Great guitar build off!

[antares]

Cool Tele Eddie. I remember it. Wasn't the pickguard some of your son's artistry?

e&oe ...

[dnic]

I do like the top on Big Ds tele. He's made an art form out of hand rubbed stains.

[antares]

My partner (we've never married in our forty years together!) makes celebration cakes too Dane, and I occasionally get roped in to cast an engineers eye over things, guess at diameters and slice cakes to enable fillings. Easier to pull that off than cutting wood! I would guess she's made around one hundred all told and a good 15-20 wedding cakes over the years, one was four tier wedfing cake for my boss's daughter's wedding! She only does it for friends and family so never charges for her time or materials which as you are aware are far from insignificant, but one time she had a request from her boss to make a "wonky cake" which was wedge shaped slabs piled on high. That cost us about $100 for the tin moulds and ever since they've been cluttering up the space under the stairs. We were given a gratis meal for two in a swish restaurant in West London as "payment" for that. Hmm. Friends and family ever since!

e&oe ...

[dnic]

My wife Johnnie started out the same way making cakes and deserts for family functions when we were still in LA. First time she made a stacked cake was after we moved to Mt Shasta and she asked me to help with figuring out how to keep it in the air. I think that was the first for hire cake. I think that was the first cake I got involved with the frosting as well. We used to use pillars and plates to get space between cakes and all kinds of different things but now most people seem to like smaller simpler wedding cakes with maybe a desert bar as well. Steve we have a whole room (small though it may be)dedicated to cake pans and sundry baking supplies. Johnnie has a Face Book page called Johnnie Cakes Mt Shasta. Check it out.

It's nice that we have a hobby we can share with our girls and funny how we have one more thing in common.

[Deleted]

Sept 25, 2020 15:23:41 GMT -6 antares said:

Cool Tele Eddie. I remember it. Wasn't the pickguard some of your son's artistry?

e&oe ...

Yes, this is some of what my son can do.

EB

[Deleted]

here ya go!

[antares]

I prefer your take on a Tele to all the pimped up ones Eddie.

e&oe ...

[Deleted]

Sept 26, 2020 10:46:06 GMT -6 antares said:

I prefer your take on a Tele to all the pimped up ones Eddie.

e&oe ...

Thanks!

EB

[stratpurist]

I guess I'm an outlier. I liked Ben's build. Some of his builds show off incredible skills but not practical to take out on stage. My favorite was Brad's which looked comfortable to play and gig worthy.


Dane: "I agree Steve the only 12 string live that's made since to me was J Ps use in Stairway."

Call me commercial but Don Felder's double neck on Hotel California is probably more recognized than Stairway.

[dnic]

Hey StratP, I forgot about Hotel Cal. Very good use of a double neck!

[antares]

But all the best bits were played by Joe on a Tele weren't they? Well put it another way- all those parts that I had to make a commitment to be able to play before I cottoned on to the fact that it was actually a duet ...

e&oe ...

[Deleted]

I had my hands on an SG double neck guitar back in the late 90's. It had 12 string and the 6 string on it. But after playing it for a while, I decided it was not a guitar that I would like to own. Although they look cool on stage, to me, I found it heavy, and again for me really not that fun to play.

 Yes Ben does have a lot of skill, and really enjoy his videos on You Tube and Face Book. Seems like a lot of builders these days are really trying to go over the top in custom builds. And that's OK. But like any custom there are some that can be over done.

 But I am glad that we all don't all like the same thing.

I know I have built one guitar that was way over the top for me. But it's what the customer wanted. So he got what he wanted. Kustoms are really for the owner not the builder. A builders job is to have the skill to bring to life anothers dream. Not build the guitar for builder.

 To date I have built 6 Kustoms for people. The rest of my Kustoms are for me. Yes I have even sold a few of my Kustoms over the years.

 I really miss building guitars just as much I miss building cars. But at least it was all fun while it lasted. I also miss working on guitars.

 A little off the point, but I think I am going to start selling off more of my collection of guitars. I am down to 17 guitars, and about half of them I could sell. The rest of them are guitars that I build for me and would like to keep them.

The only one that will not be sold while I alive in my 1971 LP custom. I have had that guitar since 1971. I bought in brand new. I still have the sales receipt for it. It also has the Gibson strap that came with the guitar.

 Ben said he will announce the next build off around December. He says it will be handled different than the last one. It will be interesting to see who will be in it next time round. Texas Toast already said that won't be in it as far as building goes. If I remember right I think Ben said the same thing on not doing a build. But he will be sponsoring it.   It will be interesting...

EB

[antares]

My Dad used to say "Son, if the customer wants it painted sky blue pink with yellow polka dots, paint it and charge him accordingly". Another way of saying "The Customer is always right" which of course is rhetoric.

I think that your position holds firm with solid electric guitars Eddie, but with acoustics you should pick your maker for his style and not try to persuade him off course. Not many "custom" acoustic builders I am aware of. They don't want to be associated with lemon instruments just to garner cash because in the long run it can hurt their carefully honed reputation. Just find someone else that builds closer to the way you want. There's good reason why a successful acoustic builder has arrived at where he has, and he kind of knows better what works, at least within his experience. He/She and $0.02 of course.

e&oe ...

