What Happens to Pickle's First Love? || '82 CAR Fender Stratocaster '62 reissue || Old Guitars

I love old guitars. New guitars have no soul...yet. But old guitars tell stories. They tell tales of old smoke-filled dive bars with remnants of beer splattering encased in between rusty screws and beat up pick ups. They have performed. And that is the reason why we love instruments so much; it is in their performance. So give me the most beat up ugly guitar and that is a guitar that has been truly loved by an owner. It is the 30 year old guitars in pristine condition that scare me. If that guitar sat around and wasn't played, that's telling me something. That is the story of a guitar that never found the right tone for someone.

This brings me to Sweet Pickle's (aka Mr. Laflen to some, key axe wielder in Them Slack Jawed Sons of Bitches as well as life-long member of The Ex-Old Ladies) 1982 Candy Apple Red AVRI '62 Stratocaster. No one sees this guitar much lately, but I am lucky enough to currently have it on loan and in my possession. For that reason I decided to snap some pictures of this beauty and tell it's tale via Sweet P.

This guitar, 1982 Candy apple red Fullerton reissue strat, was my main axe with my old bands in the 90's, The Lowdown(funk-rock) , Big Joe(alt-country), the Money Shot and SpaceFish(hippy Jam band). I have some great pics somewhere.

So I purchased this guitar somewhere in the mid-90's. A time I refer to when I was in Tucson as 'the lost weekend'.

I had a fullerton black maple necked reissue stolen from my house in the Sam Hughes district near the University of AZ. I loved that guitar and I was crushed to come home and find it missing. My band practiced in the house so it was easy for the wolves to figure out there was an electric guitar to be had. I came home to find the input jack of the guitar still attached to the cord meaning they grabbed my guitar and literally ran out the back door with it. The only thing left was the jack of the guitar as a memory of my own blackie. No insurance. So... I looked in our weekly paper and in the newspaper and found a Red reissue strat for sale for 550 bucks. The guy was freshly married and clearly on a new path. He pulled the perfect condition strat literally from under the bed where it was stored. I played it and new it'd be the one. I think I ended up paying 500 but can't recall. We were both happy with the deal. I still do not recall how I got the money for this guitar back then as I was as poor as everyone else with pickup jobs and par-time work while I was going to school.

I primarily used this guitar with a 4-10 bassman, vintage rat pedal, cs-9 chorus and Boss DD-2 delay. It served me well and the neck pickup is amazing.

That is the story on this beauty, now let's look at some pictures of this true relic.  And next time, you see him on stage make sure to ask Pickle where the hell is the red strat!