The Infinite Guitar was created by Michael Brook, as a way of allowing an electric guitar note to be held with infinite sustain (hence the name). It consists of an electronic circuit that takes the signal from a standard guitar pickup, amplifies it, and feeds it back into a separate pickup coil. When set up and used correctly, the result is a continuous sustained note that can be used as is, or treated to create new sounds or emulate traditional instruments.
In addition to his own instrument, based on a Tokai Strat copy, Brook produced two Infinite Guitars, one of which belongs to Daniel Lanois. The other belongs to The Edge of U2, who famously used it on "With or Without You" from 1987's The Joshua Tree.
The principle has been the subject of patent litigation in the past, and is (or was) available commercially in several forms, including the Kramer Floyd Rose Sustainer, the Fernandes Sustainer and the Guitar Resonator.
Famous quotes containing the words infinite and/or guitar:
“We know that every person who is loved feels transformed, unfolded, and he unfolds everything, the most intimate as well as the most familiar, to the one who loves him as well as to himself.... The person one loves is as ungraspable as the universe, as God’s infinite space, he is boundless, full of possibilities, full of secrets.”
—Max Frisch (1911–1991)
“Swiftly in the nights,
In the porches of Key West,
Behind the bougainvilleas
After the guitar is asleep,
Lasciviously as the wind,
You come tormenting.”
—Wallace Stevens (1879–1955)