Giving Birth to The Gillbillies || 1978 Les Paul Custom || Old Guitars

Isn't she a beauty?  I mean who has ever seen a custom colored orange Les Paul?  Not I.  There is some really history behind this babe.  If you have ever seen or heard The Gillbillies you know that they are an instrumental act that focuses on the melodic rhythms often found in the 60s era surf music...but with a twist.  They are heavy.  They have a sound all to their own.  And this guitar played a vital role in shaping the way of The Gillbillies ever so sweet tone.

Seeing The Gillbillies "live & in person" is an experience in itself.  When talking Gillbillies and guitars you would think that I would writing about one of the Flying V's with Bigsby's (a la Lonnie Mack) that many have seen Jimbo playing out and about the Bay Area.  But as Jimbo put it, this is the guitar that gave birth to the Gillbillie sound.  "We decided to try an instrumental surf guitar sound and this was the only guitar I had with a tremolo."  Hence, the Gillbillies were born.

But there is a lot more to this story.  I had seen and admired this guitar being played for quite some time.  One day after a jam with Jimbo and Nick I got the real story behind the Orange Custom Les Paul.  He had spotted this unique instrument while perusing through the online auction house, eBay (as many of us do who are addicted to the instrument known as the guitar).  He checked on the end date and made a mental note to check on it before the auction ended.  Life got busy and the auction slipped his mind.  Luckily it had ended with out a sale.  He sent an email to the seller and asked if he could buy it.  A week later he got a reply, "If they don't sell, I get rid of them write away."  Jimbo inquired if he could have the dealer's contact info that the guitar was sold to because he really wanted it.  "I'll see what I can do." Another week goes by and he finally gets the contact info of the dealer.  He calls the dealer and he is told that he sold it a few weeks ago to a music shop in Hollywood (the town of flashy guitars).  He asks for the shops info....and the wait continues.  On a Sunday night an email comes with the name, address and phone number of the Hollywood shop.  Jimbo sets his alarm to call the shop first thing when it opens on Monday morning.  11:05am monday morning rolls around...

Ring, ring...
Music shop employee: How can I help you?
Jimbo:  I was wondering if you have a certain guitar in your shop.  You will know if right away once I described it to you.  It is a 1978 Orange Gibson Les Paul Custom with Bigsby tailpiece.
Music shop employee: Are you shitting me?  I literally just hung that guitar on the wall right before we opened.
Jimbo: Please take it off the wall and run this credit card number.  I want it.
Music shop employee:  Ah man, one of my co-workers is going to be soooo pissed!  He loves that guitar.  Unfortunately he is over-extended on his store credit and the owner won't let him have any more.  He is going to be pissed.


Soon after it was shipped up to Jimbo.  The only change that the shop made on it was removing the floating wooden bridge and replacing with the current adjustable one.  He did find out that this Les Paul Custom originally came out of the factory polaris white with all nickel hardware (tuners have been updated).  Soon after it's first birthday it was painted the beautiful color orange it now possesses along with the addition of the bigsby.  The the sound is to die for.  But for now just feast your eyes of a few pictures of this rare gem.

And here is a little taste of that tone she puts out....

Pirate Pat's Lost Treasure || 1976 Black on Black Stratocaster || Old Guitars

I think I need not mention my love affair with the guitar.  If you have read any of my earlier posts it comes across quite evident.  When one ages, we tend to acquire more things.  From the previous spoken love, I started collecting guitars.  The true guitar behind the 1976 stratocaster is actually a 1964 Fender Jaguar.

I love the off-set shape of the jaguar and wanted a vintage one.  This preceded me learning the valuable lesson of "never buy a guitar on eBay".  I was misled by this online dealer that I decided to attempt to acquire a jaguar from.  Vintage City Music out of Lansing, MI sold me an "all original" guitar.  Jaguars are known to be complex instruments.  When I received it I couldn't figure it out.  The bridge pick up seemed dead.  I called up Guitar Showcase and they pointed me toward the direction of Mark Brown, whom I am forever indebted to in the guitar buying world.  I took the guitar right over to Mark.  He told me that the neck had been refinished, possible fret job, new reproduction tuners and the neck pick up needed to be rewound.  All in all about $700 worth of work to get it up to snuff.  I said, "ah, I got ripped off" and Mark so eloquently replied, "How much did you pay for this guitar? $2500.  You didn't get ripped off, with the work you would have a $3200 guitar, about the price of a vintage jaguar in good condition."  I love his thought philosophy.

The jaguar story does have a good ending.  They had a 24 hr. return policy, and honored it as "24 hr. business days" and took the guitar back with me paying the shipping.  Now I had cash burning a whole in my pocket.

