The Stories Behind Your Guitars.

[The Lone Chicken]

I would like to invite you all to share your stories, the histories if you will, behind your guitars and associated equipment. This can include guitars that you now own, and also guitars that you once owned. I will begin...

 

The very first guitar that I owned was a cheap no-name electric that my parents got me as a Christmas gift around 1969 when I was 12. It was one of those "department store" models with the string action so high you could drive a truck underneath (LOL), so I didn't play that one much at all, although I did experiment using it as a "lap steel" a few years later. I didn't take that guitar with me when I moved to s.CA in 1978, and I have no idea what became of it.

 

I got my first decent guitar in the summer of 1975. It was a Lark dreadnought acoustic, and I bought it at a small music store in my hometown of Virginia Beach, VA for the grand total of $95 (the body had a slight cigarette burn near the edge, and that helped bring the price down). The action was a bit high, but it was playable, it sounded decent, and it was on this guitar that I finally actually started learning to play (although I did get some chord books, I learned, and to this day I play, primarily by ear). The music store owner that sold me the Lark said that it was a brand that Paul McCartney played, although I personally doubt that, and the only Lark that I've ever seen or heard of is the one that I bought and that I still have today. The Lark has pretty much gone with me everywhere, through relationships, through my travel to s.CA in 1978, back to VA in 1982, and then finally to OH in 1987. Although I now own a higher quality Ibanez acoustic-electric, I will always keep the Lark. Practicing on its somewhat higher action has built up my finger strength, allowing my fingers to really fly when I go to the Ibanez or to my Fender Strat. In 1978 I replaced the Lark's old plastic saddle with a more durable bone one, and I also replaced the cheap tuners with Grovers.

 

It was late June 1977, and I was quite excited. I had always wanted to own a Fender Strat, and Mark Milan, the lead guitarist with the CBN 700 Club studio band (back when they had a live studio band) had agreed to sell me his for $450 (no money down, and $50 a paycheck from the Hardee's restaurant where I was working part-time back then while I was in college at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, VA). I met Mark that Thursday night at the old CBN studios in Portsmouth to finalize the deal. It was a 1963 Fender Strat with a rosewood fretboard and a somewhat beat-up sunburst body, and an action so low that my playing speed seemingly tripled the first time I played it. It also had a Schecter pickup (well, I THINK it was a Schecter) in the lead position. Anyhow, that night after meeting Mark I went straight to THE FIRE ESCAPE, a fantastic Christian nightclub in the oceanfront area of Virginia Beach, where the Resurrection Band, a hard rock Christian band, was setting up. As I walk in from the back, Glenn Kaiser the band's leader saw me with my newly-acquired Strat, said, "Hey, let me try that", grabbed my Strat, plugged it into his Marshall amp, turned it all the way up to "10", and VAAARRRROOOOMMMMMMMMM!!!!!!! The bass player in ISAAC, the band that owned THE FIRE ESCAPE, said to me, "Bet you didn't know your guitar could do THAT, did you?" My amp back then, by the way, was a Sears solid state 50-watt that my late grandma got for me on her Sears credit card--that amp weighed a ton! (LOL) (I would later change the dual speakers to Altecs). My varied devices included an MXR "Distortion +" (which actually served as the "pre-amp" for my Sears amp), an Electro-Harmonix ("EH") Big Muff Plus," an EH "Smallstone" phaser, an EH "Memory Man" echo, and an EH "Electric Lady" flanger. I also had quite a collection of guitar straps. I played my Strat in two bands back then--a Christian pop group called MICAH in 1978, and, after I moved from se.VA to s.CA, a progressive Christian band called CRYSTAL CITY in late 1978 and 1979. In January 1982, after I moved back to VA, I sold my '63 Strat and all my other guitar stuff (except for my Lark acoustic) for the sake of a lady that I honestly had no business being in a relationship with and who would later leave me (that is a part of a MUCH MUCH longer story, but since this forum is about guitar playing and not about personal issues and the such, I will spare you all!)