[Deleted]

Oct 7, 2020 17:06:21 GMT -6 antares said:

My Dad used to say "Son, if the customer wants it painted sky blue pink with yellow polka dots, paint it and charge him accordingly". Another way of saying "The Customer is always right" which of course is rhetoric.

I think that your position holds firm with solid electric guitars Eddie, but with acoustics you should pick your maker for his style and not try to persuade him off course. Not many "custom" acoustic builders I am aware of. They don't want to be associated with lemon instruments just to garner cash because in the long run it can hurt their carefully honed reputation. Just find someone else that builds closer to the way you want. There's good reason why a successful acoustic builder has arrived at where he has, and he kind of knows better what works, at least within his experience. He/She and $0.02 of course.

e&oe ...

Even at that, the builder needs to get inside of the players head. A builder needs to understand what a player is reaching for. On all of my "Kustom" guitars I built for others I worked with them closely. I would even make them play in front of me so I could see how they played. I would watch everything about their playing.

 When it came time for me to carve the necks I would set up a day for the customer to come over and I would work the neck to what they liked and how it felt to them. I feel in custom acoustics they too can be built to the customers needs. I do agree about woods used in acoustics as far a a good sounding acoustic over a dead sounding acoustic. But If I am going to spend lets say $10,000 or more for a custom acoustic, I would want it to reflect what I want in terms of feel and sound. If the builder that is building a custom and would hear what the customer is wanting then his knowledge  of woods and construction would come into play and more than likely give a custom more than what He/She wanted. The customer would be overwhelmed and would not shut up about the builder.

 Although I never built an acoustic, does not mean I don't know how they are built and what goes into them. I have studied acoustic building for a long time. I know about "tone" taping, and what woods work good with each other, I also know that the most common "X" brace that goes on top can change the sound of any acoustic out there.

 Right before I sold my shop off I was getting ready to build an acoustic. I had most of the woods. But it never happened.

 Well, anyways, I have watched a lot videos on making acoustic guitars. I even use to hang around a place in CA back in 1971 where they built custom acoustic guitars for a lot of well known people. They would would let me go in and watch them. I asked them so many questions... LOL! I was trying hard to get them to let me work there, but it never happened, because at the time I was in a work rock band and I was on the road a lot.

 At that time I was just a kid. But I knew more about acoustic guitars than I ever knew about electric guitars. You know I have too have built an ES335 guitar. Not just solid body guitars.

 On top of that I have owned a lot of acoustic guitars over the many years that I have been playing. I know what I want in an acoustic. I also know the hype that goes into acoustic guitars. Just because a company has been around a long time does not mean they are the best out there.

 About a year ago I went into a guitar shop. I seen this awesome looking acoustic on the rack. I asked if I could check it out. I was sitting there and playing it and my first thought was... Nice looking but hard to play. The action was so high to the point it looked like it already needed a neck reset.

 My wife walked in and of course the first thing she looked at was the price. That guitar was almost $7,000 Taylor. There was no way that guitar was worth that kind of money. It should have been sent back to Taylor. The thing is I see stuff like this all of the time. I know that there are people out there that don't have a clue on what they are buying and will buy a guitar like that only because of the name.

 I had a customer in AZ that he would only buy name brand guitars. He would get one and bring it to me to set up. Most of the were acoustics. There was one he brought to me that was a Martin acoustic. It had a cracked neck! Kid you not! As soon as I put my hand on the neck I felt it. So he took the $4,500 guitar back and was able to get something else. My customer said he never even played the guitar, that he bought it because it looked good. WOW!

 I have worked on a lot of acoustic guitars low end to the high end and beyond. To this dated I have never had one that I was over impressed with. At least name brand wise. My new little Fender acoustic that I had just gotten, I like it a lot but it does not over whelm me. It is an easy guitar to play and because of it smaller size is perfect for me. I can play it for long periods of time and not be in a lot of pain.

 Just because I don't post everything on here does not mean I have not done it. When I was in AZ, I was super busy building and working on guitars. That one summer I was there I had to hire someone to help me out. I did not take pictures of everything I did. I didn't always have to the time to take pictures and post them. So a lot of things I worked on never got recorded.

 My only thing is, I wish I could have built a few acoustic guitars. I wish now that I could go back to 1971 and landed the job at that guitar shop. I know I could build an acoustic that would play and sound great!

EB

[dnic]

So much to respond to and I don't want to write a book.

I'm pretty sure Don Felder who wrote the song played his parts on the 12 double neck.

Working with the public in some form basically my whole life the customer is not always right. But we must make them think they are and are getting exactly what they want and need. There is of course a line where you have to let them know that are raving mad and no amount of money or customer loyalty can save them. Then toss them out on their ear.

I think we have pretty much proven, through concrete guitar videos, that solid body guitars can be very strangely appointed and still sound good. Not the case with acoustic guitars and I would agree that a builder who has built his business on tone would be unwilling to take risks in appearance that might alter that long sought after tone result. And brace location, size and carve have a ton to do with the finished products tone. As do pretty much all the woods in the guitar.

I will be building an acoustic at some point and then I'm sure I will get sucked down that rabbit hole of tone perfection. When that happens will one of you fine folk drop a cord down the hole and help me out?