::Does anyone know what amp settings Taking Back Sunday's guitarist Fred Mascherino uses?::

I think he just takes his amps and cranks them all up to "suck"

I'd like to know as well. I have one to sell also. Mine is circa 1970-72.

If you plot out the key of C over the whole fretboard, ( in other words mark all the places you can find the notes of C major a b c d e f g a b ) you will end up with a useful map that you can explore. This pattern can be split up into boxes which each cover a range of less than 6 frets and which each include a consecutive sequence of notes. Each of these boxes is a C major scale pattern. (a pattern is just an array of notes that you can treat as you like, a scale is a consecutive sequence of notes starting and finishing on the key note.) Once you know these boxes, you can easily convert them to other keys, just like sliding a bar chord. So in D they will all be 2 frets higher. So with consistent work for a few months you can know the whole neck in all major keys. I think this is a great investment. You will end up with favorite boxes and favorite bits of some others.

A pentatonic scale just leaves out the 4th and 7th notes of a major scale.

Another cool thing to do is to see what patterns fit around each chord, so you might look at an A minor bar chord on the 5th fret and find all the notes from C major that are near it. Within the full diagram described above, you can look for familiar chord shapes and licks, and extend your knowledge that way.
There's lots more but I think this whole neck approach is very useful.

As with the "modes" discussion, I put some effort into a clear reply which appears to have been wiped.

The only confusion seems to be what key to call each mode. I think there needs to be a clearer convention on this.
(notes:) e f# g a b c# d e is the Dorian Mode taken from a Dmajor "mother key", I would think most musos would know what that means, but the question remains what key are we in? Well it's some kind of E, and since the third note is one and a half tones from the first it is some kind of E minor . Anything with the third note at that distance from the first is minor, and anything with the third note two full tones from the first is major. So I think the clearest name for the key of the above scale is:

E minor ( Dorian Mode)

or if you really want to spell it out:

E minor ( Dorian Mode-from D major)

We generally learn our modes in C and then work them out in other keys.

Risking labouring the point,
A mode formed by starting on the second note of a major scale will always be Dorian.
A mode formed by starting on the third note of a major scale will always be Phrygian. etc

The trick with modes is making the new key note sound like "home". There is usually a little sequence or a temporary change to the scale to point to the new "home". Using the above Dorian example, lines finishing with (chords) Dm C Dm
will make the Dm chord sound like the piece could finish there. The key note of a piece will always make it sound finished. ( which doesn't mean you MUST finish on the key note)
In E Phrygian (which by the way is minor) based on C major, we have (notes) e f g a b c d e
The chords available are the same chords available to C major ; that is:
Em F G Am Bdim C Dm but finishing on Em can sound indefinite. In flamenco etc., E major , which is not strictly in the mode, is substituted for Em especially at the end of lines, to give a bolder finish. So we have 3 major chords in a row;

G F E ( sounds Flamencoesque already ) We would use C major pattern ( no #'s) for lead runs except when the E major chord crops up, in which case we might finish a line on a g# note ( E major includes g#, Em includes g )

One more example: Lets say we want the Mixolydian mode in E . That mode starts on the 5th note of a major pattern, so counting back, we know that A must be the "mother" key. A has c# f# and g#, so we get:
e f# g# a b c# d e
(The only difference from E major is the position of the 7th note. In E major we would have a d#)
This mode has a bluesy sound because it includes E7 (rather than Emaj7) as a chord available on the "home" note. It would not really include a B7, which has a d# note in it, but to get a convincing feeling of E being "home" you would often play B7 (rather than Bmaj7) before E.
When a blues harmonica player picks up an A harp to play in E, they are playing in the Mixolydian mode.
So modes are moods, and the feel of each one is more important than its name. Practicing against a low drone note on the new "home" can help.

: Hi, I'm looking for an Ibanez Musician to buy. I have found one and the guy sent me some pictures on it. I have however problem in identifying which model it is.
: It looks just like an ordinary MC150 with the mic switch on upper part of the guitar. What puzzles me is that it has an tremolo bridge. I have never seen any pictures of an Musician with a tremolo. Does anyone have any idea of what model it could be?
: Thanks, Magnus

Hey man don't worry. I've seen some rigged up Ibanez Musicians' You know how the 80's were. Do it Yourself. Well Send the pics to my e-mail and I will check it out for you. I own an Ibanez Musician 200 ds and a mc150 like you are hopefully buying. It was most likely put on a while back when decided that they were not good at guitar and needed a tremelo to put out the sounds they wanted because the guitar was not good enough. but I"ll check out the pics and try to verify it hope this helps................Later

It wouldn't be hard to do a diagram in ASCii would it?

: In labouring to answer questions on scales and chords, I realise how useful it would be to be able to post DIAGRAMS on this board. Maybe some computer wiz can work out how to put up a grid that we can use for chord diagrams and scales etc.

: Which reminds me to mention tabledit.com which has a great system based on a small free program. I get huge mileage out of this program.