Introducing "The Pretty In Pimp One"

Well, it's the end of the £100 Challenge today and I seem to have just about snuck in before the end, with a burned and battered-looking slide box of a guitar - The Pretty In Pimp One.

I'll give  better day-lit photos later, but here it is and I have to say it is a stunning one to play...and it sounds absolutely raw.

For the record:

The Donor guitar was a Telecaster Clone. Maple Neck and some rock-solid hardwood body.

The Neck has been shaped, and rough oiled and generally burned to give an impression of smoke-staining with a touch of revolution around the edges.

The Body has been covered with Green Velvet, soft on the front and back, rock solid and rough as hell on the sides.

The Hardware is gold, a Jazzy bridge  and ABR tailpiece, six neat little tuners, which with the gold explains the Family Stone counterpoint, to Marvin Gaye's revolutionary call.

The Scratchplate is made from a 10" Vinyl Single, painted gold and melted strategically to let the pickups, switch, pots and jack to peep through.

The Pickups are Genuine Gibson P100s which sound immense, far better than I hoped.

The action is crazy high, set-up for slide and tuned to Open G.

The Strings are Flatwound Rotosound 12s.

The Name is burned into the headstock, with love.

As I said before, this was meant to be a bit of a concept - mixing revolution's fires with the fun '70s kitsch of a pimp's livery. I think it has ended-up something a wee bit special, and even with my rudimentary slide skills, it sound quite frankly incredible.

And yes, I think I'm allowed to say that..

Grand Unveiling

Well, tomorrow is the last day of the £100 Challenge, and I'm already thinking about how to best introduce my finished entrant, The Pretty In Pimp One, to the world. It doesn't seem barely a month ago that I was looking at the pile of bobbins on my right, *sniff*. They grope so fast these days.

But thinking about the point of this post, I have actually got a box of fireworks somewhere, so that is an option. and I do know that the local village hall is free after an unfortunate incident meant that they had to cancel the spring fair. Something about being unable to find a traditionally required virgin or other.

The other thing is, of course, that as I still haven't finished it, I'd better get me finger out. Obviously, the eBay muppet and non-seller of 10" singles hasn't delivered, but I have been lucky enough to fin a fella via Freecycle who will give me some old 78s. The only downside of this is that they are made of Shellac - which I guess is sort of like Bakelite, and might shatter. So that will be a voyage of discovery.

Other than that though, it should be do-able, and if the worst happens I can use my last attempt. It does still look pretty good to me anyway, and I guess I'm just looking for the extra 1-per-cent, blah blah & blah.

One good thing is that West Brom played and won last night, so I won't be pacing around wondering about that... Boing and boing, as they say.

---

Anyway, a chilled out tune for the day..another old fave from The Mekons and 'Ghosts of American Astronauts'

Like The Wind, I Ching

Well, I had a good hard talk to myself and decided that finishing something for once, would make more sense than picking a new direction, yet again.

As a result then, The Pretty In Pimp One will be a double P100 ensemble, and that is that.

Decision made.

To make sure that this is so very it, I've wired everything up - reliable switch from Axesrus worked first time, teach me to go cheapo on t'bay - and everything works, and is ready to go.

Well, apart from my 10 inches of vinyl delight, which is yet to show up, which is bugging me a wee bit, I have to say, and means I am scratchplate-less.

But there we are, once that arrives it shouldn't take too long at all.

And if the geezer on eBay doesn't deliver, I'll just have to go with the one I've got and revamp at leisure.

Which would be a shame, but I can't be arsed hitting the charity shops to look for any more records.

---

Coming to the end of yet another month of dithering, I'm looking forward to what I do next.
There are the amps and FX, of course, which I really must get on top off, but I'm enjoying the guitars at the moment, and have a couple of ideas I want to follow through on.

As for what is next then, hard to say. I'll see how I feel next week.

I know this is probably getting really tedious, but...

...I'm going to say it anyway.

I'm waiting for a new - 10" - bit of vinyl to show up, for what will have to be my final scratchplate for the Pimped One. Now, firstly it didn't arrive yesterday or today when I thought it was being sent on Saturday, so I'm twitchy as there are only a receding number of fewish days left if I'm going to complete the challenge, for what it matters.

Worse though, it gives me chance to think and more to the point, ponder and ultimately this usually ends-up with my changing my mind.

Dangerous, times.

And what brings this to mind, that it suddenly dawned on me that the reason said guitar has never quite hit the spot for me, is maybe because I may have got it wrong somehow.

Maybe, just possibly, I shouldn't have been looking at a couple of soapbars, but instead should have gone for a single dogear.

Now, don't get me wrong, I'm not convinced, and I haven't got a dogear to try, but....

Well, we'll see.

