American Heritage Brands- Timeless Style and Function in Yer Face!

We don't make a lot of things in this country anymore. Big corporations discovered long ago that it was cheaper to move operations to countries like Korea and China, where workers are paid peanuts(sometimes literally, I'd imagine)and working conditions are not supportive of healthy human life. The fact that this takes jobs away from U.S. citizens, exploits workers from other lands, hurts the U.S. economy in the long run, and reduces the quality of their product does not ever seem to have phased these people, when there was more money to be made. More, more, more. More to the point of gluttony, more to the point of over saturation. That is how most modern business men have interpreted the American Dream.

But it wasn't always that way, was it? America, this great rugged land of ours, was once a place of innovation, and quality, and pride. Pull up a chair, crack open a beer and let me tell you about some cool-ass stuff you can still get made here in North America that isn't (always) mass produced cookie cutter crap.

SCHOTT LEATHERS, NYC
Irving Schott was the son of Russian immigrants. In the early 1900's, he started working in pattern making for various clothing manufacturers in NYC. In 1913, he and his brother Jack decided to open their own factory and leather company in a run down basement in the slum that was then Manhattan's lower east side. Schott Bros first product was a sheepskin lined raincoat, which they sold by literally going door to door. They started attaching their fancy new "Perfecto"label to their finest coats. The label itself was inspired by the logo on boxes of Irving's favorite cigars.
Irving and Jack were not bikers or car racers, in fact Irving never even learned to drive. Motorcycles were brand new technology in the early 1900's, but the name Schott would become forever tied to images of bikers, punk rockers, outlaws, rockabillies, and daredevils. Irving had a friend, who was part of the Beck family, who had become one of the nation's largest distributors of Harley Davidson products.At the time, since the motorcycle was a new invention, there was no clothing made for riding specifically. At Beck's behest, Irving and Jack began to make rough, thick leather jackets for cyclists, with a zipper (zippers were also brand new tech at the time) on one side of the jacket, rather than down the middle, to make it easier for riders to unzip the jacket with one hand while steering with the other. Irving was the first person to put a zipper on a commercially available piece of clothing.
In 1928, the garment that we now universally recognize as the motorcycle jacket was officially born. The Schott Perfecto. It cost $5.50 then, and will now run you around $600.
Over the years, the Perfecto has become an icon. Marlon Brando, James Dean, Sid Vicious, the Clash, the Sex Pistols, Bruce Springsteen, the Stray Cats, the Ramones...the list of icons who have famously donned a Schott Perfecto is long and star studded. The list of companies who copy the Perfecto is five times as long as that. I've had many of the copies, and now that I own the real thing (I have a Perfecto that was produced between 1968 and 1970, and I found it in a vintage store for a very reasonable price. And you can, too!) I can tell you that there is nothing like a real Schott. Save up for one, it is worth it.
MOST (but not all) Schott leather jackets are still made in America (and the somewhat shockingly high price reflects that), they are still made from hand cut pieces of leather, and the machines used to put them together are run by human beings. They are the same machines from the old Schott factory, dating back to the turn of the (19th-20th) century. Yes, they are beyond the reach of most people financially. As I said though, you can find gorgeously broken in used ones on eBay and in thrift stores. Sometimes these can be had for around $200.My Schott Perfecto is magical. I found it by accident, it's around the same age as I am, it fits perfectly, and I got it for under $250. Get a Schott, I'm telling you. Just get one.

At Right: Here's the author and his beloved late '60s/early '70s Perfecto. I don't ride bikes, but I do fall down a lot.

LEVIS JEANS, SAN FRANCISO- Still an Icon
In the early 1990's, when the Clash's "Should I Stay Or Should I Go" appeared in a UK TV advert for Levi's jeans, a lot of old punks bristled at the inclusion of a tune by one of the iconic anti-establishment punk bands in a commercial selling blue jeans. This was kind of silly, of course, because the Clash were signed to one of the biggest corporations in the world (CBS/Sony) and had always ridden the line between selling out and rebelling, like all "rebel" bands do once they get big. Mick Jones, the Clash's guitarist and one of my fave people ever, simply had this to say about the furor: "Everybody's got a pair of Levi's. They're alright."
Alright, indeed.
Levi Strauss invented the bluejean in the late 1800s. Again, like the Schott company, it was a family affair, run by Levi and his two brothers, all Bavarian immigrants. Along with Jacob Davis, they introduced the Levis bluejean, which would become known (after several design mutations) as the 501, in 1890. As most people know this story, I'm not gonna waste time by repeating more detail. Instead here is a fantastic video about Levi's history and a very pleasant-seeming woman who has the coolest job in the world.



Levi's, of course, does not produce the bulk of it's product in the USA anymore, to keep costs down. You can buy some very expensive Historic Collection garments (the 1954 501 jean, etc) which painstakingly replicate the historic designs of the past that are made in the USA. These cost two to three times what you would pay for a foreign made pair of Levi's. However, my suggestion is that you do as I do: seek out the garments made in Levi's factory in Mexico. It's still North America, from what I can tell workers are treated fairly, and the product is always of far greater quality than the ones produced elsewhere. Just look inside the jeans for an origin tag, which should say "Made In Mexico", or "Product Of Mexico". Like Fender Guitars' Mexican operation, Levi's Mexico produces higher quality product at a very reasonable price.