 

21 1/2 years later, the Lord, as He has been restoring dreams and other things to my life, made it possible for me to once again be the proud owner of a Fender Strat. With my household's finances in better shape, this past September 2003 I began looking around for a good deal. A local Findlay, OH had Fender Strats, but they were somewhat expensive--and cheaper Squier copies--and I felt impressed in my spirit to look further. I got wind of a large discount music store in Toledo, OH, and they had Fender Strats at a much better price. The only Strat that they had in stock with a rosewood fretboard (gotta be rosewood--maple sticks to my fingers for some reason) was with a sunburst body, which was a bit more expensive than other colors, and although my first inclination was to wait until they got in other colors, I could hear the Lord speaking in my spirit, saying, "That's your guitar". So I got off work from my job in Findlay at 3:30 pm that Saturday afternoon and hurried to that music store in Toledo, getting there about 20 minutes before their closing time, and finalized the deal. When the sales rep opened the case allowing me to see my new '03 Strat for the first time--well, you all can imagine the joy I felt at, in a way, having my Strat back. I also got a GREAT deal on an Ibanez Toneblaster 25R amp (much better than the old Sears amp, and also much cheaper, much louder, and much lighter to carry!), as well as an Alesis GuitarFX (a single pedal capable of doing all the stuff that my many pedals from the old days could do--I am amazed at how much electronics have changed since the early years!) which they had on sale at 50% off that day. And finally, just last week I went back to the local music store in Findlay (it turns out the guy that owns the place does offer discounts--his father who was working the store the day I was shopping for my Strat had forgotten that or whatever), where I got a very nice deal on a very nice '03 Ibanez V70CE-NT acoustic-electric guitar.

 

All this is much more than merely owning decent guitar equipment once again. For me, it is about realizing lifelong dreams, and about trusting a heavenly Father who is able and willing to restore our dreams and bring them back to life if we just give those dreams to Him.

[revolead]

My first guitar used to be my dad's. He bought it in Idaho where he worked on a dude ranch. It's a 1977 Epiphone Scroll 550, I think he bought it in 1978. Unfortunately, this like all guitar stories ends with a woman. He met my mom a couple weeks later, and never looked at it much again. He gave it to me for Christmas with a Peavey Blazer 158. It's a great guitar and I love it.

My second guitar is sort of a depressing story, but turned out to be the best purchase of my entire life. I never found anyone I wanted to go to prom with senior year of high school. I was depressed about it, and as a result I did the same thing I always do when women make me sad. I went to a guitar store. I had dangerously just gotten a credit card that month, and I saw a sweet looking Jackson in the corner on the used rack. Picked it up, played okay. Asked the guy how much he wanted, it was $275 including a hardshell case. Pretty good deal. Plugged it in, played with it more and more, and came to like it more and more. Put it on my credit card, and instead of spending 300 dollars on prom like every other guy at our school, I bought myself a chick that never leaves the stand at home. And she's there every day when I get home.

Only thing I did after that, was to switch out the pickups for actual SDs, best idea I've ever had. Sounded sweet. The fretboard needed a little dressing, so I crowned it myself for he first time, and after a long hard stuggle with perfecting the frets, I had bought/made myself the perfect guitar.

[Blue Strat]

I'll make my story brief, about my main axe at the moment. I've had over ten different guitars and won't bore you with the details. In the summer of 1994, I was finishing up my senior year of high-school and tried a Fender Strat that one of my dad's co-workers was selling. Well, I really liked that guitar, an American standard hard-tail strat. So, I went to Reliable Music in Charlotte and was checking out guitars, and the first guitar I laid eyes on that was a Fender Strat was a bright neon blue Korean made Squier strat. I picked it up and played it for a couple of minutes, tried it with chorus ("Come as you are" was one of the big hits at the time, and I was kinda hooked on Nirvana) and fell in love with it! $350 later, it and a good SKB hard case were mine!

 

I've had a love hate relationship with it for quite a while until about a year ago, when I bought and installed a Seymour Duncan JB jr in the bridge position. I've also installed Grover mini's, Graph-Tech String Saver saddles, and a Fender Custom Shop blue moto pickguard. Now there's no way I'm letting this guitar go! It's mine, MINE, MINE!!

