Welcome to the monthly MusicRadar guitar gear roundup, where we cast an eye to the month that was and all the best that August had to bring us – the electric guitars, the amps, and the newly minted stompboxes for our ever-expanding pedalboards.
This was the month that brought us the MXR Flanger/Doubler, with the the iconic Dimebag Darrell rack unit rehoused in a compact pedal format. We also so the release of one of this year’s coolest acoustic guitars, the Epiphone Marcus King El Dorado – good luck finding an acoustic with this much vibe (that pickguard!) and LR Baggs electronics for under a thousand bucks.
Well, Martin and Joe Bonamassa might be able to help on that score, at least with the mojo. His latest signature collaboration with the brand features not one but two Martin guitars. One is a high-end 00-18, but the other is the very affordable Mexican-made 00-10E – and both arriving fresh from the shopfloor with that pre-War shade-top look.
We also saw the release of Jam Pedals’ Stu Mackenzie signature stompbox, the Tiny Amp Destroyer. Sleep Token’s first-ever signature collab arrived via Jackson and Charvel, Gretsch dropped a super-luxury Penguin, and Harley Benton expanded its beginner-friendly electric guitar lineup with the SC-Special Hybrid, a smart-looking singlecut with a P-90/humbucker pickup combo.
And of course, the digital transformation of guitar tone gathers momentum, with Line 6 expanding Helix Stadium ecosystem with a plugin, HeadRush adding native Tone3000 integration, and Neural DSP rolling out its biggest-ever update for the Quad Cortex and Quad Cortex Mini.
But there was more. And in this roundup we’ll pick out the highlights. But where to begin? Well, what about Gibson’s first baritone guitar since the early 2010s?
Gibson Victory Baritone
No one quite knew how the Victory would do when Gibson launched the redesigned doublecut in 2024, reprising a design that didn’t really make it in the ‘8os when shred-fever was at its highest. But lo, it worked. It found an audience.
Its slightly offset body shape, the glued-in neck, the six-in-line headstock; it had something about it. And having refreshed the second coming of the Victory with a Floyd Rose vibrato, Gibson now takes the Victory for a Victory lap with a 28” scale baritone, developing an all-new Alnico VIII ELEV8 humbucker for the occasion.
Again, you’ve got the compound radius fingerboard of its siblings, but a lot more low-end to play around in – and there’s a little push-pull coil-splitting for that Vinnie Bell baritone twang to complement the low-end chug.
Head to Gibson for more.
Epiphone Lzzy Hale Explorer Custom
Let’s stick with the Gibson brands for a moment, because Lzzy Hale’s Explorer Custom just got a refresh that may or may not be visible from space, thanks to that Black Diamond Holographic Sparkle finish. You might have seen this look before. It comes fresh off her Kramer Voyager. But the Explorer wears it well.
Again, this is an Epiphone guitar hovering just under the thousand-dollar mark but jacking the spec up high. Look closely and you’ll notice the multi-ply binding on the body’s top. We have some new Epiphone Ignite humbuckers, too. And that price includes a hard-shell guitar case.
Find out more at Epiphone.
Death By Audio x Rainger FX Amp Crash
Now to the craziest stompbox we have seen this year, and how could it not be given the minds behind it? In one corner of this padded R&D cell you have Oliver Ackermann, head honcho of Death By Audio pedals. In the other, there’s David Rainger.
“David from Rainger is who I always gravitate to at any event,” said Ackermann His effects are bonkers in the best way possible.”
What they emerged with is a pedal with a built-in 3-watt amplifier complete with an onboard 2” speaker and micropone, plus reverb, chorus and echo, and it sounds nuts. Make it your number one choice for fuzzy spaced-out echos, deconstructed twang, “Feedback Inferno” and more. At $395 it ain’t cheap but sonic extremists saw the value, with initial batches sold out. More are on the way.
“When he told me he was coming to NY to work on a collaboration, it was a dream come true,” said Ackermann. “Like cities in the world, Rainger FX is Death By Audio's sister company: weird, wild, and totally extreme. Working on this project with Rainger pushed us to create something so extreme, and then we took it further.”
Yeah, no kidding.
See Death By Audio for more.
PRS Dany Villareal Astryx
We love a new limited edition PRS signature guitar and the Astryx, a new-look Custom 24 for the Warning’s Dany Villareal is no different.
It’s mostly a cosmetic refresh but it really is stunning, with that figured maple top displaying an Ocaso (Sunset) finish that plays around with the sunburst archetype, and the birds are swapped out for some sweet signature inlays.
Find out more at PRS Guitars.
Catalinbread EG-1 Lo-Fi Delay
There are three modes on this doozy of a digital delay pedal. One emulates the analogue feel of a cassette tape, one a vintage radio unit, and the other a digital TV set. Not devices you might necessarily associate with reference-quality guitar tone but it makes perfect sense here.
You can add modulation to these giving that feeling of mechanical movement and bit-crushing, and all these sort of degradation effects that are so on-trend today, perhaps because they speak to the sounds from a more innocent era.
As a fan of Catalinbread’s sumptuous Belle Epoch tape echo emulation, this looks like a compelling new delay option, all big textures and vibes.
Find out more at Catalinbread.
Fender George Harrison 1967 Bass VI
The Bass VI is one of the strangest and most brilliant of all Fender designs, even if it might forever feel like mainstream appeal will never quite arrive.
