Tommy and Jon Rubin have an artist deal with Fender that entitles them to buy gear at cost - about half of what they'd pay at guitar center. They ordered a couple of custom made Stratocasters. Cool enough. I was not jealous. I have a cool guitar already. I'm addicted to amps. My dream is to own one guitar and all of my favorite amps. (All Fender tweeds. Originals or boutique reissues. Nothing over 30 watts.)
Then Tommy got the itch to buy the recently released 1965 Princeton Reverb Reissue, having become insanely jealous of mine. (It is the best reissue of the classic blackface designs that Fender makes - sweet, dimensional, hi-fi, with an incredible musical reverb. Not exactly the same as really good original, but close. An amazing accomplishment considering that the reissue uses a printed circuit board and other modern "improvements.") Tommy was about to go to Guitar Center (Slogan: "We have one of everything - we just don't know where it is.") to buy one for $800, when he decided to call his Fender rep to see if the artist gravy covered amps, too. "Oh sure," the guy chirped. "Those are available. I get one out to you today!" Total cost: $400. The amp arrived two days later. It's every bit as magnificent tonally as mine. I have resisted being jealous of Tommy's full-time professional guitar slinger lifestyle, since the existence of the professional musician is often a poverty-stricken, mortifying grind. But this - now I'm jealous.
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