Interesting Article - Musicians on the bond with their instruments

[Teebs]

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2020/feb/20/it-feels-like-an-extra-limb-musicians-on-the-bond-with-their-instruments

 

[Teebs]

I recognise some of the things the musicians in this article say.

 

[EdwardMarlowe]

It's very true. Of all my guitars, some I bonded with, others I didn't. Typically, the latter are ones I bought as part of 'widening my palette'  - i.e. bought with the head, not the shrivelled, black little thing I call a heart. My two most special guitars I currently own re my Fenders. The 94 US Std Strat I bought new. It had to be ordered in from the US because neither the local shop nor Arbiter in London had a lefty in the configuration I wanted in stock - three tone burst, maple board. Went for rosewood back then because the maple was untinted and looked well aneamic. It's aged nicely since, though. I remember the day I picked it up, walking out, one of the guys in the sohp saw me and said "So you finally got it, then?". Shout out to Matchett's in Belfast; they were always incredibly tolerant of a lefty kid hanging around and asking all sorts of questions about their Fenders.  THe other Fender is a 71RI Telecaster. What makes this special is that I wasn't looking for it. I saw it in a window of Guitar Guitar in Reading when I was down visitng a firend, and (she being a lefty too) we went in and spent a pleasant hour playing that and a matching white CIJ 68 Strat. THe Strat was lovely and money no object I'd have bought it too, but there was something about that Tele.... Six month later, I had some money and wandered in just to see... It was still there, and now it's mine. That wasthe first and to date only guitar that I ever bought that I didn't go looking for, somehow it just found me. I love it. Best neck of all my guitars. The Strat is still lovely, though it's always been just fractionally wider at the nut than I'd like.... somehow thatUS 43mm as compared to the Mex / Japan / Squier 42mm makes a huge difference in my paws.

One guitar I bondedwith surprisingly is my Steinberger Spirit. Bought it on eBay from someone who had imported it privately when I was looking for a travel guitar (before the clamdown on cabin-carry-on instruments which limited them to violin-size, curses). Took a while to find as at that point MusicYo wouldn't export to the UK becasue they had a UK Steiberger stockist, and the UK stockist didn't stock the sole leftymodel they did. IT's ugly AF, frankly - could only be uglier if it had the paddle shape body - mine is the one that tries to look like a guitar. I hate the headless look. The bridge is ugly. It has the absolute worst pup arrangmenet for me - HSH. I hate humbuckers. And yet.... there's just something so wonderfully practical about it for carrying about, nevergonig out of tune, it's sonice to play, thatI love it inspite of itself. I was at one point halfway tempted to start a Steinbergers-only punk band..... (andyeah, I know it's only a budget version and not the real thin,g but SFW).

[EdwardMarlowe]

Oh... my first guitar. A Kay acoustic dreadnaught that aped one of the hippier Gibsons. Looked exactly like this one:



Bought it via a smalls ad in the Belfast Telegraph, December 1991, for thirty quid. PLayed it every chance I got. About twenty years later, it was donated to a church charity; it's somewhere in Africa now, hopefully some kid is still enjoying it as much as I did. I was sentimental about that, it being my first guitar, but sometimes you have to release them back into the wild and let someone else pick up the mojo....(Ironically, I see they're now collectible in some circles and starting to make money!)

Edited March 9, 2020 by EdwardMarlowe