This is yet another AD that I have :(
Im with you on satch,vai,dream theatre etc, but dont do much in the way of ubershredding anymore. Was a big malmsteen fan for a while and pretty much perfected his style of sweep picking (without the scalloped fretboard mind you - hes such a nancy needing that IMHO).
In terms of equipment, from memory I have;
Guitars
- gibsons - 57 les paul goldtop heritage, 67 heritage flying V, xplorer reissue (cant remember the year on this one)
- fenders - my late 80s black strat which was the first electric i bought, 52 tele reissue, srv signature model, i think there might be others but my brain isnt working so well
- gretsch - tennesee rose (chet atkins model) - will be getting some more in future if I can afford it - would like a white falcon.
- indie - these guys make copies of well known models that a meant for playing, and they are such good replicas I bought a few for live work. es 355 copy, prs custom 24 copy
- epiphone - zakk wylde model - actually plays better than the 57 goldtop and any les paul i have every played, a couple of other weird things like an old nighthawk custom
- ibanez - a steve vai flower guitar 77fp i think the model is, i like some of his newer models, but the components are made out of rubbish materials and i refuse to buy them, but they are nice to look at!
- ovation - a highend 6 string (cant remember model), and their doubleneck 6 and 12 string (had it custom made by ovation a couple years ago) - these are really good for recording acoustically, but live sound is a real pain due to the "quality" pickups they have.
there are also a few other things that dont come to mind right now
Amps
At some point I realised that it didnt matter what guitar I had, if the amp sucks so will the guitar's sound, so I went a bit nuts for a while, but have culled things a bit now.
- 77 fender twin reverb (cos its from my birth year otherwise i would have gone with a 60s blackface, but glad i didnt now i have the bassman)
- victoria bassman - the single best sounding amp ever - i was going to get a proper 59 bassman (10K worth) then compared with this which blew it away. the tone is unbelievable!
- victoria champ - same amp the stones record with, goes from sweet cleans to dirty with the twist of its single volume knob. probably the best recording amp I have ever come across.
- marshall tsl stack - recently sold the bottom cab as its a bit of overkill if i am not gigging
- laney 50 watt head - their top of the line one, for british blues and rock sounds (it was that or a vox, the vox has the mojo but the laney blew it away in the sound department). will probably try and pick up a cheap secondhand vox at some point.
- carvin legacy combo and extension cab - for the steve vai stuff. only problem with steve vai gear is that you always sound just like him. there isnt much depth to allow you to create your own sound, but it does what it does very well.
Studio
For my hobby/play studio I dumped all my pro tools stuff as i got sick of their lock-in with hardware. I wanted something that had high end converters in a portable device for recording singer songwriters locally in their own studios, but their portable hardware was rubbish at the time. Even their high end hardware compared with equivalent third party equipment couldnt compare dollar for dollar (this might have changed now, not sure and I am very happy i made the switch so havent been looking). I initially went with protools as I thought it would be easier to take tracks to commercial studios and have them mastered etc, however with the internet and ability to send songs overseas for mastering by well-known guys, that argument just didnt hold up anymore (all they want is a stereo mix in wav or aif and they work their magic).
Went with logic and a metric halo 2882 expanded (might get another for some additional tracks if I start doing any work for larger bands), all the sonnox plugins and others, focal sm8 monitors (probably the best investment out of all the studio gear). I do everything on a mac pro which is probably getting long in the tooth, but I can still get a good 24 or more tracks out of it (with multiple plugins per track) without any performance hit. most of what I do for local guys doesnt exceed 10 - 15 tracks.
For control surface I have a euphonix mc mix and an mc control, which integrate with logic perfectly (so far at least).
Havent really gone with much out of the box processing gear, as I seem to be able to get good results without it at this point. I leave that stuff for the mastering guys at this point.
For mobile recording, I have a macbook pro and an apogee duet, which is the sweetest sounding portable recording device I have ever heard. Its really only good for recording singer / songwriter types, but does that job well.
Only thing that lets me down at the moment are lack of really good condenser mics which I am starting to accumulate. Considering the quality I have been able to get out of some basic sm57 and beta 58s, I will probably wait until I make some serious cash before investing in anything too high end/pricey.
Biggest thing I need right now is more TIME!!!!!