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My Guitars
or click here to go straight to keyboards and recording equipment.
So here's a page strictly for gear heads and musos, this page is full of my beautiful guitars, and some that I no longer own, but used to. Or you can skip to page two for keyboards and recording gear, and pretty boxes that make funny noises. You can also see a lot of my old flat in these pictures, which I enjoy because I moved out of there 2 years ago, not strictly relevant, but it cheers me up to look at it.
My Telecasters
These two are identical tele copies, I have no idea who made them. I got the one on the right for 50 quid a few years ago, and then spent a further 350 on it having it refretted and fitted with Seymour Duncan Hotrails. It's now gorgeous and the nicest guitar I ever played. It has the fattest neck in the world, so you can really get your fingers into it, and it wails like a big waily wonderful thing. I love it. The one on the left I got for a tenner at a car boot sale because I loved the first one so much, I thought I'd grab another one, and do it up as a spare, but I never did. It has now been completely altered, and has a Les Paul neck and twin humbuckers and is blue, it also now belongs to my step-son, who I decided to do it up for in the end, shame, will put up some pics of it eventually. Also you can see some of my prized comic collection underneath them here...
My Stratocasters
Okay, on the left we have my first guitar, which I actually owned (before that, I had borrowed my Dad's acoustic, and a rather fine Ibanez from a bloke I used to know). It's an Oakland strat copy (I've never heard of them either, but it's nice) and has been rewired so you can use all 3 pickups at once, and the tone control works on the bridge pickup as well. I have spent a lot of time dressing the frets on it, as I have ground them into dust since I was 12 years old.
In the middle is my baby, the body is a 1957 Fender, the neck is off a cheap Hohner Arbor series, and it's got custom Dave White pickups in it (like Clapton used to use) also has the custom strat wiring in it that I prefer, Fender got that one really wrong. It had a '57 Hofner neck on it when I got it, and it was so overly thin that the E strings used to slip off after the 12th fret, plus it had a zero fret that pinged every time you bent a string, hence the neck change. You try and find a '57 fender neck cheap. I've recently added a brand new fender USA dual pivot trem system to it as well, so the string spacing finally works and all the strings are on the fretboard. Coupled with new roller tees and a graphite nut, I can now play Van Halen on it without going out of tune. It's perfect, if a little beat up and buzzy.
On the right is another project, it's the Hohner Arbor that the neck came from, with the '57 Hofner neck from the Yellow Strat. I used to have it as a four string Mandytar (mandolin tuning) but I used it's pickups for the black strat, and the black strat's pickups for another project I have since sold. It currently has pickups from an old Marlin inside it, wired into two seperate outputs, sounds very scary through two amps and an octave pedal. Shame I stole the tuners and put them on my yellow strat. Must stop rebuilding my guitars all the time.
Acoustic Guitars and my Ibanez
Okay then, far left, a Washburn 6-string acoustic, got for a Les Paul copy and a much cheaper Washburn. Very nice, recently had a Dean Markley Sweet Spot pickup installed under the bridge. Next is an Aria 12-string, which I got from my Mum when I was 18, for my A-level results, sometimes parents are good. After that is my Ibanez, I did find out what it was recently, but I forget. All the neck will tell you is that it is an Electric Guit (I assume the "ar" was worn off over the years). It serves mostly as an onstage spare, as I rarely get through a night without breaking a string, even though it's a great guitar, and I once saw Nile Rogers of Chic playing one. Since I took that photo, the pickups have been removed for my step-sons super scary Les Paul/telecaster thing, and I have a zebra Mighty-mite Motherbucker for it, and a kahler flyer, pictures to follow when I finish it off. Finally, on the right, is a Brunswick classical, again, I've never heard of these before, but it's good, and has a piezo pickup under the bridge, which is always useful. That's my Vinyl collection behind them by the way, and yes, that's Spiderman on the wall, and it is that big...
Sunburst Corner
So my love of the Tobacco Sunburst is revealed at last. On the left, a real gem, my 1956 Hofner Congress (Yeah like Hank Marvin used to use before he got a Strat) it took a lot of questions on the net to find out what year it was, but I did in the end and was happy. Got it in an antique shop of all places, for a not too bad price considering what it is. Never stays in tune, I never leave the house with it, but it sounds fantastic, and almost all my acoustic parts get recorded with this baby.
In the middle is my Aria mandolin, again I have my parents to thank for this one (GCSE results this time) I always wish I played it more, but there's only so much mandolin you can use before you become a folk-singer. Shame about the electro-magnetic pickup, but I couldn't afford one with a piezo, though it's on my wants list now.
Finally, on the right, a Turner electro-acoustic. Bought it as an onstage spare, spent a fortune on it as I am doing a lot more acoustic gigs now, and I needed a backup for the Washburn, however, the Washburn became the backup. Again I never heard of Turner, but it's lovely, it looks beautiful, plays beautiful, and sounds beautiful. Has a Shadow P7 under the bridge, and that extra fatness of body that gives you a deep edge over the guys who own guitars that fit in standard cases. Used to have a Yamaha SG1000 in Tobacco sunburst as well, but I sold it when my last amp exploded and I needed a new one. Here is that very Yamaha
My Basses
On the left, weird old Yamaha bass, hugely fat sound cos of the bar pickup at the bridge, you can do a mean stranglers impression on it, and if you crank the gain up enough, you can pretend you're Lemmy. Very cool. On the right is my old Sunn Mustang, that I rebuilt after using it to play cricket with (mxr Flanger as the ball, oh dear...) took a while, but it also plays real nice, and sounds great.
The Pretty one on the Wall
Erm, yeah. I got this one as a repair job for a mate, I was unable to repair it, and did him another one instead. Then later on this artist said he wanted s guitar that looked good for an installation he was doing, so I did him this. The P-90 pickups are just an old strat backplate with screws in, the neck is held on with bits of old speaker, the machine heads are held in with blu-tack, and until recently it had volume pots glued on to the front of it (but I needed them for something else). It looks great though. Oh by the way the artist didn't take it, or pay me for the work I did for him, cos he said the headstock was too pointy, and he wanted a classic look. I spent a whole afternoon sanding that headstock down so it wasn't pointy anymore. What a git.
Once again, I have now sold this guitar for a whopping £25 to the guy I got my dog from, he's sprayed it black and put real pickups in it, plays and sounds real nice now, who'd have thought it.