
I hadn't bought a standard acoustic steel-string guitar for many, many years. I figured I needed something new that would be both a good fingerstyle guitar and a good strummer. I also needed something that would project well when I play unplugged. After much (MUCH) playing and listening to various guitars around the Seattle area, I decided this Taylor 414CE was the one for me. I really like the crisp sparkle and full low end I get from the 414. I compared it to other Taylors (614's and 714's), as well as other brands, but this particular guitar just stood out for me. Great guitar.
Baritone Acoustic Image Gallery
This is a custom-made, Noble baritone acoustic. I love the haunting sound of baritone guitars and the inspiration that comes from the lower tunings. Duane Noble (http://www.dlnobleguitars.com/) built this guitar for me, with Koa back and sides, Sitka Spruce top, Boxwood binding, Mahogany neck, and Ebony fingerboard. Duane's guitars are just beautiful; pleasing to both the ear and the eye...world-class, all the way! His inlay and woodworking skills amaze me. I had Duane install a B-Band A2.2 XOM pickup system. This system is great at capturing the lower frequencies of the baritone while keeping the highs crisp and clear. It picks up the natural sound of the guitar very nicely and I'm extremely happy with it. For a closer look at this guitar, be sure to check out the Baritone Image Gallery.

Line 6 Variax Acoustic 700
I bought this Line 6 Variax Acoustic 700 not long after they hit the market. I was a bit skeptical, at first, about buying an "acoustic" guitar that depended so heavily on electronics for it's sound. However, once I played it, and perhaps more importantly, recorded with it, I was convinced this was the way to go. It models so many amazing acoustic guitars and other stringed instruments, all perfectly EQ'ed and balanced, without the need for any tone tweaking. It's perfect for heavy strumming, light fingerstyle, and everything in between. If you haven't heard a Variax Acoustic yet, you really should. The Line 6 site has some great audio and video demos you can check out.
Yamaha Classical
This is a Yamaha Classical guitar. I bought this right before I left for college to study classical guitar with James Reid. Since then, I've used it in so many performances. The Variax kind of overshadows it now but I still use it on occasion.

Washburn Rover
My wife and sons got me this Washburn Rover travel guitar for Father's Day. A while back, I found myself in a hotel room, completely inspired after a Phil Keaggy clinic, and I had no guitar with me. Torture, I tell you! The next day, I went to check out various travel guitars so that I could easily take one with me when I travel. I played many different brands and models but this one stood out in terms of tone quality, intonation, and playability. It has a full-scale neck, solid mahogany back and sides, and a spruce top. Great little guitar. I don't gig with it but thought I'd include it here anyway.
Line 6 Flextone III
I loved the Line 6 Variax Acoustic so much...I bought the company! Okay. Not really. I recently found myself playing such a wide variety of styles in several different groups, with several different guitars; I wanted to find one amp that could be used in all those situations. This Line 6 Flextone III was the answer for me. It'll handle everything from bright acoustic to ear-drum-rupturing thrash metal. I love the tone I get out of it when I'm comping in a big-band setting, and the blues and rock tones just...well...rock!

Line 6 Shortboard
This is the Line 6 Shortboard foot controller for the Flextone III. You really need one of these if you're going to be using the Flextone in live performances. It allows you to access all of the patches on the amp, as well as some nice, extra features that you can't really get otherwise.
Roland GR-33
This is the guitar synthesizer I control using my Fender Strat. It's a Roland GR-33. Ever since I was a kid, I dreamed of owning a guitar synth someday. It's so fun to play a guitar solo one minute and then drop into a fretless bass solo or a vibes solo the next. There are so many possibilities when I have all these tones at my feet.

Pedalboard
This is my acoustic guitar pedalboard. I have a Roland RC-20XL LoopStation on there, along with an Ibanez stereo chorus, a Boss 7-band EQ, an Arion octave pedal (great, inexpensive pedal), a Line 6 direct box/power supply, and a Boss FS-6 dual footswitch controller for the looper.
Boss RC-50 Looper
I recently upgraded to the Boss RC-50 Loop Station. I needed a way to record short percussive loops on one track and then record longer loops over the top of that, on a separate track. The RC-50 is really 3 loopers in one. Each can work independently or can serve as multiple layers of a single loop.

Delay and Reverb
For my solo setup, I always run though this rack. It holds a Digitech Digital Delay unit and an Alesis MicroVerb III. I usually use a light, hall reverb with just a slightly audible delay behind every note.
Other Effects
My Flextone has most every effect I need for my electric guitars, but here are some other effects I use when needed. From left to right, there's an Ernie Ball volume pedal, an e-Bow Plus (so fun), an original Ibanez Tube Screamer, and a Digitech RP-200 multi-effects pedal. Ya gotta have the gadgets when you're a guitar player.

Yamaha Stagepas 300
This is my Yamaha Stagepas 300 PA. It's the PA I use for most every solo gig and some combo gigs. At 300 watts, it gives me enough power for medium-sized venues and it is just amazingly crystal clear — especially with my Variax Acoustic. The removeable amp locks (optionally) in place on the back of one of the speakers, making it very portable and easy to set up. I played "Evita" a while back and used just one speaker, with the mixer, as my guitar amp. What a great sound. And it filled the auditorium!
On Stage Stool
Okay...yeah...I know. It's a stool. Big deal. But if you're a guitar player, you know how difficult it is to find that perfect stool. The seat has to be at just the right height so you can reach your pedals on the floor and you need a foot rest that puts your knee at just the right height and angle to hold the guitar comfortably. I tried so many stools and then stumbled upon this On Stage guitar/keyboard stool. I think I may have heard angels singing when I saw it for the first time. Maybe not. It really is the perfect stool for me though. And it's a firm stool.