THOROGOOD BOOTS, MILWAUKEE- Tough, Stylish, Reasonably Priced, and made in the USA.

Thorogood boots have been made in Wisconsin since 1918 by the Weinbrenner company, which was started in the late 1800's by Albert Weinbrenner, the son of a German immigrant who had a shoe repair business in Milwaukee. During WW2, the factory, by then very successful, dedicated 100% of it's production to the military effort. If you see an old pic of US soldiers in the 40s, chances are they are wearing Thorogood boots. Like the Schott Perfecto and the Levi's 501XX, the basic designs of the boots have changed very little over the years. They are still made in America, they are not as expensive as their biggest (and trendiest) competitor (Red Wing), and the quality is very, very high. These are tough, cool looking, working class boots. Wear them to work, wear them to school, wear them to the punk show, just wear them. Thorogood does make more modern designs, but for my money it's the American Heritage Series that does the trick.

Where a pair of Red Wings will cost you $200.-$300, a very similar pair of Thorogoods will cost you around $150, maybe less if you luck out on eBay. The quality is undeniably the same, but Red Wing has become a trendy name in hipster fashion, where Thorogood is still known mostly to people who need work boots, and people who really like work boots, like me and you, buddy! Comparing with the great guitar companies, if Red Wing is Gibson, and Wolverine is Fender, then Thorogood is probably G&L. If that helps you.
Sadly, I do not own a pair of these beauties yet, but they are most definitely on the ol' Xmas list. Here's a pic of some douchebag who has the boots I want.

GIBSON GUITARS, KALAMAZOO- An Icon Gone Horribly Wrong

The story of Gibson is very similar to the story of Schott, Thorogood, and Levi's. Immigrant comes to America. Forms company that boasts a combination of high quality craftsmanship and innovation. Product becomes wildly popular and changes first American culture, then the world. The difference is, today in 2014/2015, I cannot recommend that you buy a Gibson. In fact, with a few exceptions, I would not advise you to buy a Gibson made after 2005.
Orville Gibson began selling instruments out of his small workshop in Kalamazoo, Michigan in 1894. Word got around about the quality of the instruments, especially in the musical hotbeds of Detroit and Chicago, which were both fairly close by. Orville died in 1918, but the company grew and grew. In 1944 it was sold to Chicago Musical Instruments. Gibson was responsible for the first hollow body electric guitar, popularized by Jazz guitar great Charlie Christian. The innovations kept coming, with the birth of the Les Paul line of guitars in the early 1950s, then as the 1950s progressed into the 1960s, the ES-335, the Flying V, the Explorer, the Firebird, the SG and more exploded out of Gibson's Kalamazoo factory and into the hands of famous and working class musicians alike, who used these rock solid slabs of mahogany to change pop culture, and the world.

Between 1974 and 1984, production was slowly moved from Kalamazoo, Michigan to Nashville, Tennessee. Some people will tell you that this was the beginning of the end, and I agree. However, everyone seems to draw the line at a different place, and I think that the company still continued to make amazing guitars up until very recently.
Recent years have seen Gibson make some very public, and very stupid mistakes. From suing every small guitar company (and some large ones, too) whose guitars had even a slight resemblance to 60 year old Gibson designs, to being raided by the feds for using illegal and endangered woods, to raising prices to absurd levels, to letting quality drop to an unprecedented low, Gibson has been pissing on it's legend for years now. The most recent development is their policies regarding their 2015 line of products. There is an overall price hike, again (whereas Fender's prices have held steady for several years now), and they've announced that ALL Gibson guitars from 2015 onwards will be fitted with the company's latest unnecessary and ridiculous "innovation", the "Robot Tuner" system. This is a strange, awkward looking box mounted to the back of the headstock that tunes the guitar for you, so you don't have to. This piece of crap, which has inspired very little besides derision since it's introduction a couple of years ago, will now be on every guitar Gibson makes, whether you want it or not. In fact, if you don't want it, you'll have to take it to a tech to get it removed, like a mole on your ass. Gibson's 2014 is full of charmless, ugly, and overpriced guitars, and it's 2015 line, while showing a slight return to more traditional designs, is ruined by the "Robot Tuner" fiasco. If the company's decidedly non-rock'n'roll CEOs and owners would recognize that musicians WANT the elegance of Gibson's traditional designs, and stop trying to re-invent the wheel with absurd gizmos and dubiously "fresh" re-designs, I think they'd win our trust back after a couple of years. They'd also need to lower prices, but hey,one step at a time, man.
A lot of people have pointed to 2005 as a loose point in time where quality went to shit, and some would say it was much earlier than that. I can only tell you that I have two Gibsons that I dearly love, pictured below. On the right is my 2003 Melody Maker Junior, also sometimes referred to as the Melody Maker P-90. It's a Melody Maker body and neck with Les Paul Junior pickup and electronics. It's got a thick, chunky "baseball bat" 1950's style neck that feels great. I added a Bigsby to it a few years back, and it is just a fabulous guitar. It was made in Nashville, Tennessee and oozes mojo. A lot of people hated the "satin" or "faded" finishes that Gibson introduced as a cost-cutting method in the late '90s/early 2000s, but I love the way it looks and feels on this guitar. On the left, I have an "SG Junior 60's" model from 2012. While most recent Gibsons I've played have been shoddy to various degrees, I really lucked out with this one. It's design is a combo of a few different 60's era SG designs. It's got a larger late 60s headstock, but the body, pick guard and controls are more similar to the early 1960's models. The volume and tone controls are placed in a straight row, more like an LP Junior than the usual 60's SG control placement. It's got a glossy finish, very nice visible cherry mahogany grain, and a fairly substantial neck. It's a good guitar. To get a good Gibson these days, I'd scour eBay, used guitar stores and pawn shops. That's what I did.

