Lloyd Gilbert: Status Quo's Guitar Tech

It was way back in 1968 that Status Quo released the psychedelic pop rock classic 'Pictures Of Matchstick Men', which gave them the first of a staggering 60 plus hit singles in the UK. During the '70s, after taking on a much heavier boogie rock metal sound, Quo quickly established themselves as one of the best live bands in Europe. And now, four decades on from their first early meanderings with chart success, they're still as big a live draw as ever. By the time 2008 comes to a close, they will have amassed a pretty tidy annual gig count of 80 shows across 17 countries, although as far as guitar technician Lloyd Gilbert is concerned, things aren't quite as frenetic as they could have been.

"It's actually been quite a quiet year to start with," says Lloyd. "We didn't start until April and they tend to do it in cycles, so next year we'll probably start in January and go all the way through. They like to take two or three months off at the beginning of every other year."

The remainder of 2008 will see Status Quo spend the summer wowing the sun-happy crowds across the European festival circuit, before embarking on the Pictures tour to commemorate the 1968 release of that all-important debut smash, during which they'll showcase a rejigged greatest hits show, incorporating some '60s hits they haven't played in ages. Then December will be seen off in style with a series of arena shows, at which they'll no doubt enthral the denim-clad masses in just the same way they still enthral Lloyd Gilbert every time they take the stage.

"I was a Quo fan when I was younger, so it's kind of come full circle now, and they're a great live band even now," Lloyd tells us. "I just love watching them play; it's a pleasure to watch them! Francis, when he's on form, is absolutely out there, and luckily most of the crew are of the same ilk. They're just a great band, great at what they do. I don't get disappointed when I watch them, so I'm pretty sure that not many people would!"

Parfitt and Rossi both use a combination of Vox and Marshall heads with Marshall cabinets — the Vox AC30 amps are built into Marshall heads.

Lloyd Gilbert has been teching on the road since about 1992 with various high-profile bands and musicians, including Annie Lennox, Blur, the Kinks, Manic Street Preachers, Reef, Ricky Martin, Therapy? and Terrorvision. His first music biz break came when he returned to the UK after running his own business in the US during the '80s. In the midst of the recession, Lloyd found a job with an old mate who was in the process of opening a new 200-capacity live music venue in Berkhamsted, Hertfordshire. It was here that Lloyd was able to first profit from his lifelong love of rock music and also guitars, of which he is a keen collector.

"I'm from Watford originally, and a friend of mine who was a local musical entrepreneur bought this small music venue," he says. "This place came up and we all kind of went over to Berkhamsted en masse and turned it into a live music venue called Going Underground. I started working there and talking to bands on the phone and booking bands, and it actually became part of the circuit — we had some good bands down there for the time. And I also did a bit of the sound at the venue, and monitoring and stuff."

"It just seemed a logical progression to actually get in the van and go out, because I had the knowledge of equipment and stuff," says Lloyd. "Of course, I got to meet a few people, and a guy called Rev Hammer — I had a few links with New Model Army and bands of that ilk — said, 'Why don't you come with us to a couple of gigs and just help us out?' It started out as a sort of side bet to actually working at the music venue and then it took over."

As Lloyd explains to us, once you get your name in the right places, crews get to know your face and your teching skills start getting a reputation — you're in the game for the long haul if you want to be. One gig will literally lead to another, and that's exactly how the Quo job fell into Lloyd's more than happy lap.

"I'd been working with a friend of mine, Andy — the guy that does Quo's FOH — on a few tours. I'd been offered the Quo gig a couple of times in the past and for various reasons had never made it to the interview stage," says Lloyd. "It's a very small circle and the guy that got the job was another old friend of mine, Adam Birch. He was going back to do Kylie, so he phoned me and asked if I would cover for him. So I didn't even go through the interview stage with the band as such; I was just in it from his recommendation. I started covering for just three weeks and I'm still here now, four years down the line!"

For Status Quo, Lloyd's job description is essentially personal guitar technician for both Francis Rossi and Rick Parfitt, maintaining all their equipment and looking after all their guitars. However, working with other groups in the past, Lloyd's brief hasn't always been so straightforward — for example, when he was working as tech for the Manic Street Preachers' James Dean Bradfield.

"When I was doing the Manics, I was doing all the pedal changes for James," he says. "I had all the pedals in front of me while James was just out there playing on stage! You have to learn the songs in a different way, and not really being a musician I'm a bit of a bluffer when it comes to guitar playing. That was a very different and critical role!"

When chatting about Parfitt and Rossi, Lloyd is never short of praise or enthusiasm for what they are able to achieve on the humble six-string. "They're great musicians!" says Lloyd. "Francis is a very, very good guitar player and Rick is a very understated rhythm player, but they're so totally different. It's like chalk and cheese. Even though they play through the same rigs with an identical setup, it's like a country player versus a thrash metal player. And I think that gives the essence of Quo."

