Hey, thanks for stopping by! In case you couldn't tell from the giant text at the top of this page, my name is Brandon Bull. I'm a worship leader at my youth group, and guitarist at my church on Sunday
In addition to guitar, I also play bass, drums, and piano. My recordings were done completely by myself, unless otherwise indicated in the song description.
I was born, and then 24 years later, here I am!
I started playing acoustic guitar in August of 2001, I joined my church's worship team December of the same year, I picked up bass and piano the beginning of the next year. Drums, I've kinda always played. I just needed refreshed. I'm still being refreshed. I play freaking loud, yet have the worlds weakest grip on drumsticks. I think that means I have good technique - except when the drumstick flies across the room and takes someone out.
Yeah, I always play live every week. Usually I like it, not so much lately.
Third Day, David Crowder, John Mayer, Coldplay, Jason Upton, Misty Edwards, Merchant Band, and IHOP-KC in general.
What I use now is different than what I used in the past. Listen to my recordings, the line between the two setups is quite apparent! As of right now (April 2008), I'm using:
- Ibanez. (It's tinny, I plan on getting another.)
- Squier. Don't laugh, I've overhauled the crap out of it. It had good action on the neck, so I modified it. Even though it's a strat, it has the ability to sound like either a strat or a Gibson. Pickups are: Seymour Duncan Duckbucker at the bridge, Fender Gold Series Lace Sensors at the mid & neck. Each pickup has it's own switch. I've also added a mid scoop/boost knob. My other knob died in the process, it's just for show now. Pickguard was replaced with a black tortoise-shell pickguard, and all hardware was replaced with gold-plated hardware, including the volume & tone knobs, which also feature a gothic cross in the center. (Yeah, I have a mild gothic side.) I also replaced the bridge block with a steel one for increase sustain. Moving on...
- Korg Toneworks AX1500G. Only using it for light compression, distortion, chorus, and tap-tempo delay. (Because I love delays.) I used to use the amp simulators until I bought a real one that blew my mind. I also use a volume pedal (if that counts as an effect) hooked up to actually control gain into my AX1500G (mainly because of delay fade-ins). Also using an Ibanez Weeping Demon wah pedal, ahead of the volume pedal. Last in the chain before my amp is a Liquid Blues pure tube dual channel overdrive pedal. Best $200 I ever spent!
- Fender DeVille 2x12. It rocks, plain & simple. It's pure tube, why wouldn't it?
- Just recently bought a Schecter Diamond Series bass with EMG-HZ pickups. It is quite simply the most incredibly bass I've ever played in my life. I walked into Guitar Center with no intentions of buying anything (was doing research on pro audio equipment), saw this thing and thought I'd just play around on it. It blew me away. Perfect bell-like slap/pop tones, nice & growly finger tone, and easier to play than my guitar! Plus an excellent finish, and a full-length 24-fret neck. I bought it on an impulse, which I don't even do for stuff half it's price. In my opinion, it sounds better than the legendary Peavey Cirrus.
- I have crap drums, I'm not even going to mention them. I use my church's. (They're not that great, either. Someday, I'll buy some good ones.)
- I have a full-scale Fatar Studio 1100 midi control (which weighs a ton), and an M-Audio Keyrig 49 (half scale) for lighter work. Ultimately, all the MIDI data I record with these gets run through my church's Roland Fantom-S88. Which of course sounds amazing, it's Roland!
- AKG C1000S on lead vocals & my amp, Audix F-10 on snare & toms, F-12 on floor tom, Sennheiser e902 on the kick (which I hate, I replace it with a sampled kick). AKG C1000S on the drums' overhead mics. Cad M179 on backup vocals for more "airiness." Sometimes a GXL2200 (or whatever it is. It's my least favorite mic.)
- Presonus FP10. I love it.
- Music XPC Pro M4. 1.83 GHz dual core processor, 120 GB HD, 1GB ram, WinXP SP2. Not spectactular (for recording at least), but it gets the job done well.
- I don't use this often, but I have a Lexicon MX200 reverb. Their reverbs rock, I wouldn't have anything else. If I'm not using that, I'm using a Lexicon software reverb.
- Sonar 6 Producer Edition, baby!
- Art SLA-1. Only 100 watts, but for the studio, that's more than enough. And it's clean and has incredibly quiet fans. My laptop fan is actually louder than my power amp fan!
- Behringer Truths B2031P. [me dodges tomatoes!] Come on, they're not that bad. Most people hate Behringer. Admitedly, most of their stuff is crap. These don't really handle highs well, they break up. But there has to be an unrealistic amount of highs to do it. Mostly, I'm happy with them.