With today’s cheap Asian imports, almost everything becomes disposable. Why try to salvage an old guitar when you can buy a new one for under $200, right? Nahhh… used guitars sometimes have more mojo than a new one ever could. Even rough ones with a little TLC can be made into something playable and decent sounding. Look up photos of Willie Nelson’s “Trigger”, or check out Glen Hansard’s beloved Takamine (from the movie Once), and you’ll get the idea. And the ones that are beyond salvation, the spent weaponry of El-Kabong if you will…. well, they can go on the wall or hang from a ceiling as a decoration in your basement rec room, a music store, or even the local pub. There are also many new guitars being made from sustainable forestry wood and wood-alternative materials, such as Martin’s X series and Rainsong’s graphite guitars, if you really want to score some green-peace karma points .
Welcome to my little guitar-centric starter blog which may or may not one day actually have stuff for sale, and does not yet have any credible material on recycling or other environmental issues pertaining to guitars, but is guaranteed to irritate you with toothless rants and useless information in the meantime. It’s not like I expect to develop a big following of readers with this drivel, but it’s a fun project, an outlet for my occasional urge to write, and a good way to record my thoughts, tweaks, and transactions for future reference.
1.75" Gibson Nut On A&L Ami
The recent attempt to widen the string spacing on my A&L Ami parlour was a success. This, as mentioned in my last post, was done by changing out the stock nut for a 1-3/4″ nut (for Gibson guitars- I chose this one because it had a narrower E to E spec than other Tusq 1-3/4″ nuts), lining it up just right and then sanding down the excess to fit the neck nicely. I’ve been playing it a lot over the last few days, and have no problem with strings slipping off the ends of the fretboard. It worked exactly as hoped- there is just a bit more breathing room between the strings, and the treble E string is closer to to the edge so that the slide is hitting the fret ends less when tilted forward to “dodge” the B string.
I also was lucky enough to score an old Schaller pickup off my local luthier, Chuck Shifflett, and had it installed. I tried it with some slide playing through my little Fender Superchamp XD on one of the hi-gain presets, and it was pretty much what I had in mind: dirty sounding and perfect for some nasty electric blues. Plus, the pickup just looks so vintage cool. And we know, I’m all about the mojo, even if it’s fake….well just look at the guitar and you’ll get the idea….
TUSQ PQ-6400-00
I got this idea… On my Art & Lutherie Ami parlor, I’ve been diggin’ playing slide and fingerstyle blues on it a lot lately. Some things that inhibit my playing on this guitar are that it’s not as easy to thumb bass notes on the low E string as on my Martin 000, and that I always get a lot of fret knocking sounds when playing slide on the high E string (tilting my slide forward a bit as I do on some songs when I only want to slide on the 1st string, so that it doesn’t buzz against the 2nd string). I was also thinking about my Martin 000 and one of the things I love about it- compared to my other guitars with the 1-11/16″ nut width, it seems to have a bit more room between strings, and easier to thumb bass notes, so although I never measured it I’m betting it’s got a slightly wider E to E spacing of the nut slots than the others. So then it dawned on me- I could order a new pre-slotted TUSQ nut for a 1-3/4″ fretboard guitar, be careful to choose one that doesn’t have an unusually wide E to E spacing, and just sand it down to length and height to go on my Ami. The end result should be that I’ll have wider spacing without being too close to the edges of the fretboard, and it should improve both of my aforementioned issues…plus give the ol’ fingers a little more room to roam as a bonus! Total cost with shipping CA$18.
