First Parker Rig....

[D8th]

Pretty sure I was one of the first in Kentucky to purchase a Fly. I think this was mid-late 90's. Got the Fly Deluxe from Carl's Music when it was located on Winchester Road. Since I didn't have an acoustic amp, I also purchased a Fender Acoustasonic at the same time. The electric end of the setup was a Johnson Millennium Amp. One of the first digital modeling amps on the scene. Coupled with the proprietary foot controller, my options were unlimited. The Johnson sounded fantastic but had a fairly steep learning curve, so I probably spent more time tweaking than I did playing. I ran the Piezos through a Aural Exciter/Acoustic Exciter pedal which punched up the acoustic end considerably. A great rig. Sadly, it all went away, including the Fly. However, having recent medical issues requiring a lighter instrument and missing the hell out of my original, long-gone Fly, I scored a 1998 Fly Deluxe on ebay a few years ago.I'm running it through a Swart Atomic Space Tone pretty much clean, with the Piezos through a Genz-Benz Shenendoah or my monitors.

[vjmanzo]

Hi @D8th; thanks for this rig rundown! Sounds like a great setup; those Johnson amps are great!

Sorry to hear of the needs for a lighter instrument, but great to hear that it rekindled your interest in the Fly! Welcome to the forum; glad you’re a part of this!

What do you think of the Fly through the Swart? I’m not familiar with one of those.

[mmmguitar]

The Johnson and Swart are some fine amps. My friend had a Millenium 150 that I wanted to buy off him because Adrian Belew swore by them (prior to adopting the Axe FX), but it died onstage after the company went under. Shame. The Swart model in my Axe FX is in regular rotation after having convinced myself I wouldn’t use the tremolo effect enough to justify buying a real one - But that’s certainly an amp that makes my playing sound better than it deserves.

I think my first Parker-specific rig was a pair of Line 6 HD500s with an A/B box between them, and the mag/piezo signals running in parallel signal chains between the main/aux inputs of one unit. My backup guitar was a Variax plugged into its designated input in the same unit. As elegant as it seemed in 2010, I’m certain it didn’t sound anywhere near as good as I thought it did.