Guitar Flayer
While Amrit was shredding through C86 earlier this morning, we ran across an article in the Wall Street Journal (yeah, so) about peeps paying a pretty penny for distressed guitars -- basically folks at the plant get a hold of high-powered solvents, sand paper, hammers, etc., to make new guitars look old. Never been a fan of distressed jeans and this seems significantly dorkier (especially when you find out that Tom Murphy, the head of Guitar Preservation Inc., is "a former professional music who in the early '80s played guitar in Marie Osmond's touring band").
Thing is, is Murphy (and folks at similar companies) aren't just making these scratched axes for rich doctors, lawyers, and martial-arts fighters-cum-"amateur" blues men jamming on their weekend Harley's...
Dude's built replicas played by Jimmy Page, Joe Perry, Eric Clapton, and Andy Summers, among others. Whaa? Via WSJ:
Fender is producing copies of Police guitarist Andy Summers's 1961 Telecaster -- which he bought used in 1972 for $200 -- which are authentic right down to the broken bridge and quirky custom electronics. The 250 replicas are being offered at $15,000 each ... This summer, Mr. Summers is using three of the replicas on his band's reunion tour; he is leaving the original home in Los Angeles. The British-born guitarist says that visually and musically he can't tell the difference between the doppelgangers and the original, whose battered paint job he compares to "a map of a foreign planet."Sting's playing a replica of his 1955 Fender Precision bass, but unlike Summers, his is a one-off, not something you yourself can purchase.
Reportedly, when Summers caught a glimpse of his first factory-aged guitar at an L.A. studio he had a "quantum-physics moment": "I said: 'It's back at my house. How's it here? It's an impossibility!"'
Speaking of impossibilities, hypothetically, if you could waste loads of money on a distressed axe, whose would you choose?
Posted at 4:39 PM
Tags: Andy Summers | Sting | The Police
this is better than instrument insurance for touring musicians who can afford it. and why not sell a few to the doctors and lawyers while you're at it? nothing wrong with capitalism. ;)
if i had the scratch lying around i'd have my cherished guitars replicated before going out on tour. especially the older, customized stuff that'd be impossible to replace. and imagine how nice it'd be to break a string on your #1, turn to a tech, and have them hand you the exact same guitar all setup and ready to go. pretty sweet: that's what it'd be.
given loads of money to waste i'd be hard pressed to choose between an exact copy of trey's languedoc, summer's tele and a copy of one of lifeson's les pauls with a floyd rose in it.
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It's been going on for years, not a secret amongst musicians.
The rumor is that Keith Richards started this trend in the late 80's/early 90's when he asked Fender to make him exact copies of his old telecasters because they were starting to get worn out from use & they have essentially become irreplaceable to him. What was a $200 gtr purchased in 1972, is now a 20K gtr regardless of who owned it before.
When these guys were buying and playing these now old gtrs, they were new or at least new-ish.
I'd get Jimmy Page's LP. But they already did a run of those that cost A LOT of $$$.
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Fender have been doing it for years. And how bout that exact Eddie Van Halen replica. I'd feel like such a phoney for buying one of those.
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The Van Halen one is probably the worst because it's easily recognizable. Eric Clapton's Blackie replicas aren't far off.
Angus Young's SG is gorgeous.
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Scuse me while I get busy working on my Fender Mexi-Strat, my Epiphone SG, and my Tokai Les Paul. I'll have to tie some rope and drag them along when I drive to the grocery store next time.
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Story time: I've been saving for a beautiful PRS 513 in Blue Matteo tiger maple... I don't make all that much money, at least not so much after Discover card (and misspent youth) get their pound of flesh...
To alleviate my depression over lack of funds, I truck it to Guitar Center a couple times a month just to stare at the PRS guitars. Masochistic? Yes. Pathetic? Yes. Does it make me feel better? No, but I don't drink or get high, so whaddya gonna do?
So anyway, as someone with such egregious coveting
going on for this majestic piece of hard-bodied, shine-laquered, triple pickup'd beauty, I can't fathom why anyone would f-up any guitar they could actually afford to have. Worse, pay cash money TO have it shitted up!
Or as John Hiatt once sang:
Oh it breaks my heart to see those stars
Smashing a perfectly good guitar
I dont know who they think they are
Smashing a perfectly good guitar
Frickin' retards...