So there you have it...some great American products. Some that are still great, some that have fallen from very lofty heights. All worth your time, and all great inspiration to get you dreamin' about this country's glory days.

Flat Top Cruiser: The Legacy of the Gibson Les Paul Junior

Tailfins, hair grease, B-Movie Sci-Fi, Kerouac, Elvis, James Dean. I love the 1950s. It's my favorite era of American history, and one that produced an absolute overload of groundbreaking movies, music, literature, fashion, ideology, design and style.

In the world of guitars, the 1950s era still looms largest. The innovations that blasted onto the still new and untested electric guitar field in that decade are still the biggest leaps forward made in the guitar business. The Fender Telecaster, Stratocaster and Precision (the first electric bass guitar) were all invented in the 1950s and are still made, virtually unchanged in design, to this very day, 60 years later. Ditto for Kalamazoo, Michigan's Gibson Guitars,who had been in the guitar business since the 1800s. Gibson is world famous in perpetuity for Gibson Les Paul, SG, ES-175, ES-295, The Byrdland,and my absolute favorite guitar of all time, the glorious Gibson Les Paul Junior line of guitars, which includes all variations of the Melody Maker, Les Paul Special, and Les Paul Junior.



The original single cutaway Junior was developed when Gibson saw the need to compete in the lower end electric guitar market, as Fender's Telecaster as well as several other guitars made by upstart companies were selling huge numbers in the wake of the first appearance of rock and roll music on the mainstream national scene in 1954. Gibson knew that in order to compete in this market they needed an affordable but high quality instrument that would appeal to young rock and rollers and student guitarists. They looked to basically develop their own version of the Fender Esquire (the single pick up version of the Telecaster) but price it even lower.

So the LP Junior was born. A slab of mahogany for the body, another for the neck, a rosewood fretboard, a single P-90 pick up, and a simple, brutal bar of metal for the bridge. It was initially finished in two colors. One, introduced in 1954, was a gorgeous tobacco sunburst, like Leo Fender's first Stratocasters. The other, which appeared the following year, was a limed mahogany, called "TV Yellow" by Gibson's marketing wizards. Some say that this finish was called "TV" because it was meant to "look good on television". The real reason was the Fender Telecaster. The buttery yellow color, which ranged on different guitars from a dark mustard tint to a full on screaming banana yellow, was meant to compete with Leo Fender's early butterscotch Teles.

The Junior was similar in shape to Gibson's popular Les Paul series of guitars, but without the extra frills, carved cap and aesthetic pleasantries that made the LP a more expensive guitar. There was no drop in quality here. This was a well made, solid as a rock and virtually indestructible guitar with a bright, full throat-ed sound that was surprisingly versatile for only having the one pickup, one volume, and one tone in it's electronic circuit.

The guitar was almost immediately Gibsons' biggest selling electric. Students, young kids, and even old pros gravitated to this guitars' combination of low price point and high quality. The guitar sold for $99.00 dollars in 1954, as opposed to the Les Paul Standard which went for just over $200. Funnily enough, if you'd like to buy a vintage, original LP Junior from 1954 in good condition, you should be prepared to shell out upwards of $5,000.



Four years later, Gibson decided to up the ante with it's double cutaway version of the LP Junior, which for a time replaced the classic single cut. These are highly sought after guitars, mostly because of the punk rock guitarists who began buying them in pawnshops and used guitar stores in droves in the late 70s, in emulation of the NY Dolls Johnny Thunders, who famously played one.



In 1955, Gibson also introduced the LP Special, a two pickup version of the Junior which sold for slightly more, and was meant to be an upgrade, or a gateway guitar to a more upscale LP Standard or Custom. This too was a popular and fantastic guitar, available in single cut in 1955 and double cutaway by 1958. Original LP Specials, depending on condition, can fetch as high as $30,000. on the collector's market now.



In 1959, diminishing guitar sales prompted Gibson to introduce an even more affordable, even more stripped down, even more Fender-sounding instrument: The glorious Melody Maker. This guitar had an even thinner mahogany body, a slimmer headstock, and an option of one or two very Stratocaster-like pickups. A double cutaway version was introduced a bit later.




