MGS - First off Joe thank you so much for taking the time to speak with us.
JN - No problem. I'm honored to be featured on such a unique, tone-centric website.
MGS - First off for those that don't know can you give us a history of how you got into the musical instrument biz?
JN - Ok, here's the long version! I started playing in 1980, my first year in college, and shortly thereafter purchased my first electric guitar. It was a used Japanese Epiphone Crestwood ET-290 cherryburst, wish I still had it. Within one hour of owning it, I had it completely dissected, right down to the last screw. As a kid, I used to build those flying wood airplanes, and I was a professional bicycle mechanic since I was 16 years old. So ripping the guitar apart was no problem. I was fascinated and knew right then I had to be in the guitar business one way or another.
What followed was several years of intense information gathering. Back then there were no instructional videos, no local guitar shows, and very few books. Hands-on was the only way to go, so I'd hit the music stores and junk shops and buy their crap... if it was under $30, it was mine. I had piles of Japanese necks, bodies, pickups, and parts that I'd assemble into mutant guitars. I would try odd combinations just to see what would happen. One of my favorites had a fully-hollow Aria ES330 body, Cort strat neck, Bigsby trem, Dimarzio bridge humbucker and no-name neck single-coil. The pickups were out-of-phase with each other, but the thing sounded amazing! If you really want to learn about guitars, you gotta get destructive... preferably on cheap instruments.
I also used to hang out at Pete Moreno's repair shop in Kalamazoo. He's one of the best, and has a very interesting shop. He worked at Gibson, and when they closed he bought a bunch of stuff at the factory yard sale. He had stacks of unfinished flame-top Les Paul bodies and necks; build-it-yourself Explorer and Flying V kits with real Gibson bodies and necks, for like $200. I bought a full box Gibson pickup coils off him for $5... just insane stuff. Anyhow, the first time I went there was to get a quote on a guitar refret. I couldn't afford it, so I asked him how to do it. He hammers one fret in, hands me a roll of fret wire, and tells me to go home and do it. I come back the very next morning, with the guitar completely re-fretted, and he's looking at me like "man, this kid is nuts". So over the next few years, he'd help me out if I couldn't do something on my own.
After I got my Industrial Design degree, I headed out to Phoenix and attended the Roberto-Venn School of Luthiery. It was a 3-month course, 40 hours a week, studying traditional luthiery techniques for acoustic and electric guitars, as well as wiring and pickup winding. After that, I returned to Kalamazoo and worked out of my basement, specializing in repair, custom guitars, and pickup winding.
In 1992, I moved the operation into a Detroit area storefront, where I expanded into sales of used and vintage guitars and amps. This was an incredible learning experience, as I played through and analyzed every single piece of equipment that came through that shop, whether it was a vintage Telecaster or a solidstate Gorilla amp. The day-to-day buying and selling also forced me to study vintage guitars and amps in detail, as far as history, features and value.
In 1993 we introduced the J.F. Naylor Special Design 50 speaker, one of the earliest 12" Jensen-style, upgrade replacement speakers. In 1994 we closed the retail and repair side of the business, and introduced the Naylor amplifier line. In 1996, due to differences in business philosophies, I sold Naylor to my business partner, who ran the business into the ground after about a year. We produced the first Reverend guitar in early '97, and have been going strong ever since.
MGS - I remember Naylor amps as the first "boutique" amp out there to my knowledge at the time. I rememeber seeing the local bands Slam Circus, Solid Frog and Sugarbuzz using the amps. They are still highly sought after. How did that all get started?
JN - It all evolved from the music store. We had successfully introduced the Naylor speaker, and I was getting burned-out on the retail/repair side of the business. Kendrick, THD and Matchless were already in business, so we figured if they can do it, we can too! I already had a background in design and manufacturing, so we decided to go for it. Our amp repair guy, Dan Russell (Blitz Amps, 810-772-4458) was doing all these outrageous amp mods, so we commissioned him to design the amp circuit to our liking. We also later worked with Guy Hedrick (www.guytron.com), who designed the circuit for the reverb-equipped series of Naylor amps.