[Virtual Jim]

My second, but first decent, electic guitar was/is an Epiphone Les Paul. It was a christmas present from my parents, which normally is not remarkable. Except they were in the early stages of separation is the last present I ever got from the both of them together. This guitar is also from the mid-90s Epiphone phase of major hit or major miss, and I'm proud to say I got one of the hits.

 

The guitar I bought in May that I've talked about on this board before is a frankenstein Fender Musicmaster. The store I bought it from dates it to 1972/3 and I agree. It's got two humbuckers, locking tuners, hardtail strat-style bridge, pu switch, etc. I want to know the stories this thing's been through. They're probably lame garage band stories throughout the years, but it'd be interesting. Hell, I bought it in Delaware. For all I know, it was the guitar George Thoroughgood learned on. Right.

[yamsa2000]

I found my Yamaha SA 2000 in a pawn shop, for about half the price you'd expect to pay. It was hardly used but the top had a few cracks from the wood drying out.The guitars Yamaha was producing in the late 70's and early 80's were giving Gibson a run for their money.

 

I had fallen in love with my friend's Yamaha SG3000 goldtop - this guy played in a Santana cover band,and this was the same guitar Santana used through the 70's. I bought a SG 1000,but this has never lived up to expectations - a few weeks later I spotted the Yamaha SA2000, cherry red and has the same hardware and, I figured, the same high quality craftsmanship.A big plus is it has a really wide neck. The pickups needed replacing though, just did'nt give me the sound I wanted. Tried a gibson pickup, but didn't suit either. Finally I stuck the pickup from my lap steel in the neck position and - voila.....I couldn't describe the sound, except that it's what I was looking for.It's can squawk like Hubert Sumlin or sound real mellow like Mark Knopfler. It's very responsive to getting different tones just by changing your hand position - it allows you to play with 'touch'. Currently looking for a suitable bridge pickup.

My Maton electro/acoustic is the latest, and best, in a series of Matons I've owned over the years. To my shame, I paid for it with gambling winnings.If you've ever heard a Crowded House song, you've probably heard a Maton.

[gtrpir8]

First guitar - classical, forgot the maker, but it was imported thru St. Louis Music. It developed ski ramp syndrome on the neck after about five years. This was purchased in 1974, and sold to a pawn shop around 1980. My understanding at the time was that without a adjustable truss rod in the neck, this guitar was not repairable.

 

Next, purchased my one and only steel string, an Alvarez copy of a Gibson SJ-200, in 1975. This is a huge guitar. Its blonde finish has taken a golden hue over the years, and the sound has a warm, mellow tone, even as new strings lose their brightness. This was also the first guitar I named - Katherine Anna.

 

I followed Katherine Anna in 1977 with my first electric, a 1973 red Gibson SG. I paid $270 for her, and named her Jaclyn Elaine, primarily after Jaclyn Smith. At the same time, I purchased a Fender Princeton Reverb for $150, and a Morley volume pedal.

 

I have no major purchases since then, as music has been mostly a hobby. I did purchase a mandolin from a local flea market around 1987, made by Lotus. Not a premier instrument, but its fun to mess around with, and I have used it on Sundays with praise and worship on some country things we've played. I named her Daisy May. Somewhere around 1990, my mother-in-law gave me a Framus classical guitar that was sitting in the corner of her piano room collecting dust; she has been named Greta, and gets played far more often than when she resided with my piano teaching mother-in-law.

 

All of my acoustic instruments have Barcus Barry piezo transducers on them. While still active at church, I played all thru a Boss GT-6 (church owned) direct into the church PA. I will likely pick up my own GT-6 for future church work. I have no other plans to add instruments at this time, but of course that is always subject to change!

[cherri]

My first guitar is an Alvarez acoustic I bought in '78. It's still in mint condition. My second guitar is a cheapo strat knockoff that I use now and then when my good guitars are out in the practice area.

 

The story guitar: My husband picked up this guitar in 98. He traded his web tv to a buddy for it, who thought it was a piece of junk. I started playing it, took it to the luthier to have the electronics updated. He was impressed with it, so we researched it's origins. It's a Goya Rangemaster, circa 1967, semi-hollow. I had to retire it after gigging with it for a year, because the electronics just won't function as they should. But she's a beauty, a few road marks here and there, but all in all a good sounding and easy playing guitar.