In 1961, the Junior line was revitalized with a new shape, similar to Gibson's newest offering, the SG, (or "Special Guitar", not to be confused with the Les Paul Special, an entirely different beast). This shape actually replaced the original LP Junior shapes, as the SG replaced the Les Paul. By the 1970s, interest in vintage Gibsons prompted the company to begin to re-issue all of the various shapes. At present all of these variations are being produced by the Gibson Company. At the time though, Gibson was very concerned with staying fresh and changing their guitar line completely every few years. New designs were not added to old ones, they were introduced to completely replace them.



Gibson's re-issue series were not, initially, period-correct replicas. They were new versions of the old guitars, with modern conveniences such as Grover tuners and Tune-o-Matic bridges. They were also offered in finishes not on offer for specific models back in the 50s and 60s. These early re-issues are also prized collector's items in the present day and are highly sought after at price points just a bit below the originals. Some purists bemoaned the modern "upgrades", but aesthetically these re-issues were a welcome blast from the past and at least a partial return to what used to be known as "Gibson Quality".

They also saved Gibson from losing sales of new guitars, as it was clear that most players would rather buy the old designs. By creating new versions of the classics sold at a cheaper price than the highly sought after, collectable originals, Gibson was able to capitalize on the reputation of their older guitars (see '75 LP Special advert below). Later, Gibson's Epiphone line started producing even more affordable versions of these guitars with the Epiphone headstock in place of the Gibson "open" book shape. These were produced in China and varied greatly in quality from guitar to guitar.



My own love of LP Juniors started with my early worship of Mr. Johnny Thunders. The tragic NY Dolls/Heartbreakers guitarist rarely played anything but a '58 double cut TV Junior and I wanted one badly. This really started my obsession. The first one I got was a black Epiphone singlecut Junior, with a bolt on neck and P-90. this was around 1998, and I played this guitar on most of my band's (Dimestore Haloes) releases and live shows in this era. It was not a bad little guitar. I wasn't psyched with the Epiphone headstock and bolt on neck, but it sounded great and held up well on stage and in studio. Below is a pic of me holding the guitar onstage with the Dimestore Haloes in 1999.



I bought a double cutaway TV Yellow Epiphone Junior around a year later as a backup guitar, and this guitar looked amazing, but the neck was a piece of crap, the pickup sounded thin and weird and I soon traded it in on what was to be my favorite all time guitar (see pic below). It was a 2001 single cutaway, sunburst LP Junior, a 1955 re-issue. This guitar was just disgusting, it was so great. The finest guitar I have ever owned. I played it onstage and in the studio during the recording of the Haloes' last album, "The Ghosts of Saturday Night", and it was the only guitar on my 2005 solo disc, "Amazing Graceless", despite the fact that I'm holding a Grestch on the cover and an LP Special DC on the inside panel.



In 2004 I bought the aforementioned 2002 TV Yellow DC LP Special. It was a great guitar, but had a much mellower sound than my '55 reissue Junior. Much less biting and throaty and much more fat and warm.

Because I am an idiot, I sold both of these guitars in 2006. Traded them in on a 2005 Gibson SG with classic brown leather case. This was a nice guitar, but a bad decision. It wasn't long before I needed the money and sold that, too. I had a 1954 Reissue Fender Strat in daphne blue at that time, and a couple of Gretsch Electromatics. Which I also sold eventually. I've owned well over 50 guitars in the last ten years. None of them has been as perfect for me as that '55 reissue LP Junior.

I've also owned several LP Junior copies. One by Dillion, which was a great copy of a late 50s cherry double cutaway Junior. I put a Bigsby on that and it was even cooler. See an earlier blog here for pics of that guitar and a rundown on that process. I ended up selling that guitar to Tim from the Hormones, who has the same guitar acquiring/selling disease that I have. He, of course, sold it. It was a great little axe.

I also had a Melody Maker/ Junior combo copy by Agile, who import pretty good quality chinese guitars. It was a good little axe and they actually still used my review of it on their website until recently. I've also had a re-issue 1959 Melody Maker, in worn white. Also a groovy guitar, and also one that I should have held on to. I have also owned an Epiphone Custom Shop TV Yellow '55 Junior re-issue, and an Epiphone Custom Shop LP Special re-issue. Both really, really great slabs o' wood. Of course, I sold them eventually. I also seem to recall a Xaviere Lp Junior singlecut copy in cherry sunburst that I had for about three days before I traded it in. It, unfortunately, was a fresh piece of elephant dung.

Speaking of holding on to things, I'm keeping this one (pic below). It is a rare bird of sorts, a real sleeper, and a guitar that is pretty much perfect for my needs.

In 2003, Gibson re-issued the Melody Maker, but with a difference. They took the Melody Maker's super thin slab body and thinner headstock, and coupled it with a hot p-90 Les Paul Junior pickup, thick, chunky 50s style neck, TV finish and newer LP style tune-o-matic bridge. This became the Les Paul Melody Maker Junior, an amazing hybrid that was sold from 2003-2006. They went for about $500. in 2003, and used ones are still fetching that price now, nine years later. I managed to score mine on eBay for around $475. It sounds and feels amazing.



