WITR 001 - Kyle Buss
Welcome to our new series, What’s In The Rig, where we explore unique guitar setups and tone secrets shared by gear enthusiasts of all levels from around the world. In this series, we’ll take a deep dive into the details of your guitars, pedals, and amps — uncovering how they work together to shape your sound. If you’d like, feel free to include your social handles so others can connect with you and follow your musical journey.
For our very first post, we are featuring a good friend of mine, Kyle Buss (@kyle.buss_guitar). Based in Colorado, Kyle is a phenomenal guitar player and a huge gear head. Let’s see what’s in his rig!
Hey everyone! I’m excited to share my guitar rig, a setup that blends vintage tone with modern gear. My go-to guitar is a Stratocaster partscaster, featuring a Bloomdoom body in aged Olympic White nitro, a Fender Custom Shop neck, and a Callaham Tremolo. The icing on the cake for this guitar is the Genesis Fairfield pickups! They really bring out the best in this guitar, and thanks to a PleK’d fret job, it sounds and plays flawlessly. I keep it strung with .10 gauge Ernie Ball strings in standard tuning.
I have a collection of about 13 tube amps, but my favorites are my 1968 Fender Bandmaster Reverb and a 1970 Super Reverb converted to a ’64 SRV Spec Vibroverb, both loaded with vintage Electro Voice speakers which sound Beautiful. Lately, I’ve been diving into vintage sound equipment conversions—I have a Marshall Super Bass made from organ parts and a Tweed Fender Harvard built from an old phonograph. When dialing in my sound, I typically start with all the knobs at noon and tweak from there, always aiming for a warm, piano-like tone.
Though I keep things simple, my pedal board usually includes a Vox wah, R. Weaver FX Violet Vibe, a Klon Clone (J. Rockett Archer), Jan Ray overdrive, and either a Fuzz Face or Shanks Fuzz. If I were gigging, I’d also throw in a reverb pedal and a strobe tuner. I also love using amp tremolo at a subtle level switched on all the time. Soon I am looking to add a phaser pedal I have always loved the sound but never have owned one.
Musically, I’m influenced by players like Eric Clapton, Stevie Ray Vaughan, John Mayer, and ’60s European Gibson guitarists. I love dirty tones but always adjust my volume and tone knobs on the fly, keeping my rhythm tone around volume 8 with the tone rolled to preference. One of my most prized possessions is my 1955 Gibson Les Paul Junior, a dream guitar that plays and sounds incredible.
If I had one piece of advice for players building their own rig, it would be to never stop exploring new sounds—inspiration often comes from unexpected places! What’s in your rig? Let’s talk gear!