Bugged

Well, spent some time this morning wiring the Pretty In Pimped One up, couple of P100s, one volume, one tone knob, and a lovely Les Paul-style three-way-switch.

Pretty simple, you have to agree.

Absolutely nowt to go wrong.

Easie-and-a-peasie.

So why doesn't the bridge pickup work, eh?
The neck one does, the pots do, no ground problems.
Traced everywhere around with the multimeter thing I've never really understood.
But still...

Sod all.

Finally,  realise that it is the switch itself.
The brand new, straight out of the pack
switch.
Doesn't, well, 'switch'.
I even swapped the pickups to the opposite terminals
and now the neck one doesn't work.

Not happy.
A switch
I ask you.

Final Furlong?

Well, obviously, when I came to wire the Pretty In Pimp One, I was always going to realise that I was missing a couple of parts that might come in handy, wasn't I?

So, ordered they are - pennies from the 'net, or a budget-blowing-tenner from the local music shop - so I'll have to wait until Monday now to solder everything in place.

I should be within budget though - by pennies - which is nice, although I'm glad postage and finishing materials are out of the mix as I would have failed dismally.

So, in summary - mainly because I changed my mind so often, this is what the world has been waiting for:

Body & Neck came from a donor Tele-a-like. Nice quality for the price, and after selling all of the other bits that came with it the Net cost was £9.

Tuners: Gold ones. I had bought some Wilkinson ones, but ended-up using some that I was given for nowt . They aren't great and I will upgrade them post-challenge, but they should work well enough for now and kept me within budget - so thanks to Tom for those.

ABR Bridge and Tailpiece: £26 from Axesrus. I wanted something off the wall for a Tele and these gave me that gaudy feeling in excelsis.

Pair of Gibson P100 soapbar pickups £50 from eBay. Still not sure that I won't end-up with just one pickup on this, but that will be later or if I realise I've blown the budget and somehow forgotten.

Vinyl LP for the scratchplate, this was my own but for due diligence I had a look in a local charity shop and they had the same one for 50p

2 x Pots £2.20 from Axesrus

LP Style switch £1.99 from eBay

Strap Pins, String Trees, Screws scrounged

So as finishing materials don't count, although the cloth was a shiny sterling pound tops , and neither do strings I think the total spend was actually £89.70

Lovely. Though I hate too think how much time was spent, never mind how much I blew on things I didn't use in the end, postage and coffee whilst I pondered.

I do have to admit, that as I have a week left before this has to be officially complete, I might blow the rest of the budget on electronic gubbins and try and do something a bit flashy...we'll see.


The foto? oh, just the body with the LP scratchplate placed on...

Another Day, Another Donut

Well, obviously, the other day's euphoria at making a decision over the scratchplate - pickguard for our American readers, hi y'all - has given way to another change of mind. You see, I was pleased enough with it, but not, like, pleased enough, if you see what I mean.

I decided then to have another go, and that has been this morning's job. Another record bites the dust, but there you go. There were a couple of reasons for this Volte Mush, as cockernees say in Germany:

Firstly I decided that I would rather use a Les Paul type of pickup selector, rather than the Jaguar-esque slider that I had planned to go with. This was mainly because I wanted something that was a bit more on the solid side, but also because I'd used a slider on the Paisley One, and lets face it, life is too short to get in those sort of ruts.

Secondly, I just didn't like the shape. It didn't look enough like a record, too much had been taken away.

So there we are, and I am happier with the new one. The pickups and bridge pop through the plate and the record is as near intact as I could make it. The melted vinyl effect around the pickups looks better with them being surrounded too.

Other than that then, I did forget to put the screw holes in, which is a slight inconvenience, but I can do that once the paint has dried I guess.

As far as the putting-it-together goes,, the body is being readied for such interfacing at the moment and I'm aiming to have the electrics wired and ready to pop in tonight. Hopefully then, it should be playable this week, or maybe next Monday, depends how things go.


For the people who are waiting not-very-patiently for the Sophie's I've been promising, apologies, but they will be here when they arrive. The girl is always worth the wait though.

Making a Gold Record Scratchplate - Jooky Style

Well, after much messing around with cloth and velvet and suede, I thought I'd try a different approach to the whole scratchplate idea and go back to the basic idea of the guitar.

You see, we're into the last weekish of the challenge, and I've kind of gone off on tangents, as per, and so I thought it was time to go back to what the 'concept' was in the first place.

Now, I know I haven't really explained before, but with the 'Pimp One' I wanted to do some kind of tribute to the question and answer that went on between Marvin Gaye and Sly and The Family Stone in the Seventies, mainly because it was a volatile and interesting time, and in both cases they produced amazing records.