Many players don't like the "worn" or "satin" finishes that Gibson produces these days, but I actually do. Every guitar that I've had with this finish was louder, brighter and felt better under my hands than sticky, thick nitro finish jobs.

Gibson began using this finish for a couple of reasons. One, it is cheaper to produce than their traditional thick, glossy finish jobs, and can bring the price point of a great guitar down enough so that a regular joe like me can afford it. Number two, it resembles the worn away, time-thinned, broken in finish of a real vintage, 60 year old guitar. Not exactly, but close. Purists will tell you that this is blasphemy, but I'm not a purist. And the way this satin finish allows the wood to breathe and brings out the tone of the instrument is so awesome that I can't argue with it. In fact, Gibby now uses this finish on all of their mid-price Melody makers, LP Juniors, LP Specials, SGs, etc. And while it's said that the satin finish doesn't last as long or wear as well, you'll be able to afford to re-finish it down the line if needed.

Thanks for reading my very personal and subjective account of the legacy of the LP Junior. These are beautiful and sonically superior guitars, and every guitar geek should own at least one. Collect them, drool over them, admire them, buy them, sell them, but most of all, PLAY 'em.

In Defense Of The Fender Stratocaster......

Conventional rock and roll wisdom says that a Strat is not a "rock" guitar. It is a "funk" guitar, it is a "soul" guitar, it is a "blues" guitar. But for Rockabilly? No, that's a Gretsch. For Punk Rock? No, that's a Les Paul Junior. For Metal? No, that's something pointy with too many frets. For Country? No, that's a Telecaster.

As for me, it took me a long time to come around to the ways of Strat-love. I even refused to let a great guitarist join my old band on the grounds that he played a Strat. I hated them with a passion. I was wrong, people.

Why do us "rocker" types hate Strats so much? I believe the reason is threefold:

REASON NUMERO UNO- "The terrible, awful people who have famously played Strats." It all starts with a very overrated man named Eric Clapton. He was great in his early years, when he played Les Pauls, SGs, Teles, 335s, etc. But as soon as he fell under the spell of the Stratocaster, it was all over. He not only came to epitomize the Strat player, he came to epitomize watered down, shitty white blues music. Terrible crimes he committed against his blues/rock roots, all the while clutching a black Strat in his puffy hands and making a queasy expression that most people thought meant he was a kindly British rock star having a good old time.Of course, that grimace of puke to come really signifies a deep, horrible self knowledge. This knowledge comes after you have sold out your high minded ideals for a steady and massively huge paycheck and a couple rolls in the hay with George Harrison's wife. This often comes with the realization that your playing has become trite, obvious and boring. Because this brings you millions of dollars, you will not seek to change this. But forever will you suffer the guilt and shame.

ERIC CLAPTON IS NOT FIT TO WAX THE LARGE, BLACK BALLS OF MUDDY WATERS. It has to be said.



(LEFT: The great Buddy Holly.) So who, besides Clapton, ruined the Strat for us all? Well, a man named Stevie Ray Vaughan really made the Strat the horridly common instrument it is today. Stevie was actually a really great guitarist who played with soul and grit and real blues feeling. He sold all those qualities to a major label in order to be more like his hero Eric Clapton, then he cacked it in a helicopter, thereby leaving us a couple listenable records, along with some dreck. At least he spared us the further crimes against rock and roll he was most likely about to commit with his trademark beat up 60s Strat. I'd like to think he would have eventually wised up and gone underground, becoming a fixture on the chitlin circuit and shunning the garish MTV spotlight. I'm a fan, sadly, and that's a fan's wishful thinking. Other Strat-ruiners: Mark Knopfler of Dire Straits, Billie Joe Armstrong of Green Day (now busy ruining the LP Junior for us all), U2's constipated martini bar waiter "The Edge", and lots, lots more, including frog faced frat boy John Mayer and retarded Allman Brother Johnny Lang.

REASON NUMERO DOS that we hate the Strat: "It's too common." Yes, the Strat is the highest selling guitar of all time, and the most copied. More guitars resemble a Strat than any other guitar shape. Almost every guitar maker, large and small, have Strat like guitars. Even Gibson, who recently bought the Charvel company (who were very famous in the 80s for making really gaudy modernized Strat copies, which led to the coining of the term "Superstrat"). Only the Les Paul guitar shape is as close to being as recognizable and constantly copied.


(Left: The great Dave Alvin and his well worn 60s Strat.)
REASON NUMERO TRES: "They sound so thin and wimpy." The Stratocaster, like the Telecaster before it, was developed with single coil pickups, the latest in technology in 1954 when it was designed. These pickups are capable of a wide variety of sounds, but they do favor the cutting, thin, high end treble side of tone. This guitar was developed for playing early country music and western swing, like the Telecaster, as these were Leo Fender's favorite musics. Compared to slightly later technology developed by Gibson and Grestch in the form of "humbucking" pickups, they are also kind of buzzy and noisy when plugged into a cranked amp. Humbucking pickups eliminate the buzz, but also eliminate the high, keening wail of an original Strat bridge pickup.

