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Forum Newbie
Group: Forum Members
Last Login: 05/08/2008 07:04:57
Posts: 49, Visits: 113 |
| Uke Man
The PMs is a'buzzin'
Ray |
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iMuso Guitar Guy
Group: Administrators
Last Login: Yesterday @ 22:35:28
Posts: 669, Visits: 1,549 |
| | When I finally persuaded my parents to buy me a guitar it was an 'orrible Zenta out of Grattens catalogue. It really was a stinker with a traffic bollard for a neck and an action so high that swans would fly into the strings and break their necks. Eventually the hunt was on for a second-hand guitar (largely because that's the cheapest option and we wuz terrible poor). After rejecting a couple of Woolies specials my dad and me went to see someone in a village down the road who had a Watkins Rapier for sale. Upon arriving we discovered it was a left hand model. But is was so lovely I had to have it and the deal was sealed. My dad had a bandsaw and we cut a new body using the original as a template. He then routed the cavities, I flipped the scratchplate and it all went together rather nicely. This was my only guitar and it saw gigging service with my first band at school. The lead guitarist had a black Columbus Les Paul copy, he's not in the picture because he was holding the camera! 
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The Man in the Jar
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Junior Member
Group: Forum Members
Last Login: 13/03/2008 22:53:38
Posts: 50, Visits: 144 |
| Tooth Hurty - Ray. Get the kettle on before I get round. Proper builder's tea and bourbon biscuits please. How very un-rock 'n'roll of me. Looking forward to it but do I have to use the tradesman's entrance? Uke Man
MIJ. Smashing photo of the good old days! Ah, the Watkins Rapier 33 - I bet it was red. I'll tell my Watkins story later as this thread seems to have legs aplenty yet.
Columbus guitars - another blast from the past. My best mate had a black Columbus Les Paul. They were quite er... adequate instruments. I had another mate, Mark Phillips, who played a Hofner Galaxy in the 1970s. He didn't just play it, he sounded like Eric Clapton to lesser mortals like me. But that's another story for another time. I'd love to see a picture of a Hofner Galaxy again for old time's sake.
Stay in tune!
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Uke Man - "Man Overboard!" |
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Forum Member
Group: Forum Members
Last Login: 22/09/2008 14:33:09
Posts: 191, Visits: 562 |
| My first guitar was an Encore strat copy... nuff said! In white, mind, just like Hendrix used!
About 15 years ago I got my first really good guitar. It was a Charvel 275, in fuschia, 22 fret neck, locking trem, humbucker, single coil, 3-way switch and a volume control. What more do you need? Played like a dream, sounded fantastic. Over the years, that guitar got modded and battered like crazy (I refinished it 3 times, removed the single coil and the 3 way switch (filling up the holes with copious amounts of Magic Wood before I repainted it), reshaped the headstock, scalloped the fretboard, slimmed down the neck. Managed to snap the trem arm during a performance in 1996, so I blocked up the bridge for more sustain. I'd still have it to this day, except the last time I was refinishing it, I somehow mislaid one of the bridge posts... oops! Searched high and low for a replacement, but noone had one in stock, anywhere!
In the end (after about 18 months of having the guitar in bits in an old suitcase), we came to move house and it just had to go. Although I have more and better guitars now, I do still miss that guitar, it sounded and played completely uniquely, and it was my guitar! Only decent shot I can find of it (with me looking a whole lot younger than I do now - this gig was December 2001 I believe) is here:
Voyager Project - Christian Progressive Metal |
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Forum Newbie
Group: Forum Members
Last Login: 05/08/2008 07:04:57
Posts: 49, Visits: 113 |
| Uke man
I didn't think you'd have problems with Chinese Dentist Time - I can usually recognise other environmental humourists* from a distance of five miles or more.
If you like Rapiers remind me to show you the pic of me and my Burns on stage with a guy called Terry Thomas (no, not the old film star, he was Terry-Thomas) playing a Rapier.
Mind you, these days The Rapiers** play Strats (but then, the Burns guitar company is run by Mr Gibson so everything is back to front).
Bourbon biscuits being mined and washed clean as I speak.
Ray
* environmental humourist - a person who recycles old jokes.
** The best current UK professional band for reproducing the early '60s sound of The Shadows. |
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Forum Newbie
Group: Forum Members
Last Login: 24/02/2008 10:28:01
Posts: 8, Visits: 18 |
| Hi guys!
I'm an enthusiatic recycler with a 'rapier' wit -not.
At the recording studio the producer stops the recording half way through the first take. " The bass player is out of tune. Check it, please!"
The bass guitarist pulls all his stings. " Nothin' wrong with my tunin': all the strings are equally tight."
The lead guitarist, who has no love for the bassist, turns around to him. "You bloody idiot! Everone knows it's not the tension. It's the tuning heads that have to be parallel."
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Bouzouki Joe - "Man in a Suitcase"
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iMuso Guitar Guy
Group: Administrators
Last Login: Yesterday @ 22:35:28
Posts: 669, Visits: 1,549 |
| Dear ol' Joe. The man who puts the Git back into Guitar...
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The Man in the Jar |
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Junior Member
Group: Forum Members
Last Login: 13/03/2008 22:53:38
Posts: 50, Visits: 144 |
| As everyone else is either showing or unashmedly boasting about their Watkins Rapier, I'll show you mine.
Circa. Summer 1969 -With the future Mrs Uke Man and me holding repainted Rapier 33 - original colour red as in headstock. Note my bell bottoms and the Italian, two-tone maroon suede and leather brothel creepers I am wearing!
Enjoy the two pics.
 
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Uke Man - "Man Overboard!"
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iMuso Guitar Guy
Group: Administrators
Last Login: Yesterday @ 22:35:28
Posts: 669, Visits: 1,549 |
| | Talking of Bell Music catalogues I can remember drooling over this exact page for hours on end 
I was particularly entranced by the Wilson Super 6 at bottom left-hand corner. This possibly informed my decision to buy a Shergold Masqerader a few years later... 
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The Man in the Jar
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