Our first model, the Superdrive 60 head, was possibly the first high-gain, Marshall style, point-to-point wired boutique amp on the market. It's still the most highly sought model, I've seen them recently sell used for more than the original list price.
MGS - Do you have any old Naylor amps at home or at the shop from the old days?
JN - I have a Superdrive 60 head here right now that belongs to a friend of mine, it used to belong to Mike Cross from Sponge. It brings back memories... that amp was on MTV, Letterman, etc.
Unfortunately, Naylor was ahead of its time. Back then, selling a $1500 head was no easy task, especially a high-gain one, because the original boutique amp market was mostly traditional blues guys who had no interest in a master volume.
MGS - The new line of Reverend amps look great. Can you tell us about them? They look very versatile.
JN - After Naylor, I vowed I would never get back in the amp business, because Naylor essentially failed as a business. So out of the blue, one of my sales reps tells me he knows this guy who designs tube amps, and has overseas connections to get components built at a reasonable cost (our amps are assembled and tested in our facility, using American and imported components). It turns out the designer was Dennis Kager. Dennis was head of repair service and quality control at Ampeg in the mid-sixties, and was involved with design as well. He owned Sundown amps in the eighties, and now operates Central Jersey Music Services, one of the country's largest amp service centers. He's also a consultant/designer for hire, who's worked with all the big-name companies. Dennis and I hit it off real well, and I figured if I could build a good tube amp at a price the average person could afford, I'd give it another shot.
The basic concept is simple... make an all-tube design with the simplicity, reliabilty, and tonal purity of a single-channel amp, but make it affordable, versatile, and light weight. Our secret weapon is the 3-position Schizo switch, which changes the pre-amp gain and EQ for three distinct voicings: US which is Fendery, UK which can do a good Vox, Marshall or Hiwatt imitation, and LO-FI which is reminescent of vintage Supro and Silvertone type amps. If you know how to tweak the controls, you can really nail a variety of vintage tones. We have excellent sound samples up on the website that really demonstrate the possibilities (www.reverenddirect.com/reverend/sound_samples.html).
All our amps have a 1/3 power reduction switch, Electro-Harmonix tubes, Accutronics reverb, and super-light neodymium magnet speakers... our 60 watt 112 combo weighs 32 pounds! I think it's the lightest 60 watt, all-tube 112 on the market.
I'm really into single-channel amps right now. There's less stuff to go wrong... and what if you don't like the second channel that you just paid for? If really need to footswitch, there's now an endless variety of high quality pedals with every flavor of distortion imaginable. Our amps are very pedal-friendly, especially in US mode. On the other hand, if prefer to simply ride your guitar's volume control for clean and dirty, they'll do that to.
MGS - What was your inspiration for the design of the Reverend guitar?
JN - Right after I got out of Roberto-Venn, I bought an exceptionally great sounding Silvertone 1448 guitar, the single lipstick pickup, amp-in-case model. I originally bought it for the cool case, but was shocked when I plugged in the guitar. I even remember my roomate saying, "If you build me a custom guitar, it has to sound is good as that one", and he was a keyboard player! It just sounded great, even after I routed it for a humbucker and added a tremolo!
The masonite and pine Silvertone defied conventional logic, and I wanted to crack the code. I began building bodies out of non-conventional materials such as aluminum, formica (phenolic laminate), Masonite (hardboard), and various plastics and rigid foams. I once built a semi-hollow body with a center block of rigid foam and balsa wood, with a thin aluminum top and back... it had so much resonance and treble harmonics, it sounded like a 12-string! It's amazing what you can do to the tone with alternative materials and modifed internal body structures.
After about 10 years of experimentation, I ended up with the Reverend High Resonance Body Design, which was granted a U.S. Patent in 2000. The design allows us to manufacture a body that consistently produces the resonance of a semi-hollow, but with the attack and sustain of a solid-body. It also eliminates conventional body painting procedures, which lowers my labor costs, and in turn allows me to sell a pro-quality, USA made guitar for under a $1000. It's hard to verbally explain the construction, but there's a good cutaway view at our website (www.reverenddirect.com/reverend/guitars/about_guitars.html).
MGS - For those not familiar with Reverend tell us what makes the guitars different than what's been on the market for 50 plus years.