What I'm talking about is Marvin Gaye recording and releasing 'What's Going On?' - something political coming from somebody who had been seen as our standard, 'pop' act, if a really good one, that signalled a change in music and the power it had to convey what was going on, on the ground, without the hideaway easiness of the Sixties metaphors.

This was revolution, and very much symptomatic of the times, and without sounding like a dodgy NME retrospective was pretty much incredible.

As for Sly and his merry band, they answered Gaye's question with a statement of their own, the album 'There's A Riot Goin' On' complete with Stars and Stripes on the cover. This signalled a less stark approach but with words and ideas that captured the mood, even while the groove made you shake you thang

Coming back to 'The Pretty In Pimp One', I wanted this guitar to kind of capture that. On one hand it would be scorched by revolution's fires, and yet on the other it would have the whole Family Stone, pimp-esque livery of crushed velvet and gold.

This I've tried to do - the neck is tarnished and literally scorched, while the body is covered in velvet and the fittings are heavy gold.

The scratchplate though, what to do there?

Finally though, it sank in and so today I've made something that I hope will join the two sides together.

I've taken an old LP, and roughly melted a shape out of it using my trusty and now rather messy pyrography tool, gouged holes for the pickups, pots and switch and then with a nod toward two fantastic albums, painted it gold.

I like to imagine that this is how Time Life make their Best-of collections.

Anyway, you can't really see from the foto, but it does rather look like somebody had butchered a 'gold record', which was the point of all of this. It is drying at the moment, but I'll put it together later this week, let you see whether it works or not for yourself.

p.s. Yes, it was a U2 record, but what the hell, eh? Nobody is more, err, revolutionary than Che Bono

Frustrating Week

Well, it started so brightly - nice little pile of Sophie's ready to be put into tins and things, The Paisley One en-route to pastures new and The Pretty In Pimp One well on it's way to going together.

Then I managed to put my back out a wee bit, abseiling in Snowdonia.
Silly really, but it was that final 300 foot drop for the cameras that did it.

OK, maybe not.
I did rick my back but  it was stretching for something on a high shelf in the pantry.
Not so glam, yet
still bloomin' painfilled,
my days have proved.

Anyway, what it meant was that sitting to solder or drill was out, so no tins of fuzz just yet, so I concentrated on sorting the scratchplate for The Pimpy One...and what a mare that has been.

Basically, this was the first attempt.

It is faux suede, meant to be golden in hue,
and soft of touch
but looked a bit dowdy to me
and apparently like a piece
of cardboard to others.

It was also quite big, and I wanted something smaller.

Next idea then was to get some gold coloured velvet, which I did
as you can see here
but that too doesn't work.

I mean, I like gaudy and that is half the point here -
the fire-burnt-neck
and the seventies gaudiness of the body
I know, I'm
very deep.

But it looks rubbish
even by my standards.

Anyway, I have a Plan C now, so later I'll try and sort that out.



Speaking of the pimpy one, I've decided against the sustainer as it doesn't really fit with what I want to do with this guitar. I'm thinking funk or vague jazziness, and that doesn't feel right.
It is going to be a pair of P100s then
with maybe something a little extra if I have the time.

Nice to improvise a tad
here
and over
there.

So there we are, less than I wanted, but can't be helped.

Plans for the day - Bizzy bizzy bizzy

Well, Tuesday already - where does the time go? And I've got stuff to do if this Jooky little world of mine is going to flourish

La la la.

OK, firstly - I'm going to finish the Velvetificaton of the Hundred quidder, I need to get on with it.
I plan to finish that today then. The velvet, not the whole shebangabooloo.

Secondly, I've realised the posting box for The Paisley One has been turned into a Fire Engine with windows ripped in and other modifications, which leave it somewhat unfit for purpose.
So I need to get a replacement box from somebody nice in a local music shop.

Thirdly, tomorrow morning is my one chance this week to do a bit of soldering - kid free - on the amp/effect front, and so I need to dig all the parts out and make sure I'm ready to go and have everything I need. It would be nice to get at least a couple of them up on the site as it feels a bit silly now, a shop with nowt to sell. Not that I'm complaining folks.

Fourthly, I'm investigating pickups for a future project - on-line that is.

Something that sounds like this would be nice...

Tailor Made or Further Adventures In The Use of Fabric In the Making of a Guitar for Not-a-Lot of Money

Well, with another can of spray glue, I decided to trudge on and sort the front out too...not complete as the sides will need a fair bit of tidying-up, but hopefully you'll start to see the general idea.

The scratchplate is still the gold suedette thing I made, but I'm not sure whether we'll end-up with that. All seems a bit tasteful at the moment, I fear, and more to the point quite thick. I'm wondering whether I can find something better to be honest.