Before we get to those identical rigs, it's time to talk a little about Quo guitars. Currently, Lloyd is carrying six guitars on tour with him to cover Rick and Francis, and they're all Telecasters. Rick Parfitt's main guitar is his trademark refinished white '62 Tele, which he plays in standard E tuning. His backup is a white '62 Tele, which is tuned to drop-D for tracks such as 'Don't Drive My Car' and 'Whatever You Want', and then tuned back up to standard E by Lloyd as a spare. Rick also has a third guitar, an Esquire Tele, which is tuned to open G with a capo on the second fret for 'Down Down.'

As far as Francis Rossi's axe requirements go, he's also currently playing three Telecasters: a '68 Tele in open G with a capo on the fourth fret for 'Down Down'; another '68 Tele as backup; and his main guitar, one of the most gossiped about six-strings in British rock & roll — his iconic '59 faded and battered old green Tele, bought after the band's first hit record back in 1968. Lloyd explains the ins and outs of this legendary instrument.

"I guess it's a '59," he says. "Leo Fender did actually get hold of it to do some work on it back in the day when he was still alive, and he said the neck was a '59, although I think it was sold as a 1960 or maybe a '61. But there's nothing left on it now apart from the neck and the body that would relate to a Tele. It's a Strat configuration with three lace sensor pickups and a G&L bridge, so there's no through-the-body stringing or anything like that."

One of the more mysterious elements of the green guitar, which Francis Rossi apparently repainted personally with green fence paint, relates to the hole that's been drilled slap-bang through the middle of the body. Although various stories have been perpetuated and circulated over the years regarding the hole's origins, Lloyd believes he has found a fairly plausible explanation, despite the fact that Rossi himself will never quite confirm the real true story.

"A lot of it is done tongue in cheek just to keep the mystery surrounding it!" says Lloyd. "You don't want to give everything away; that's one of the main things about peoples' great guitars isn't it? Keep a little shroud of mystery about it. But as far as I'm aware through talking to a few people, the hole was put in the guitar (and some others) so that back in the day they could put a bike block through them to stop them getting stolen, because they did actually get stolen at one point. But you never know the real story. Francis said it was done as a precursor to putting your lead through your strap so it didn't get pulled out, so it would go through a hole in the body, but I think that's a little bit excessive!"

"Francis is quite dyed in the wool with the wireless system," says Lloyd. "He's got an old Samson Concert system that he's used for probably about 15 or 20 years, but it's now basically obsolete. You can't buy any parts for it. So because Rick wasn't as fussy and didn't mind changing, I went out and bought him a new Sennheiser system. And then all the Samson spares that I had I've used to try and keep Francis up to scratch. But it's been a nightmare. I think we're going through our last belt pack now, and that'll be it. But they like what they like and that's another part of the job really, just keeping that kind of thing going."

Amp-wise, the setup for Parfitt and Rossi is completely identical, using a combination of Vox and Marshall heads and cabinets, and a Palmer speaker simulator. "They're very basic really. They both use exactly the same setup," explains Lloyd. "The wireless systems go into a split box that we have built by a guy called Mike Hill, who actually developed the preamp at Marshall. The wireless splits to six outputs and out of that you can drive up to six amps, but what we do is use a Marshall JCM-800 and a Vox AC30, basically. But it's an AC30 built into a Marshall head, so when you look at it on stage they look like they're all Marshall, but it was built by Marshall at the time when they were building all the AC30s. Consequently, you've got a Marshall JCM-800 and a 4 x 12, and there's also a Palmer speaker simulator that sits in the middle of that. Then you've got the AC30 head that runs to an AC30 cabinet, which is off stage buried in a box so you can keep it at a good volume, and that's how the bottom end stays in. When you turn a Strat down or a Tele down, you lose everything, but having that AC30 turned pretty much full up off stage keeps that sort of chug going, but it also keeps the clean sound underneath it."

Both Parfitt and Rossi use minimal effects on their guitars. Both have a Roland GP-8, whilst Parfitt also has a Zoom G7 boost pedal. "Francis uses an old Roland GP-8 that he just uses four presets on," says Lloyd. "One is a straight through sound, one's just got a bit of delay, one's got a bit more drive, and one's got a delay and chorus just for soloing. Rick uses two effects really: a flanger or a chorus, which comes again from a Roland GP-8, and a boost pedal, which is just the G7 graphic, so when he comes to the start of 'Caroline' or whatever all we do is push the level up."

One of the AC30 heads runs to an AC30 cabinet in a 'speaker coffin' off stage, allowing it to be kept at a high volume without affecting FOH.

When Status Quo are playing medium-sized venues, as on the current tour, they take a crew of seven or eight around with them, including Lloyd Gilbert as guitar tech, plus a bass tech, a keyboard tech, a drum tech, a front-of-house engineer, a monitor engineer, a lighting engineer and a tour/production manager. When they play arenas such as they'll be doing towards the end of this year, they pick up another busload of crew to cover the PA, extra lights and extra gear that arena shows necessitate. One of the responsibilities that Lloyd sees as being one of the most important for any guitar technician working on the road is the ability to troubleshoot in the face of almost any adversity.