I will now address each of those concerns, proving once and for all that the Stratocaster is the ultimate rock and roll guitar.

1) Famous Strat players: Yes, hacks like Eric Clapton are associated with the Strat. Guess who else played one? Buddy Holly was the first well known Strat player. Buddy revolutionized pop music in the mid fifties, wrote his own songs, dressed sharp, and was rarely seen without his trademark mid fifties sunburst Strat. In fact, he owned several, and outside of acoustics, was never seen playing a Gibson.



ROCKABILLY AND SURF MUSIC: Other rockabilly players besides the great Buddy Holly, favored strats. Ronnie Dawson, of "Action Packed" and "Rockin Bones" fame, always played one. So did Johnny Meeks from Gene Vincent and the Bluecaps. As did Roland Janes, who played on Sun Records sessions by Jerry Lee, Billy Lee Riley, Charlie Rich and more. Sonny Burgess and James Burton have been seen with Strats, as well. Dave Alvin of the Blasters and Jimmie Vaughan (yes, Stevies' bro) have been seen playing nothing but Strats for their blues/country/RnB based musics in modern times. As for the Surf? The Ventures, the Shadows, The Trashmen, Dick Dale. These giants of reverb and tremolo all played Strats. The hollow twang of surf music would not have existed without the Stratocaster. Even the Beatles played Strats on several cuts on "Rubber Soul" and "Revolver". Here are the Shadows with Cliff Richard defining 60s Brit Pop. Shadows guitarist Hank Marvin had the first Strat in Britain and his guitar heroics on said bright red Strat began the UK's enduring love affair with the electric guitar.



(At left, the Shadows rock out on matching Strats.)
Another Strat hero was Jimi Hendrix. Probably the most famous guitarist of all time, and the most famous Strat player. He sold more Strats than all the guitar salesmen on the planet, just by making it his instrument of choice. He liked Strats because Buddy Guy and Ike Turner did. That's right, Ike Turner. Perhaps one of the earliest bad ass guitar heroes, Ike stuck pretty close to his Strat collection for the entirety of his career. He beat his women and he beat his guitars, but both seemed to do alright for themselves afterward.



(Check the pic on the right to see Ike and Tina and their 1950s Strat.) Brother Wayne Kramer from Michigan Proto Punks the MC5 played a Strat quite often in his heyday (and today), as did his counterpart Ron Asheton from the amazing Stooges. Yep, that's a Stratocaster being flogged on such ballsy rock epics as "Kick Out The Jams", "Down On The Street" and "TV Eye".



That's Ron Asheton looking superemely cool with his late 50s Strat. But surely a Strat is no good for Punk music, one says? Hmm. How about Bob Andrews from Generation X, who used one more often than not? How about Robert Quine from Richard Hell and the Voidoids, who rarely played anything but a Strat? What about the brilliant Ruts guitarist Paul Fox? He was a Strat player.



Here's Bob from Gen X reminding you that punks played Strats in 1977.
What about heavy metal? Surely the shrill, quacking Strat sound couldn't keep up with the balls out punch of a metal riff? I'm not sure my favorite metal guitar player, the human riff factory that is Fast Eddie Clarke of Motorhead and Fastway, would agree. See below.



Sticking up for Strats in metal would also be... Richie Blackmore, Yngwie Malmsteen,Eddie Van Halen, and ...oh, just every guitarist in Iron Maiden, plus Steve Harris, who plays a Fender Precision. That's the Bass version of the Strat, for those keeping score at home. Witness:





I think I've just about wiped away that image from your mind, right? The one where you picture Eric Clapton's unfortunate weasel face grimacing in bowel-constricted agony as he plays another one of his cliche ridden, ham fingered solos while the world's most boring audiences cheer him on listlessly? Just take another look if you need to, while the rest of us move on to...

COUNTRY MUSIC. Although the Strat is now widely associated with blues and blues rock, and the Telecaster is universally known as "the country guitar, the Strat itself was originally designed for country players, by country players and one particular country fan by the name of Leo Fender. Here's the one man who, besides Mr Fender, contributed most to the perfect functionality and design of the Stratocaster.



That's Bill Carson, who played amazingly hot guitar licks for country music legend Hank Thompson's band, the Brazos Valley Boys, in "Country Music California" in the early 1950s. For those of you who don't know, Cali was once second only to Tennessee as the leading state providing country music to the hungry masses, back when the hungry masses had taste. That was a long time ago. Bill here was also a close friend of Leo Fender, and that Strat he's holding there is one of the first few ever made. Lep gave Bill a strat to test out onstage, and Bill's carefully worded opinion on the instrument contains many of the ideas we now associate with every Stratocaster. He was key in developing the instrument's wide variety of sounds and it's curvaceous and comfortable body shape.

Now that you've realized that just as many Strat players have rocked the ballsy riffs as Les Paul players, let's move on to reason number two: "The Strat is just too common".

Well, that one is true. Many guitarists like to consider themselves different, and will thusly play weird or obscure or highly customized guitars to stand out from the pack, who mostly play the two most popular guitars, the Strat (in its many variations) and the Les Paul (which also exists in many variations).