DwD
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Harley's? The plight of the apostrophe is enough to make this English teacher weep.
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they have been doing this for years. it is from the fender custom shop. sadly, they refer to these guitars as relic'd. as real as a three dollar bill. if you have seen one of these, you can tell. there are tells in the aging. these are the acidwashed jeans of the guitar world.
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Cobain's. You could smash it against the stage, and Earnie Bailey would be able to put it back together again for the next show.
Of course, I don't know where you're going to find a replica Earnie Bailey.
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um, DUHHHH. who didn't know about this? and btw, it's not some "dude" who is selling these guitars for $15,000 (or more. the new EVH one is going for 25) it's FENDER MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS CO. The ones that some dude made and is selling on ebay are usually obviously sand-papered down (kinda like that one in the picture up there), the ones fender sells for multi-G's actually look authentic and are often only subtly worn.
More notable than Andy Summers guitar is the Joe Strummer Telecaster. That shit is absolutely redic. Strummer beat that thing to shit and repainted it multiple times, the idea of fender trying to replicate that is just beyond me.
But if you want to know the truth, I bet even Strummer did shit to his guitar to make it look worse. I've definitely known plenty of punks who cut holes in the their jeans.
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Guitar damages are battle scars - you remember where you were and how each one happened, and you need to earn them for yourself. Agreed the Joe Strummer guitar is particularly ridiculous. Not to mention the fact that, with the exception of a group of very old guitars, if you want a guitar that has been beat to hell by a player so you look cooler, go on Ebay - you can buy a REAL 70's guitar which someone slammed around for (often times) less than the relics.
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@Dw Dunphy: I'm citing you for misuse of those John Hiatt lyrics. Hiatt was lamenting the destruction of guitars, but these guitars not only are still playable, they sound as good as new.
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I don't think anything can beat Dweezil Zappa's strat. It's the same one that Hendrix burned at Monterrey. I guess Frank picked up the remains and had it rebuilt.
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That is some whack shit, for sure.
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~~~, I confess. I misappropriated the Hiatt lyrics, but you have to admit I was in the ballpark. I could've quoted "Slow Turning" and confused everyone.
But give me this: even though these old looking guitars are brand new guts, who would take a brand new car, meant for massive commuting, and key the sides, kick in the quarter panels and scorch the roof to simulate sun damage? Sure, the motor's pristine and the radiator ain't cooking up that bad maple syrup smell, but that outer damage has no reason for existing.
Same here. If you want a shitty looking guitar, play it a lot, throw up on it occasionally and maybe clock an Abbe Hoffman look-alike on the head a couple times. Faking a history is... well... kind of retarded.
DwD
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I wonder if they could replicate one of Townshend's guitars?
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Great story.
John Mayer has been holding these on his album covers for a while now, as well as other wannabe guitar heroes like That Bearded Dude from Linkin Park (the first lead guitarist who doesn't know how to play an actual guitar solo).
It's all an act, and a show, and a sham.
Surprise. What a pathetic generation we've got here.
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The guitars that John Mayer plays aren't reliced - they're real Strats from the 50's and 60's that he purchased.
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I'd agree with everyone about this relic guitar business accept for how I, literally, stumbled across one. There was what looked to be a 40+ year old Fender Strat laying in a case on the floor of the guitar shop I was in. I when I picked it up and played a few chords it sounded amazing. When I asked the guy behind the counter what had happened to the old case he smiled. Then he filled me in on the whole relic thing. Its not about the looks but the feel of these instruments [at least the ones I've played] that make them really special. There's more to it than just cosmetics as well from what was explained to me. The wood has been aged in a different way which allows the cells to dry differently. I don't know if that's true anymore but at the time thats supposedly how Fender was doing it. In most other cases I doubt that is the case. FWIW - if I were to get an aged guitar I'd seriously consider getting one from Bill Nash [http://www.nashguitars.com/].
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Thats funny - "the wood has been aged a different way"
Its the saem bodies and necks as the new guitars, just distressed. Your mind makes up the rest.
ThE only one factor that exists is the ultra thin nitro paint. Distressed guitars are painted in thin nitro as oppossed to the thick plastic like poly modern guitars are coated in. This is the one and only legit factor that makes a guitar sound better.
Bill Nash for instance used some of the cheapest wood known to man.
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REVOLUTION we're all gonna DIE ! ! !
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