JN - Mostly the patented body construction, the combination of materials and the internal structure are unique. It's unusual to have this much resonance in a semi-hollow body this small. It's also unusual to have so much resonance, with great sustain and attack.
Otherwise, the rest of the guitar is fairly traditional, with aesthetic and functional elements borrowed from classic designs, and then tweaked to my liking. You gotta keep in mind, by 1958, the Strat, Tele, Les Paul, ES335, Flying V, Explorer, and all the essential Gretsch guitars already existed! Much of the heavy lifting had already been done.
MGS - Lets also touch on the 2005 guitars. This new pickup bass contour knob looks very cool.
JN - I'm very proud of the 2005 line. We built the first Reverend guitar in '97, and have continually improved the same basic design since. So the 2005's represent a very highly evolved instrument, with 8 years worth of tried-and-true refinements in construction, hardware, and electronics.
Although the Reverend design was inspired by the lowly Silvertone guitar, our guitars are designed for the professional or serious hobbyist looking for something visually and tonally unique. We use high-end appointments such as Sperzel locking tuners, custom-designed pickups, string-thru-body bridge, dual-action truss rod, graphite nut, stainless steel neck screws, and custom-designed circuits.
The new Bass Contour is a passive bass roll-off, which can go from a slight bass cut, to totally re-voicing the pickups. Passive bass roll-off controls for guitar are nothing new. What's unique is that our control taper and component values were specifically selected to allow re-voicing of the pickup, not just simple bass reduction. And of course there's a few sneaky-tweaky things I did, that I'm not free to discuss at this time.
You can back off the Bass Contour just a little bit, to tighten up the low end. Or you can roll back further, which reduces the gain and thins the tone for a cleaner, brighter and more percussive sound. It'll make a full-size humbucker sound like a single-coil... I think it sounds better and is more usefull than any coil-tap I've ever heard. It will also re-voice a P-90 to sound like a Strat pickup. The cool thing is, because it's a variable knob, you can create your own hybrid tones by using settings in-between the two extremes.
MGS - I noticed Rick Vito now has a signature model guitar. How did that come about?
JN - Well, Rick has used Reverend guitars since '99. For those who don't know, he's probably the top sideman in the biz, having worked with Bonnie Raitt, Fleetwood Mac, Bob Seger, Jackson Browne, Todd Rundgren, John Mayall, Hank Williams Jr., John Fogerty, Roger McGuinn, and many others. His best known track is that bad-ass slide solo in Bob Seger's "Like a Rock".
When he's not working with the big-shooters, Rick records his own solo blues CDs (www.rickvito.com). It just so happens that his upcoming release is about 90% Reverend guitar, in particular the P-90 equipped Slingshot model. When I heard that, I proposed we collaborate on a Vito Slingshot. I figured we'd co-promote it along with his new CD, and we'd both benefit. We were already sandblasting Hawaiian scenes on to aluminum bodies, so we decided to do a similar thing with his artwork, which has a very New Orleans/voodoo vibe. The original Slingshot I built Rick years ago had over-wound P-90's, so we incorporated that into the Vito model, as well as the new Bass Contour control.
For the new CD, he's also using our Kingsnake amp and a Dumble amp that Jackson Browne gave to him... he thinks it's the one Stevie Ray Vaughan used on his first record, which was recorded in Jackson Browne's studio. Rick claims the Kingsnake holds its own next to the Dumble, which of course I was elated to hear!
Rick will make an appearance at the Fall Philly Guitar Show, June 25-26 (www.bee3vintage.com). He does a very cool slide clinic, which is educational and entertaining... his feel, touch, and phrasing are spine-chilling. We hope to bring him to several of the bigger guitar shows this year.
MGS - We would like to give you props for being a USA company. It seems a lot of the bigger builders out there are outsourcing close to 100 percent of their products. Is it possible to do a little outsourcing, like say a more affordable Reverend guitar made in Korea, but keep the core biz and manufacturing in the US?
JN - That's exactly what we plan on doing. We will keep making the USA guitars as our flagship line, and we plan on introducing a Korean-made line late this year. These will be solid-body and semi-hollow guitars using conventional wood-body construction.