[doc taz]

This here sharp edged guitar has plenty o\' road stories. It's an Ibanez RG560, stock except for the Schaller strap locks I installed on it a couple of years after buying it.

 

It's served time as a dinner party instrument. That was during the early 1990's, when I still lived in the Washington, DC area. In later years, up until I moved to Jersey in 1997, it was a balls to the wall grind crusher.

 

There is a slight crack in the heel joint where the neck and body meet, but I still would use this live, just very carefully. I've never really tuned low with this shred machine. I usually just drop the low E to D if I wanted more girth and grind. It sounds surprisingly great when played clean, which is true of most of the Ibanez RG's.

 

For now, it sits mostly at home, though it does get used occasionally when I do impromptu jams with friends.

[strat0124]

not a fan of long posts....I'll spare you guys....

[Tedster]

Interesting thread...I'll post something when I have time, but my guitars don't have such colorful pasts...at least not that I know of...

[BiC]

A quick timeline, not necessarily a "story":

 

Appr. 1984- I received a Bently accoustic for Christmas.

 

Appr. 1985- I bought a Kay electric along with a Crate amp and Peavey cab w/ 4 15" Scorps.

 

Appr. 1986- I bought my 1985 MIJ Fender Strat along with a Laney Linebacker 50 Reverb and Arion Metal Master.

 

Appr. 1989- I bought a Ibanez Tube Screamer Classic and an Ibanez Chorus.

 

1991- I bought a Digitech 21 PRO

 

1994- I bought a Marshall JCM 900 w/ slanted cab

- Crate 8 Channel PA

- Boss DR 5 Drum Machine

 

2003- I bought a Washburn I-64 PLAB

- Boss Metal Zone

 

I just bought another 1985 MIJ Fender Strat.

[reachjkh]

My current favorite guitar is a custom built ash strat, red stain to black sunburst, lace transensor singles, Duncan lil '59(I added this), ebony board, schaller strap locks... I got this guitar by trading a 486 laptop for it about 4 years ago.

 

My beloved black MIJ Fender Jazz, EMGs, Schaller bridge, Schaller strap locks... I traded a Pentium I 90 MHZ, 16M ram, 500M hard drive desktop computer for this about 4 years ago.

 

WOO-HOO!

[The Bear Jew]

Hmm...

No good stories really.

 

I saw the guitars in stores, bought them and hooked them up the way I wanted them.

 

End of story.

Not very interesting.

[strat0124]

Originally posted by CMDN:

Hmm...

No good stories really.

 

I saw the guitars in stores, bought them and hooked them up the way I wanted them.

 

End of story.

Not very interesting.

You sound like Keith Richards talking about his guitars....simple and to the point. Funny!

[southpawstrat]

Before I got my main USA Strat I had a Squier Pro Tone (which is still a very good guitar). It has a maple neck and I put lace sensors in it. However, I was itching for one of the new Americans, with the nice bridge, bigger frets, 22nd fret, and a rosewood fretboard. Both of my other Strats were maple but I loved the sound of rosewood and the feel (backtrack.... my first electric was a mini Lotus guitar w/ rosewood... so it was like home).

 

Anyway, the first place I searched was eBay. I had worked in the summers and on saturdays at the local music store to save up some money. I found a 40th Anniversary rosewood Strat with EMGs in it. I thought it was the coolest guitar. I bet on it, and stayed up until 2 or 3 in the morning waiting for it to end. I was winning. In the last 10 seconds, someone sniped the auction and snatched the guitar from me. That hurt a bit.

 

I searched eBay again for the hell of it the next day and found the most beautiful blue 2001 Am. Series Strat in mint condition. I used buy it now and it shipped immediately. When it came, it was like opening a new guitar straight from Fender. I set it up, put my favorite strings on it, etc. and it plays like a dream. The biggest surprise was how nice the pickups sounded. They are the sweetest sounding pickups in the world. It felt like another arm, a part of me. I call it "Smokey Blue," because that's what my english teacher named the color of it.

