DOUG DOPPLER

San Francisco Bay Area guitarist, Doug Doppler, is best known for Nu Instrumental, which was released on Steve Vai’s Favored Nations label. Doppler is also highly regarded for the gear demos he’s done for Universal Audio, Gretsch, Ibanez, Ernie Ball Music Man, Audio-Technica, Line 6, Orange Amps, plus many more.

Like Vai, Doppler studied under the tutelage of guitarist extraordinaire Joe Satriani. In fact, it was Satch who presented the album to Vai for signing consideration. Doppler toured extensively for Nu Instrumental, supporting Michael Schenker in the U.S., and Gilby Clarke across Europe.

After the demise of the whole Nu Metal genre, Doppler opted to wait until inspiration struck to release his next album, or in this case two! That inspiration came in the form of a 1954 Les Paul ‘conversion’. As Doppler puts it, “That Les Paul changed the trajectory of my entire life. In the first twenty-four hours of owning it, I wrote enough material to make an album and then some!” Doug is currently working on overdubs for the all-instrumental Swagger, featuring fellow Gibson endorser, Jared James Nichols on the track and video for “Wahssup”, the debut single.

While surfing YouTube, Doppler came across a ‘suggested video’ for American Idol winner Caleb Johnson. “The moment I heard Caleb sing, I knew I had to work with him. The video with J Lo’s reaction to his rendition of Dream On says it all! I got Caleb’s eMail address and sent him the link to a demo I did for Orange Amps – and he called me that night. Because this was all happening in the middle of Covid, everything we wrote happened via Zoom. For the demos he just sang into his iPhone, which you’d never know listening to them. The first time we met in person was for the pre-production sessions at Pete Keys’ studio in Nashville!”

The rhythm sections for both albums features the Peter Keys (Lynyrd Skynyrd), Zoro the Drummer (Lenny Kravitz), and Angeline Saris (Narada Michael Walden). The tracking and video sessions happened at 25th Street Recording in Oakland, CA, with John Cuniberti (Surfing with the Alien) at the helm. Cuniberti will also be mixing both releases.

When Satriani went out tour in support of ‘Surfing’ he asked Doug to take over teaching duties at Berkeley’s Second Hand Guitar Company. And thanks to an invitation from Satch to teach at the first G4 Experience guitar camp, Dreamcatcher Events hired Doug to teach at Steve Vai’s, John Petrucci’s, and Paul Gilbert’s camps as well.

In addition to having done gear demos for a virtual who’s who of manufacturers, Doug is also an avid gear collector. Doppler’s vintage Ibanez collection was featured as the cover story for Vintage Guitar magazine. Doug and his vintage wah wah collection were also part of Cry Baby – The Pedal that Rocks the World, featuring Eddie Van Halen, Slash, Kirk Hammett, Steve Lukather, Buddy Guy, Paul Gilbert, and Eddie Kramer.

Doppler is officially endorsed by Gibson, DiMarzio, Sustainiac, Floyd Rose, Orange Amps, RapcoHorizon, and Jim Dunlop. In addition to ‘Goldie’, the ’54 Les Paul, Doppler has been working with guitar tech extraordinaire Gary Brawer (Joe Satriani, Neal Schon, Metallica) on a highly customized Gibson Flying V.

For more information please visit DougDopplerMusic.com, @DougDopplerMusic on Faceboook, Instagram, and YouTube, or message DougDoppler@GMail.com

In his teens he studied with Joe Satriani, who later asked Doug to take over his teaching duties when life on the road called. Thanks to an invitation from Satch, Doug is also a staff instructor for Dreamcatcher Events at Satriani’s G4 Experience, as well as guitar camps for Steve Vai, John Petrucci, and Paul Gilbert.

Doppler’s career includes a disc on Steve Vai’s Favored Nations label, for which he toured the U.S. opening for Michael Schenker, and Europe opening for Gilby Clarke. He was also one of the session player on the famed Guitar Hero video game franchise, and has over 1,000,000 YouTube plays as a gear demonstrator for brands including Audio-Technica, Brainworx, Ernie Ball Music Man, Gretsch, Ibanez Line 6, Orange Amps, Roswell Pro Audio, Tech 21, and Universal Audio.

Doug is endorsed by Gibson, DiMarzio, Floyd Rose, Mesa-Boogie, and Jim Dunlop.