I used to think this as well. Then I played a Les Paul, and I played a Strat. They may be common, but there's a reason: They have not been beatn in design or functionality yet. Nor have they been beaten in beauty or tone or versatility. You see alot of Rockabilly guitarists playing Gretsches, but not many (if any) metal players. The Strat, however, is comfortable on metal stages, rockabilly stages, punk stages, country stages...just about any form of music. It really is a case of Guitar Darwinism. The best guitars will win. Strats and Les Pauls really are the best. And they have been since the early 1950s when they were designed. What other 1950s technology do we still use today? So yes, the Strat is common. Because it's the best.

Now we come to reason number three: "The Strat is too thin and wimpy sounding." Hmm. Perhaps the following clip, made with a stock late 60s Strat, with no pickup modifications at all, will make you question that widely held opinion?



And then there's the best thing about the Strat: it's ability to be easily modified. Strats are the ultimate DIY "hot rodding" platform. You can do anything you want with a Strat, because Leo Fender designed it to be that way. He wanted a guitar you could take apart, easily service, easily modify and personalize. And in designing this, he designed the ultimate guitar. The most comfortable to play, the guitar possessing the widest variety of sounds, the best looking guitar.

One of the many ways players have modified the Strat concerns it's "wimpy" or "thin" bridge pickup tone. Just as an aside, the bridge pickup on a Strat can indeed sometimes be thin and glassy. However, if a player just switches the pickup selector to the neck and middle pickups, one discovers a huge, thick, overwhelmingly grungy and dirty tone, with a cranked amp. If this is still not loud and aggressive enough for you, many players, such as fast Eddie Clarke, Eddie VH, Billie Joe from Green Day, some of the Iron Maiden guys, etc etc have opted to switch their Strat's single coil brisge pickup out for a double coil humbucker. This will fatten up that razor sharp, blade thin Strat sound, giving you the best of both worlds in one guitar (Gibson and Fender tones). Some Strat players say this is sacrilege and spoils both the original look and sound of the guitar, but I say have at it. Strats are for personalizing and playing. They were part of one man's search for the perfect multi function proletariat guitar back in the 1950s, and like the 1950s hot rod cars they were built to resemble, they exist for the driver/player to modify, customize and personalize. See the guitar below, which would be suitable for pretty much any kind of music the world has to offer.



In short, the Strat is both the world's most popular and most undervalued instrument. It looks great, sounds great and feels great. If you need other sounds, the Strat can take on new personalities with just some simple modifications. There's very little a Strat cannot do, and just about nothing a Strat hasn't done, from Rockabilly to grunge to pop to punk to RnB to soul to metal. Where there is guitar noise, there is likely a Strat. Don't hate, celebrate.

To the right is my newest guitar, a Lake Placid Blue 60s style Strat. I'm going to do some mods to it that I will talk about in later Blogs, I'm sure. Hope you enjoyed my Strat rant, and hope it changed your mind a little bit about the perfect versatility of a Stratocaster. And let's remember, it's not what guitar you play, but what you play on that guitar, that counts.

Guitar Dummy Goes Ape!

Hey, dummies! What up?

So, I traded my Hagstrom Swede for a Mosley "Pasadena" Tele. I dunno why, I just felt like it. Ended up getting acquainted with Mosley's sales rep, Jay. A nice guy.

Apparently, Mosley was an obscure brand name in the 60s. I cannot find any evidence of this on the web. No mention in any of the rare guitar books I have, either. None of my guitartard friends has heard of the name. According to Jay, though, and the Mosley website, it's true. I thought it might refer to MOSRITE, and Semie Mosley, the owner/designer of that legendary company, but Jay says no.

Mosley these days is a relic guitar company, that is providing relic'ed, original vintage style guitars at cheaper prices. Some very very nice guitars on their Website.

So of course, I was interested, and Jay was interested in getting his hands on my Hagstrom so they could relic the thing and sell it on eBay.

I'm not at all into relic guitars (you want me to pay MORE money for a guitar that's beat up???), so i was glad to see their Hot Rod Pasadena model.



Here's the axe:




Nice, no? Upon recieving the guitar, I noticed some stuff. First, the headstock says "USA Custom Shop", but it's obviously a Korean guitar. Jay confirmed this for me. Korean parts, anyway. Secondly, that the neck plate on the back of the guitar reads, "Number 100 of 76." Hmmm. Jay assures me that this is the "old school" way of doing things, and people of today just don't understand. Could be true, but I've never heard of that. In all fairness though, who knows, stupider things have happened.

I also noticed that they are selling a Strat copy, very nice one, that they are calling the Fullerton. However, the headstock of the guitar pictured actually reads, "FullertIon. Perhaps that's the old school way of spelling Fullerton, who am I to say?

So back to my swank Pasadena. It's got some other weird things going on. The headstock also says "Vintage '52 Series". Anyone who knows guitars , though, will see that this axe looks nothing at all like a '52 Tele. It's very, very nice, but sorry, nothing to do with '52. Jay says that the headstock refers to another model.