"I'm pretty much happy to take a Marshall amp apart," Lloyd tells us. "I don't have any electronics grounding, but part of this job is actually being there and doing it. A degree in physics would not necessarily help you out if you don't know what happens when a Marshall goes wrong. Troubleshooting is one of the greatest things in this, and quite often the same thing happens over and over again, so you know immediately where to go."

Keeping on top of the valve situation across Rick and Francis's amps is particularly key when it comes to maintaining the, erm, status quo — especially when you've got a big charity gig at Wembley Stadium. "They run their amps quite hot and they are older 800 heads," explains Lloyd. "I'll re-valve Rick's probably every four months, just as a course of practice, just to liven it up really. The preamps get a bit whiny because Francis has a lot of top end on his guitar, so I just keep my eye on them and see what happens. I actually had an accident with an amp when it got dropped on the day of the Diana memorial show at Wembley. As we were loading in, it got dropped, so I had to re-valve it there and then, and luckily enough we had no problems with it. You get to know what's going on, and when you find a problem you go through a process of elimination. You need to get yourself up to being able to fix those kinds of things."

When it comes to cleaning Quo's guitars, amps and other equipment, Lloyd has a few tips and tricks to share with other guitar players out there. "I've got a little jack socket cleaner that I'll go across all of the amps with, especially after outdoor shows," he says. "A lot of people don't realise that if you're not using an effects loop on a Marshall amp and there's dirt in the loop, it will affect the overall sound. That's one of the biggest causes of problems with amps; when unused jack sockets get dirty, they do cause problems in the chain."

For cleaning Francis and Rick's vintage guitars, Lloyd avoids any off-the-shelf cleaning products. "Just spit and polish," he explains. "I don't use any guitar polish, because I'm not a fan, especially with the finishes on these guitars, which are almost gone. I just use a good clean cloth really, but Dunlop do some great sort of zero grid sandpaper just for fret polishing. All I do with that is just brush across the frets every day and that gets the grime off, but as far as cleaning goes, I just use a bit of elbow grease."

As far as string changing goes, Lloyd changes the main two guitars — Francis's '59 green Tele and Rick's '62 refinished white Tele — every show, whilst the other four Teles are only played for one or two songs each night, so they're only changed every third or fourth gig. He stretches the strings on all Quo's guitars again and again, "until you get to the point where you could probably hold the guitar up by the strings and it will stay in tune."

Lloyd is and always has been a fan of the Boss TU-12 tuner. "I've always used TU-12s," he says. "The band use them on stage as well, so it's all a simple point of reference. We calibrate them all, and if everyone's tuning to the same thing you're almost there. I have got an expensive strobe tuner I spent about £500 on, but it's in a box in the bedroom! With the TU-12s, they're easy, they're fast. You've just got a dial in the back, and you just get everything to a standard pitch so your bass tech, your bass player, your guitar players and your guitar tech are all using the same tuning. That's an age-old thing, just to make sure you're all working from the same ballpark."

As far as what the immediate future holds, Lloyd Gilbert knows that he'll be working with Status Quo for quite some time, and that sits happily with him. He freely admits that he feels very lucky to be earning his way in the world fuelling his passion and can't really see how he'd ever want to stop.

"Well, I'm 45 now and I used to think I didn't want to be the oldest roadie on the bus, but there's always older bands to work for, put it that way!" laughs Lloyd. "I'll carry on collecting guitars. I love working with guitars and I enjoy having guitars in my hand, which is a godsend really considering what I do for a living! And I'm very lucky to have worked with some of the most famous guitarists in the world. So, yeah, I'll just keep blowing really. One year just seems to merge into another at the moment!" 0

Be your own tech

"I can always tell a well organised guitar player when they turn up because they don't have a carrier bag full of red leads. You should really try and get your head around a bit of soldering and make some good leads. And just carry a little kit — a little microphone bag full of a few bits and pieces, including a peg winder. You can also always tell by the way someone strings a guitar. If it takes you a week to do it, then there are a lot of great reference books around, and once you start reading through them you'll realise that it's very straightforward. Learn a bit of soldering, learn how to troubleshoot, and learn about pitch. Really learn about playing in tune, because that's one of the great things that a lot of old-school guitar players do have. You could give any guitar to Francis and he could get it into concert pitch in, like, two seconds. There's a lot of mysteries that surround the guitar like intonation and stuff like that, but just be flexible with it.

It also doesn't do any harm to learn a few little bits like how to use a multimeter. Just check your batteries when you put them in, that they're not dead from the outset. What I do every day is to follow my 10 point rule. You've got to treat it in a systematic way, and if you follow a routine you don't tend to overlook anything. I think that's good advice for any guitarist or keyboard player, or anybody!"

Lloyd Gilbert: Status Quo's Guitar Tech

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