There's a couple key things to a great import product... the company bringing them in has to have some design chops, and has to be willing to enforce quality control. I have personally designed and spec'd out everything on these guitars, and all the guitars will be set-up and QC'd here at our Detroit facility. We're not talking about cheesy Les Paul knock-offs, these will be Reverend pedigree all the way! Totally high performance, very consistent, and with some unique features.
MGS - What's the biggest hurdle in being an American company and staying strong?
JN - The hard part about running a business in the USA is the high costs... labor rates, taxes, health insurance, etc. You always have to think about efficiency, producing something fast, but without compromising quality. And the marketing is just as important as the product. You have to know how to present your goods to the right group of customers, along with an appropriate product/company image. Don't even think about getting in this business without some marketing and sales background. The guitar gear biz is brutally fickle and unforgiving.
MGS- I remember the Kid Rock ads with Reverend guitars. Did he bring his posse with him? When you met him did you say, " My name is JOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOE NAYLOR! BAWWITTABAADADANGDADANDIGGYDIGGY"? Sorry, I hope you can appreciate the sense of humor. Tell us how that came about.
JN - Dude, that's exactly what I said! Then we downed a couple fortys of Ol' Mil' and burned a few blunts. Just kidding!... it was actually Strohs.
His lead guitarist, Kenny Olson, endorsed Naylor amps and Reverend guitars. Well, Kenny got a big money deal out of Fender, so he dropped us like a rock. I think he felt kinda bad about it, so he told Kid Rock that he should be playing Reverend. Kid Rock called me, and explained how they're gonna be this huge group, and that he's all pro-Detroit, and that I should hook him up...well, the rest is history. I think he has a Gibson deal now, but I'm not complaining... the guy took great care of us for a couple years, gave us a lot of exposure, and he's even holding a Reverend on the cover of "History of Rock".
MGS - Why were the Drivetrain OD pedals discontinued? They had quite a following. Are you still working with Bob Weil?
JN - It became no longer feasible from a business standpoint. Our minimum production quantities were very high, and they weren't selling fast enough, so it became money sitting on the shelf for too long. I'd rather invest that money into another part of the business. In the last couple years, everybody and their brother got into the pedal business. Drivetrain sales dropped radically... there's just so many overdrives on the market now, and a lot of good ones.
I'm not doing any projects with Bob now, but we do sell all his Visual Sound pedals, which I'm real happy with. Maybe we'll do the Drivetrain again if the timing looks right, and if I can get it done in much smaller quantities.
MGS- I know you have been back and forth on the direct vs. dealer issue over the years. Where do you stand on it now?
JN - We originally had dealers, and that grew to about 100 dealers. We had a sales rep company that would sign-up just about anybody. Our big mistake was that we didn't control territories, pricing, store inventory or the internet sales. Stores would have one Reverend guitar, and call themselves a dealer. Internet stores would sell them for $10 over cost. There's still over $10,000 owed to me from ex-dealers who bounced checks and never paid me!
Consequently, sales to dealers dropped off, because Reverend no longer was a priority line in most of these stores, just a name to have in case somebody wanted to special order one. So in 2002, we dropped all the dealers, fired the sales rep company, and went direct. In retrospect, I should have kept the 10 or so dealers that actually supported the line, but at that time I was frustrated and wanted nothing to do with dealers.
Fast forward to 2005, and we're signing-up dealers again. Only this time, it's a totally different program! We are more selective about whom we bring onboard. We want medium-size stores who are going to stock the product, and have a high level of knowledge and service. In return, we give the store an exclusive territory which is the total area within one hour's driving distance. We don't sell into that territory, and they don't sell out of it.
There's also price consistency... dealers sell at the same "Direct" price shown at our website. Customers don't have to worry about getting ripped-off, and the dealer's profit margin is protected. It's a win-win situation for everybody involved. And I know it's working... the 9 dealers I currently have are selling more Reverend product than the 100 dealers I had before!
MGS - Ok it's time to sound off. Lots of folks in the gear community will read this. Think of it as your State of the Union address. Tell it like it is Joe. Also a special thanks.
JN - Keep America Cool... support small companies!
