here is a lovely picture of an old Olympici guitar that someone gave me recently in exchange for a broken minidisc player that subsequently started working.Back to list
and this one, taken by the excellent Keith Pattison is of me at a village hall in front of the toilet holding my accordion which I bought for fifty pounds in a music shop in North Sheilds and trying to appear competent, it's also the cover of the first album.Back to list
This is a John Grey snare drum that I bought, together with a homemade stand, in portobello rd market for a tenner. It is from the 1950s and has the original vellum heads and snare and it sounds like a pile of crap.Back to list
This is an 'Audition' electric guitar made in Japan in the late sixties/early seventies. When I was young my split knee jeaned rugby shirted lank haired elitist friends and I would stand in Woolworth's and mock instruments like this and the fools who bought and attempted to play them. Explain then if you can my utter delight in being presented with one by a noble friend of my son's who saved it and four other instruments from the skip as they were removed from the wall of the bar in the hotel where he worked. Give , if it is possible, a credible reason why my eyes filled with tears of love as I tenderly restored it and invested supernatural significance in the fact that at the very moment i was handed it someone offered for sale a bridge for one on ebay. Enlighten me as to the motives underlying my wish to never be parted from it. And the tremelo works and everything.Back to list
.
I present here a cheap italian mandola damaged beyond repair as a warning to all those seeking easy thrills by leaving their instruments for prolonged periods in inadequately heated outbuildings
Back to list
My delightful USA made 1988 fender telecaster bought new in 1989 after members of the criminal classes made off with our instruments after a show in Derby. It cost 200 pounds more than the japanese made model and the only difference I can tell is that all the string holder metal cup things fall out of the back and get lost with depressing regularity. Well worth the extra.
Back to list
A Japanese Fender Precision bass guitar bought new at a bargain price of £199 from Sound Control in Newcastle because you had to have it in pink and this constituted too large a threat to the average male bass player's sexuality to enable the full retail price to be asked. I have never played the instument in public but would have no objection to doing so as I am fully comfortable with my robust heterosexuality and only very occasionally do I feel the need to stroke it's sensuous pink curves against my benegligeed torso.Back to list
The true wonder and glory that is my Harmony 'Roy Smeck' 5 String banjo. A constant source of joy to me and my fellows, bought by my friend Graham's dad at an auction for £10 and subject to an ugly rumour that I have it on some kind of long term 'loan' arrangement after I had lovingly restored it (new bridge and small piece of white gaffa tape) and repaired the cracked bakelite resonator with super glue and got a case for it which my friend Tony found in a back alley in Heaton and if anyone wants it they'll have to pry it from my cold dead fingers...Back to list
A Fylde Orsino 12 String acoustic Guitar fitted with an EMG under saddle pick up and preamp by Paul the marvellous violin repairer in Berwick upon Tweed who also miraculously repaired the headstock after the forces of darkness (in their then guise of a toddling child and gormless juvenile dog) snapped it off for want of better amusement. Paul has also and quite recently glued the bottom and side of this instrument which appears to hit a hard object every time i get the bloody thing out of the case. The case is broken as well.Back to list
And this is a gratuitous picture of the aforementioned dog now grown to maturity and looking pleased with himself after commiting some ghastly atrocity that I, ( barefoot hungover and in the dark no doubt,) have yet to encounter .
Back to list
A strange 1970 Framus'Texan' type guitar with a 'moustache' bridge that I bought recently off a man who runs a folk club. It is solidly built in the German manner and has (he assured me) a solid mahogany top The back is bowed for no reason I can think of.
Back to list
A Scandalli 96 bass accordion is here presented which I swapped for a frankly indifferent Hofner Senator. It has lit up my life to no small extent except there are screws missing that I can't replace and it is on the heavy side for a man of my advanced years. The round things on it are mutes and are an elaborate way of adjusting the volume apparently but don't do the job very well which is strange when you consider the Italian reputation for design although that tower in Pisa leans a bit and many of their cities are built foolishly close to volcanoes so perhaps we should not be too surprised.
Back to list
The Lord is kind and good and has spared me long enough to unite me with this piece of fabulousness made in Sweden in 1962. It came in an unredeemably awful case and playing it is a spiritual experience. There is a spade in this photograph for which I can offer no explanation.
Back to list
This guitar, a hofner 461s featured lavishly all over other pages on this fabulous site, has recently been the focus of frenzied attempts to buy it by offering frankly not enough money. It is as lovely to play as it looks and actually sounds like something you'd want to listen to as opposed to other hofners I have rubbed up against which sound not very good, and anyway a lot of tripe is spouted about the supposed marvellousness of vintage guitars and amplifiers mostly by people trying to sell them at comic prices, I don't recall hearing that musicians in the 1960s got worked up about 1920's instruments but then a lot of them were on drugs and driving cars without seatbelts. The instrument here pictured was made in 1954 and is sometimes known as the 'Black Beauty' as it looks very like a horse that's about to have some exciting adventures.Back to list
Here I am only partially obscured by a mic stand rocking out playing rock and roll which aint noise pollution at a benefit gig for Callum Atkin with Brian Johnson out of AC/DC singing, Paul Thompson out of Roxy Music on the drums, Brendan Healy on the Keybords and the young Peter Peverley giving it his all through his new old WEM dominator combo. We were thrilled. Brian Johnson said I played the bass like Donald 'Duck' Dunn, (or it might have been just the 'Duck' part, I couldn't really hear), and he signed my son's guitar and the next day I dissolved the autograph by applying a preserving acrylic varnish I spent some time trying to find in town after being assured by the troll like man in the Art shop would be perfect for the job. Rarely has a Father gone from coolness to foolness in so short a space of time..Back to list
Return to Jim's Special Place