At this price (£8,599/$9,500), this version modelled after the model the Beatles used in the studio, the Bass VI will surely remain a niche instrument but it not only presents collectors with an exceptionally well-made offset six-string bass guitar that blurs the line between guitar and bass (it is a bass but still), but a Fender history lesson too. Note the 3-Color Sunburst sunbleached to two on the instrument’s top.
It comes fitted with three custom-wound Jaguar single-coils and has a bound AAA rosewood fingerboard with block inlays, and it is as good a time machine to the late ‘60s as you could find. That tone… Not just for Beatles fans.
Find out more at Fender.
Hotone Pulze Jr
Okay, 21st-century digital amp time, with the Hotone Pulze Jr the latest to roll off the factory floor fitted with some AI superpowers.
It goes without saying that this super-compact little amp (a definite contender for your practice amp needs) sounds bigger than it looks, but it also comes with AI tone creation (voice or text) and AI track separation, and if it does not give you the ick, there are “intelligent backing tracks” you can play to sharpen up those practice sessions.
Other features include 200 presets, and the seven moveable effect modules, all of which deliver your tone in full stereo.
See Hotone for more.
Cort Exotic Series
Those bored of the spruce/mahogany acoustic guitar paradigm might like the looks of these keenly priced Cort Exotic acoustics, which pare the solid spruce top with ash burl, myrtlewood and walnut.
Cort is offering these in its SFX and Grand Auditorium cutaway models, which come stage-ready with aCort’s CE304T acoustic guitar pickup and preamp, which means you have a piezo pickup, and a 3-band EQ and onboard digital guitar tuner. Expect to pay less than 300 bucks.
Find out more at Cort Guitars.
Charvel Pro-Mod Plus DK24
Already, shred heads, here’s something that might be worth loosening the purse strings for, and you know the drill. It’s a DK24, so that means a Jackson Dinky body with a 24-fret Charvel bolt-on neck and build, and a spec that’s pretty damn metal. At least the choice of pickups suggest as much.
The dual humbucker options feature a Seymour Duncan Nazgul at the bridge, a Sentient at the neck, while the HSS version pair a Seymour Duncan Full Shred humbucker with a pair of Custom Flat Strat SSL-6 single-coils.
This is a great drop for fans of green guitars. Just check out that Floyd-equipped Cloaked Emerald Green HH model – complete with black Speed Knobs – and the Zombie Fade HSS model with the recessed Wilkinson tremolo.
Find out more at Charvel.
Blackstar adds Moises support for Beam Solo and Beam Mini
Blackstar’s compact digital amp and headphone amp was already a tech-forward proposition. You have all the effects, the amp models, and you have the Tone3000 integration, and now – as promised at NAMM 2026 – there is Moises support too. The industry leading stem separation technology is available now if you use iOS, and is coming to Android on September 30.
Download it on your app and you can isolate guitars in your favourite songs, or remove them. It’s a superb practice tool, allowing you to isolate the part you are trying to learn then play along.
Find out more at Blackstar.
Walrus Audio Canvas Expression Pedal
The most useful expression pedal ever? Possibly. We’ve got two independent outputs, which can be configured as expression, switch and CV outputs It’s fully customisable (tapers, sweeps, you name it), and can be your MIDI controller too.
Okay, $299 is not cheap but for complicated rigs it could be over-qualified performance-friendly utility pedal you’ve been waiting on.
Head over to Walrus Audio for more.
Old Blood Noise Endeavors Beam Splitter v2
The sequel to the 13-knob distortion pedal promises the same madcap take on the distortion pedal. It, too, takes your signal, makes three copies of it, applies three different overdrives to it, then sends a pair of them through two individual delay lines, thus making your sound f____g humungous – the sound of one guitar turned into three.
But this is a lot more user friendly. Enter, presets, expression control over every parameter, MIDI control over everything, mono/stereo output (and trereo as OBNE call it), and switchable buffered trails or true bypass.
If you are the sole guitarist in a rock or metal band – or any band where gain is called for – the Beam Splitter could be transformative. At $379, it’s expensive. But what other pedals on the market do this?
Find out more at Old Blood Noise Endeavors.
DOD Drag Analog Delay
Is this the second coming of the Rubberneck? Well, there is a Rubberneck mode, which extends this bucket brigade delay pedal’s maximum repeat time from 750 ms to 1.5 seconds. And it’s got self-oscillation at its extremes.
With Delay Time, Repeats and Level controls, it might present itself as a straightforward analogue delay, but those mini-dials for Drift and Friction add modulation and a time-warp feature for pitch-shifting repeats and all kinds of strange temporal anomalies. And strange is good.
Find our more at DOD/Digitech.
JHS Pedals AT Mini
JHS Pedals shrinks down Andy Timmons’ signature overdrive pedal and does so with a minimum of compromise. Literally, the only thing that is different is that the wattage switch has gone, with this AT Mini set at Timmons’ 100-watt setting at all times, and we don’t have the footswitchable boost.
But otherwise it’s the same circuit, with Volume and Drive doing their thing alongside an Air control that behaves like presence on an amp, and an EQ dial for a high-pass filter that brightens or darkens your tone.
And there you go: red-hot amp-in-a-box drive tones in a mini pedal format, for just $129 and you can buy the full-fat version for $219 if you really want the boost and alt-wattage settings. Lovely.
See JHS Pedals for more.