I asked jay if this was a B stock guitar, as there was a bit of scraped finish on the fretboard. Jay said not at all. On further inspection, I noticed alot more stuff:

A loose tone pot/knob, and a very acute and worsening grounding problem. I've had the guitar two days, and it's already giving me little shocks every time I touch it.

My final issue with the beast is the pickups. Mosley refers to this humbucker design as their own "exclusive" Quad blade humbucker. However, the much cheaper China-made Stadium brand has a Tele with EXACTLY the same set-up. Jay tells me the pickups are "basically" Seymour Duncan hot rails. I'm not a huge Seymour Duncan fan, but this pickup has no character whatsoever. I'm going to be switching it out,very soon, for a Guitar Fetish Nashville pickup.

And I'm going to take it to a Pro to get it done, so he can fix the grounding problem and loose knobs while he's at it.

Mosley is selling this guitar on their website with a case for $799., and without a case on eBay for $499. But my opinion is that it's actual selling price should be around $199. to $249. There are Squiers and Rondo SX's that are better than this.

It's big selling point is the way that it looks, because this is a very swank looking retro/modified style guitar. I'm going to fix it up and keep the sucker. Just replace the bad parts as they crumble beneath me.

I also reviwed this guitar on Harmony Central, but that was before the grounding problem got so bad and the knob started falling off.

I hate to say this stuff because sales rep Jay was so cool and nice to me, very friendly and helpful, but man, this guitar...let's just say I can work with it and make it into something decent.

Meanwhile Jay is going to take the Hagstrom I traded him, relic it, and probably make some big bucks off of it. Yeah, I kinda got ripped off, but...I knew better and went ahead and let it happen.

Still...damn guitar looks swank, doesn't she?

Surgery for a Starlet

Any guitarist worth the salt in his goddamn tears knows that guitars from the 50s are the most desirable. Unfortunately, classic guitars cost thousands of dollars for examples in poor condition. Old axes in prime condition will cost you more than you can imagine. The emotional and nostalgic value of a classic guitar is, like anything else, subject to the crassness of capitalism.

Alot of American companies now produce replicas of classic guitars in Korea and China, to cut costs. This was once thought to be a sign of poor quality, but experts these days are having a hard time telling the difference between the copies and the copied.

Companies like Eastwood, Dillion, Mosley and Waterstone are all producing affordable copies of classic instruments at high levels of quality. Some large companies are even copying themselves, as is the case with Gibson's Epiphone line and Gretsch's Electromatics.

The main thing I like about this however, is when small companies reproduce guitar classics at low prices. This allows a low rent schlub like moi to buy them and avoid paying huge corporations like Gibson thousands of dollars for their generic product.

Hence my sick hearts and flowers love-crush on the designs of one Mr John Dillion of Dillion guitars. He makes very high quality mid priced guitars that look like the classics of yesteryear, but with modern features and upgrades. He manufactures these guitars in Korea. Not in sweatshops, but in modern factories that are offering jobs to local peoples.

Perhaps my favorite guitar of all time is the 1950s style Les Paul Junior, originally by Gibson. Dillion makes a very high quality replica of the '58 Junior, and I was lucky enough to score one on eBay. I've had two Gibson LP Juniors, Three Epiphone LP Juniors, and several other copies. All were pretty good guitars except one horrible piece of TV Yellow crap by Hondo that I'd rather not talk about. But this Dillion is truly special. It's not perfect, but no guitar is. I love the hell out of this thing.

I like the lightness of the Junior (as well as it's cousins the Special and the Melody Maker), and the biting tone. Of course, the cool retro 50s look and Johnny Thunders connection doesn't hurt either. However, there is one problem here. I also have a huge fetish for the Bigsby vibrato. A device that, when bolted to your guitar, enables you to make cool snazzy rockabilly and surf sounds and look cool as hell doing it. That is not the technical explanation, but you're smellin' my guacamole, no? I basically don't want to play any guitars without a Bigsby, ever ever never ever. Get it?

The Bigsby comes stock on alot of Grestch and Gibson guitars, and you see 'em on Fender Telecasters sometimes, but seeing one on an Lp Junior is very rare indeed.

I looked on the web, though, and found this gorgeous original 1958 sex-beast:



And I decided I needed me one of those,right quick like. So I set about turning my new Dillion LP Junior replica, pictured below, into one.



First, I set the Bigsby on the guitar to determine string angle and placement. Then I used some meat string I stole from work to simulate the path of the string.



Then, I very carefully drilled the bastard a new one. Five new ones actually. Then I drove the screws in and voila! Bigsby goodness! You string it up (always a bitch) and it looka like dis:



And now the thing sounds like Brian Setzer playing Johnny Thunders' guitar. Hipsters, you need to know what I'm talkin' 'bout. This guitar makes you wanna take off your girl's jeans, shave your ironic beard, throw out your Mastodon CDs and be a real man!Like Eddie Cochran! Except not dead!

And it was easy, and only caused me a little bit of nausea. Which for me is a light afternoon.

I'll be talkin' guitars more on this here blog, so if you liked this, check back. If you didn't, go play Guitar Hero or something, you useless little chunk of My Chemical Romance fan!



HUWAH!