The roland V-guitar stuff is simply amazing. I find it too complicated for my tastes, to be honest.

I'm now in Colorado Springs and my new boss has a Godin with the built-in midi pickup and the V-Guitar outboard processor. He doesn't even use the 'normal' jacks on the guitar - just connects the multi-pin thing.

There are presets right out of the box for Gilmour and Santana. Use them. I'm with Mac, many of the presets are dead nuts right on the money.

I also agree with Mac that you need to turn off the computer. Don't show up here for a month. Use the time to hone your chops. You've got quite alot of gear - it's going to take time to learn how to use it properly.

A bunch of sounding like Jeff Beck, or Santana, or Gilmour, etc. is note choice and placement in the song. Swanman here on our forums has the Jeff Beck styling nailed down pretty well. Note how he ends his phrases. Very often times they don't end on the tonic of the scale - on purpose - just like Jeff Beck. Actually, almost always, they don't end on the tonic. Santana is similar. Can't end on just any note, however.

Learn your box patterns down cold. You'll go a long way with just learning that stuff.

David Gilmour is the master of the upward full-step-and-more bends. Also, never really plays real fast. His most famous solos (comfortably numb) are not about speed, but absolutely perfect melody note choices.

Trevor Rabin also comes to mind as another one who builds his solos on upward intervals that just tend to make you feel good as you listen to them. Most other rock guitarists will go up in some scale stuff, and then they always come back down. Not Trevor.

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