 

The same story basically happened for my nylon string Godin guitar. The first guitar I bid on got sniped, but I got a better one in the end. I love the Godin for classical stuff, or anything acoustic.

 

Fun fact: The guy who sniped the 40th Ann. Strat I bid on never paid, and I was offered the guitar. It was tempting, but I didn't have the money and I was happy with Smokey Blue anyway. Makes you wonder, though....

[Boggs]

My first guitar (and I just got mostly done refurbishing it) was my Yamaha FG230 Red Label 12-string. I really liked the sound of Carly Simon's "No Secrets" and a lot of Joni Mitchell and Cat Stevens' stuff back then and it seemed like the 12 could cover all of those pretty nicely. I wasn't disappointed!

 

My next guitar was my Peavey Fury bass. My wife got that one for me on a Fathers' day as I was asked if I would play bass for a song in our church, but I had to borrow one because I didn't have one. I really enjoyed it and when I went to the great, great, House of Guitars, I played that one for fun and it was really comfortable for me to play. My wife took note (no pun intended) and got it for me as a surprise gift!

 

My 3rd was, again by necessity for our church group, my Washburn MG600F electric. I bought that one at a used/consignment shop a couple of blocks from my house. I then did a lot of modification to it incorporating a GraphTech FAAS piezo system/preamp and changing the single coils to Carvin AP11 pickups. That is my FrankenWashburn now.

 

My 3rd guitar was a heartbreaker. It was my Alvarez-Yairi CY118 classical. stunningly beautiful guitar but extremely problematic. After a yer and a half and one complete replacement and several trips back to the factory for the same problem, I finally had to turn it back in to the factory. Broke my heart.

 

The guitar I replaced it with is now my prized and extremely versatile Carvin Cobalt C980 Jumbo steel-string acoustic. I've never been overall more satisfied with a guitar. My C980, my 12-string, and my FrankenWashburn have all been featured on our group's 2 CDs. I hope to build a couple of guitars this next year just for the fun and the experience of doing it. I am hoping ot do a solidbody and a chambered or hollowbody. Boggs

[Dave da Dude]

bluestrat,

So, I went to Reliable Music in Charlotte and was checking out guitars, and the first guitar I laid eyes on that was a Fender Strat was a bright neon blue Korean made Squier strat.

I've had a love hate relationship with it for quite a while until about a year ago, when I bought and installed a Seymour Duncan JB jr in the bridge position. I've also installed Grover mini's, Graph-Tech String Saver saddles, and a Fender Custom Shop blue moto pickguard. Now there's no way I'm letting this guitar go! It's mine, MINE, MINE!!

That's the cool thin about the Squires (and now the Series24), you can buy them cheap and slowly (as money allows) replace the "marginal" parts and make a really fine axe out of it.

 

My story: I had two or three cheap guitars and was tired of the crap! I'd had my fling with fast cars, a mod'd 1963 Jaguar XKE in 1967-1968 and saved up for a good guitar. As I was saving, I tried out various guitars (MANY trips to guitar stores in SE Connecticut) and narrowed it down to the Gibson Hummingbird or Martin D-18. I finally decided on the Martin becasue of it's "deeper" tone. I figured I could always "thin" it out with lighter gage strings. The local stores wouldn't take ANYthing off of retail, so I went to NYC in 1972 and bought one. I bought from a smaller dealer because Sam Ash was a little more money. In retrospect, the Sam Ash guitar was better set up, but at the first neck straightening on the one I bought and it was just as good. The real interesting (to me anyway) part of the story is that while at Sam Ash, I saw a really cool leather guitar strap. Very thick leather (about 1/8" thick), doubled over and cris-crossed "laces" merging the piece of leather together. It was way too expensive, something like $35 of 1972 dollars, so I didn't buy it. I searched in Connecticut for something even close to it for a couple of weeks and then said "screw it" and drove back to NYC and bought the strap I loved. I still love it.

