Justin S Davis
Guitarist - Songwriter - Teacher
Links
My Bands
These are the bands I regulary play with, and I hope as many people check them out as possible. Both these bands have records coming out in 2014 (the Strong Suit release is available now!) and they sound great, if I do say so myself!
I perform and record with many other artists as well, so for a complete listing of shows I'm playing, be sure to check out my Gigs page as well.
My Publisher
I met John Budz and Vee Sawyer of Ward Street Press at a Super Bowl party at my uncle Tom's home in Tacoma. When I learned that they had both worked in publishing, I told them I had always wanted to write a guitar method book. I explained that I hadn't found the perfect book yet after nearly 15 years of teaching, and they both got excited and said: "Write it! We'll put it out! We can help!" I'm so grateful for that moment. It was the first of many great evenings together, and the book is going to be terrific!
My Gear
Brent McElroy, of McElroy Guitars, is an artist building some of the very best guitars I've ever played. And he's a good friend. I met Brent when he was just hitting his stride as a builder and I was working at Lark in the Morning, a small world music instrument shop near Seattle's Pike Place Market. He would bring his new guitars in and we'd all play them and give him our opinions. I was playing a lot of classical guitar at the time and Brent came to one of my shows and was appalled to see me playing an old plywood Yamaha guitar. He offered to trade me guitar lessons for a new classical guitar- how could I turn that down?? We worked together on the design, and the result was the first Generation 2 Classical guitar.
In July 2013, Brent built me a new steel string guitar, my own a Generation 2 Standard! This is not only the best looking acoustic guitar I've ever played, it also plays like a dream and sounds twice as good! You'll be seeing that guitar anywhere you see me from here on out. It's just too good to leave home, and has very quickly become a part of me. Check out Brent's website to see for yourself what magic this guy works with wood and love.
Union Jack Amps are hand-built in Tacoma WA by Derek Springer. I got my first Union Jack when Derek brought me one of his amps to demo, saying if I liked it, he would build me a custom amp. But I fell in love with the one he lent me to demo! I used it the first time at the Star Anna & the Laughing Dogs 2012 Bumbershoot set, and called him the next morning to let him know he wasn't getting the amp back! That amp sounded so good that the stage manager at the show also called Derek afterwards and orderd one for himself! That's my 60 watt Union Jack Tweed.
After about a year and a half of playing that tweed, I just never wanted to play anything else. I sold my other amps. But it's a big amp and while it always sounds great, I needed something smaller. I told Derek I needed a smaller combo version of my tweed, and that if he could build trem and reverb into it, it would be my workhorse. Derek came back with the idea to build an amp based off of the brownface Fender Vibroverb from 1963; the first amp Fender made with onboard reverb. He made his usual tweeks and put that Union Jack mojo into it and damn if it isn't the best amp I've ever played! That one isn't in his official line, it was special for me, but if you want a taste, his new 20A amp is based on the first channel of my UJA Vibroverb.
Gibson Guitars What can I possibly say about Gibson guitars? I play a Les Paul Custom. I put a Bigsby on it, and unpotted Burstbucker pickups. I love my guitar so much!
Gretsch My good friend, editor, and publisher, John Budz, let me borrow his Gretsch Duo Jet when my Les Paul was in the shop and I fell in love with it. New songs were all over that guitar. It opened something inside me and radically changed my approach to guitar. Happily he told me to hold onto it for a while, and shortly after that, he made it a gift and told me I could keep it. I'm so grateful, and that guitar continues to be an inspriration to me!
Cool Stuff
Craig Giffen is one of the funniest, smartest, and most interesting people I know. If you've been to one of my shows in the last couple of years, you've likely seen Craig and his ever-present camera with the sound recorder attached and it’s big goofy furry cover. The two great things about Craig always taking the pictures and video are 1) he’s really good at it and, 2) he shares his work in cool and innovative ways. The two websites below are proof of this. Human Clock, Craig’s flagship site, provides a clock where time is told in photographs. It started with just pictures Craig had taken, but it’s grown to where people from all over the world send Craig their clock photos. Now, for every minute of every day, we can choose to have our time expressed not by a relentlessly ticking machine, but by a global community sharing a collective artistic experience.
Human Calendar is perhaps the less lofty of the two sites, but it’s just as fun. This is Craig’s version of a calendar, something of a cross between yearbook photos of Craig’s friends, and the Brady Bunch.
I’m honored to be one of the dates on the calendar, along with Star Anna, Red Fang’s Aaron Beam, comedian Ron Funches, and many others. Unlike them, however, I’m on the t-shirt too!
If you have an iPhone, there is a fun Human Calendar app as well.