60s Smugglin' Pat

The cosmos must of aligned wanting me to have, our family friend, Pat Ryan's 1976 black stratocaster.  I met Pat through my uncle Craig.  This guy was a real character; boisterous laugh and parrot on his shoulder.  Pat had a rough go at the end of his life.  He lost his wife, Carol, from a obscure ailment and this sent him into an unfortunate tailspin.  He couldn't hold down a job leading to a depressed & broke dude.  He stated it was his buddhist teachings that made him want to get rid of all of his prized possessions and live a simple life.  Looking back on it now and think he was just preparing for the ending.  Unfortunately Pat took his own life at the age of 58.

80s Jammin' (note Blackie in the background)

Before the end, he approached me about buying his 1976 Black on Black Stratocaster.  It was in good shape with just the tuners being changed.  He wanted $1900 for it.  I was flush with the return cash of the jaguar.  I wanted a vintage instrument and the opportunity to try and help a buddy out.  I did give him the caveat that if he ever wanted his Strat back, I would give it to him for the money I paid.  He said he would not be wanting it back.  An unfortunate truth.  This is the story of how I am in possession of a beautiful 1976 Stratocaster.  He said he bought it because David Gilmour of Pink Floyd fame played one.  But he said he never played it that much because he was much more of a Gibson man.  I understood this philosophy because I am more of the opposite.  I love Fender guitars.  And this one was a beauty, right down to the instruction manual and extra springs.  I did have Mark Brown set it up for me and the tone pots needed replacing and I also had him put back on the original tuners.  It plays and looks great.  See for yourself...

 

 

 

And this is how it sounds......

Patrick Joseph Ryan 1951-2009

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!

The Ukulele, Me and The Making of Uncle Louie

I have had a longtime relationship with the Ukulele. Sometimes it just sat in the corner of the room collecting dust while getting the occasional strum from a guest.  Other times it assisted in serenading my future wife by asking for her hand in marriage.  Either way, it has always been there for me and my heartfelt love for the flea-sized instrument only continues to grow.
The first time I got my hands on a uke was during my college years.  I was driving away from Scott Guild's house on a summer visit and his mother yells to me, "we need to get rid of some of this junk for our move.  Do you want any of these instruments?" I took an old, beat up uke and a violin.  The uke was cracked but it still worked.  I gave it to my brother for a short while.  After college I noted it was just sitting on the shelf at his house, so I decided to fix it and learn to play a few songs.  Taking it into the shop, I discovered it was a Martin Soprano Ukulele from the early 50s and was worth some money.  I spent about $70 to have it repaired and I also bought a nice case for it.  I learned to strum it a bit, still just a minimal ditty was the only life it saw.  I decided it would be better fit in a collectors hands and I sold it (something to this day I regret. pic below).

A few years passed before my next encounter.  This happened when I met Paul Berry.  He is a longtime friend of my Uncle Craig’s.  His family is from the Islands.  In 1969, Paul and my uncle went to Waikiki to visit Paul’s family.  At the end of the trip, one of Paul’s cousins raided another relative’s trinket shop and gave the young men a bunch of souvenirs to take back to the mainland.  Among the booty were two very nice Kamaka ukuleles that my uncle still owns.  Paul borrowed the Tenor Kamaka for 20 years and became really, really good on it.  He learned all the hawaiian classic songs.  When I moved down to the south bay area I was considered “family” and now the invitation was extended to me to join in on all of Paul’s families Luau’s and Pig Roast.  This is where I saw first hand how two corporate businessmen could capture the hearts of an audience with these tiny little instruments.  From that initial experience, I started to learn to play the ukulele.  It became a lot easier to learn when my Mom and Dad picked one up in Hawaii as a birthday gift.  I finally had my own ukulele, again. 

(Uncle Craig's pair of Vintage Kamaka Ukuleles)

As we grow older, we have to learn to go with our strengths and rocking all night in a dive bar can take a toll on the body.  Needless to say, the ukulele is a great instrument to have lying around, pick up every once in a while and strum a tune.  But it has done more to me.  It captured my soul on the day my daughter way born.  I left the hospital early morning to run home for supplies.  It was a beautiful day in May of 2009.  I flipped on the radio and the IZ version of “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” had come on the radio.  Tears instantly came to my eyes as I heard the strumming of those short nylon strings.  I told myself I was going to pick up that uke my parents bought me a few years back and learn that song.
I did learn that song and several others.  Having a newborn baby sleeping in the other room inhibits your ability to pick up a guitar but not your ability to pick up a ukulele.  I used this time to learn several renditions of my favorite songs on Ukulele.  One day, in the fall of 2009, I was working out an arrangement of the Dean Martin classic, “That’s Amore”.  A good friend had called and asked if I would do some music for an independent feature length movie him and his friends were making.  Of course I would.  When he told me he wanted something soft, dark and moody but with a little Italian flair I knew I had the right song for him.  Below is a video of That’s Amore for the Film Uncle Louie.  I was able to sneak one other uke song into the movie too.  It is a version of Guy Lombardo’s “Enjoy Yourself (it’s later than you think)”.  I continue to strum the ukulele.  It’s cheap, portable and always brings a smile to my face.

Here is a video of "That's Amore" on Ukukele


The end