 

My gear history:

 

1972 - Martin D-18

1985 - Seymour Duncan SA-1 sound hole pickup

1985 - Roland Jazz Chorus 55W (goin' be a rock star)

1985 - Ovation Legend 12-string

1985 - Ibanez Roadstar RG600,

"Cream Cheese & Jelly" , since stolen

Feb. 2002 - Raven 1000Q (Korean H-S-H, ebay)

May 2002 - Randall Tube Pro II (50W)

Nov? 2003 - Fender Highway 1 Stratocaster

 

I bought the last two things "on sight". The Tube Pro on ebay, sound unheard. The Strat, I was "just lookin'" with my sons, tried it, loved it, put it on layaway. I'll pick it up soon, hopefully in November.

 

Dave

[Blue Strat]

Originally posted by reachjkh:

My current favorite guitar is a custom built ash strat, red stain to black sunburst, lace transensor singles, Duncan lil '59(I added this), ebony board, schaller strap locks... I got this guitar by trading a 486 laptop for it about 4 years ago.

So, what position is the lil '59 in? Is it in the bridge position or in the neck? What do you think of the tone? I think I want one for the neck & middle positions in my strat.

[ricknbokkerv2.0]

I've owned a few guitars, built or bastardized most of them.

 

The best...favorite...most loved, was an old Aria copy of a Gibson 335 Thinline. This was way before Aria Came out with the "Pro II" line.

 

Hell, the label inside the F hole was even misspelled!! (Arai, in script)

 

I wrote to the company, asking mainly about the amazing humbuckers in this thing. They sent me about 6 pages of copied material of pickups available on the Pro II models and a letter stating that they had no info on the guitar in my possesion.

 

Yes, it sounded wonderful. Gorgeous, too. Emerald Green sunburst, chrome hardware, and a thick peice of carved rosewood glued to the Fake Bigsby.

 

I slept with that guitar. Lying on my back in the dark, falling asleep playing the whole "Ziggy" album from Bowie. Trying to understand. How did I go from moving six to eight ounces of Meth a week, making so much money that I didn't do laundry for six months... buying new clothes every Friday night, so I could make my deals hanging at all the tittie bars....

...to living in my brother's house, broke and out of work, stealing juice from the electric company so I could at least run the Sivertone Twin Twelve I was hearing these beautiful sounds from.

 

That was my best guitar. It was there for me at my worst time, and comforted me.

 

What more could I ask.

 

Ricky

[69tele]

Well here is the story of how I got my 69tele ...

 

http://www.gear-review.co.uk/reviews/tele/

 

Of my other guitars, 2 I have bought whilst on vacation to the USA, a Washburn n4 in Orlando in 95 and a LP Studio + last April during my honeymoon in LA !

 

........and my most recent an Epi Dot Deluxe suffered a car crash on the way back from the store ! (it was fine thou)

 

Ernie

[The Bear Jew]

Originally posted by CMDN:

Hmm...

No good stories really.

 

I saw the guitars in stores, bought them and hooked them up the way I wanted them.

 

End of story.

Not very interesting.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

You sound like Keith Richards talking about his guitars....simple and to the point. Funny!

Yeah, I guess. I dunno. They're tools, ya know? I found a few good ones and made 'em work for me by changing some stuff around (hardware, p-ups, etc.)

 

I do have one that's kind of interesting, but that's mainly because it's kind of weird. It's a 1978 Gibson Sonex. Yeah, you heard me right. It's one of the crappy guitars that Gibson made out of some kinda bondo and wood back in the late 1970s. It cost me $200 or something. It had shit p-ups in it and a lot of knobs and switches, so I swapped the p-ups for ONE Tom Anderson H-3, took off all the knobs and switches except for one volume knob, replaced the hardware with burlier stuff and put a grahite nut on it. Then I had a friend cut me a custom smoked mirror pickguard, which I promptly destroyed onstage when I put my hand through it. When I showed him the damage, we both laughed and said, "This guitar needs a metal pickguard so you can't break it." We stopped laughing and contacted a metal shop... they cut me a new pickguard from a chunk of steel diamondplate. It weighs 8 lbs by itself. We screwed it onto the guitar, and TA-DAhhh.... instant hernia machine. The guitar weighs about 20 lbs and is virtually indestructible. Sounds kinda cool, too. Most of my guitars are like this... simple, solid and efficient... and they sound good.

[yamsa2000]

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