Music

Kyle Bobby Dunn turns a prepared electric guitar into a 50-minute drone study

Recorded in 2005-06 and reprocessed this year, the album uses household objects and altered pickups on a 1968 Fender Jazzmaster to stretch the instrument into slow-moving texture.

Sep 28, 2026

Album cover for Kyle Bobby Dunn's Vexations for Electric Guitar, a close-up photo of a weathered 1968 Fender Jazzmaster

Credit: Kyle Bobby Dunn (via source)

Kyle Bobby Dunn released Vexations for Electric Guitar on Bandcamp on September 25, a single 50-minute piece for prepared electric guitar. The recording dates back to sessions at Founders Hall, North Carolina, in the winter of 2005-06, reprocessed this year with laptop-based signal processing layered over the original guitar takes. Dunn built the piece around a 1968 Fender Jazzmaster, using household objects and altered hardware on the strings and pickups rather than conventional playing technique.

The result treats the guitar less as a melodic instrument and more as a resonant object — a chamber for sustained drones and tactile friction that Dunn extends electronically into long, industrial-feeling textures. It's a useful reminder alongside a week of new pedals and signature models that guitar innovation doesn't only come from hardware releases: preparation, pickup behavior and duration can reshape what the instrument does just as much.

Credit: Bandcamp (via source)

Why it matters

It's a reminder that meaningful electric-guitar innovation can come from preparation and signal behavior, not just new hardware or virtuoso technique.

From Guitar News to Guitar Progress

Discover it here. Learn how it works. Practice it until it's yours.

Today's focus in Practice: Technique — Clean hands. Clear sound.

Open Practice

How Guitar Radar works · About