Other things - you might notice a single coil type cover at the neck. This is to indicate the Sustainer, but who knows...time will tell I guess.

I've also gone further with the smokification of the neck and scorched the headstock - and my fingers - in the process.

I have to say, it doesn't look much like a Telecaster to me anymore...

All part of the plan
kind of.

Monday Mourning

Well, another week and it has started well with the plumber taking a couple of hundred quid off me before breakfast...

Kind of sets you up for the week,
truly it does.

All of which probably explains why I finished the remainder of the chiseling quite so quickly and with-vigour, as the instruction book may say. I really should know the Latin for that, but don't.

Anyway, I decided that removing enough rather than all of the wood, was a good idea, so that is what I did. Both pickups will nuzzle in quite nicely if that is the way I go, or there is plenty of space for sustaineresque gubbins if that is my eventual truth.

Feeling kind of funky again then, I covered the back of the guitar with green velvet, as planned, and very nice it looks too, I think even the Reverend Ian would agree.

I may however, have done a bit too much practice as I've run out of the spray glue now, but I can get more. I'm resourcefilled like that.

I'll pick some up later and see if I can velveteenify the sides and front of the Pimpy one by nightfall.


Game on then,
if brassic.

A-Pimping-We-Will-Go

Yep, finally got off me backside and did a bit more on the £100 guitar thingie...though to be honest I do feel like I'm drifting a wee bit.

What I did today, was change direction a little on the neck as the oiled version just looked a bit neat. Instead of going with the prissy-teen, I've rough sanded it back and have now decided to re-oil it, but this time it is coming out with a dirty, slightly streaked look.

OK, not an obvious thing to do, and it really isn't an attempt at producing a relic. The idea is that I wanted something that looked a bit beaten up and maybe even burned around the edges, as far as the neck goes...hopefully why will become clearer later on.

To follow this through, I've named the headstock, burning that in as well with the old burny-thing I used before on The Paisley One. I've also got a contrast in mind that will tie things together, but there is procurement involved with a teeny budget, so that needs to be juggled.

As for the body, I've half-chiseled things out there and I'll hopefully have that completed before I put this on the web site - if there is a foto, you'll know I did...though actually, as it turns out,I didn't.

What I did do was fit the nice gold tuners at a jaunty angle, although I couldn't find the goldy coloured string trees, so they will follow-on afterwards.

As far as the do-I-or-don't-I-use-a-sustainer dilemma, I'm still not sure on whether I will or whether I'll use the two P100s. I guess it will come down to time really. I'll try and get the rest of the guitar put together as soon as I can, and if there is time to do the Sustainer, I will, if not it'll be the twin pickups.

Though I've got the Octaver I never used on the Paisley One as well, 
Hmmmm....

Decisions, decisions.

Always the slowest part,
for me.

A Chipping and a Chopping

Well, I figured that as Day 3 had arrived, I might as well do something about the hundred quid thing, and so I tackled the bit I always dread the mostest - the woodwork.

Not that I'm doing anything flash or clever - though I expect some of the other 'participants' will be dusting off timber they laid down in the seventies for such an eventuality as this. Nope, my woodwork requirements are limited to a few minor  tweaks to accommodate the gubbins that I'm using that isn't particularly Tele designed.

First of these was the holes for the tuners. I've got some nice Wilkinson ones I got for a fiver off eBay, but they are too big for the existing holes.

I read around and apparently I should:

'Carefully ream the holes out, taking care to rotate the hand reamer in the direction of the grain'.

That sounded simple enough, so I got an Electric Drill - these still scare me and I wish I had a handraulic one, but I haven't, so there we go. Anyway, I got the drill and tried a few different drilly bit things until one of them made a hole that would let the tuner peg go through, and then repeated another five times. Lovely.

Next, was the bridge and tailpiece. As both of these are more archtop suited, I wasn't surprised to have to make a couple of adjustments. Again I expect I should have used something full of voodoo to do the actual hole making, but once more an electric drill did the trick, and as you can see on the foto, the ABR bridge thing snugly dropped it lovely like.

On a bit of a run here, I thought, and so I pushed on.

The next thing I wanted to do was reshape the headstock a wee bit. The original was slightly odd looking to me, and I wanted to soften the edges a touch. To do this I got a steak knife and did the first bit of whittling I've attempted since I sliced my knee open trying to carve a tent peg, around about the time of the Silver Jubilee.

Actually, the headstock now looks a lot like that tent peg, thinking about it.

Once that was a nicer shape and smoothed with some sandpaper, I gave the rest of the neck a wee sand too, to try and remove the light varnish that was on there. I'm not sure if I said before, but the neck is a light, and insipid colour, so I had decided to Danish Oil it. To give it a nicer hue and bring the grain out a bit.

As it turned out, the varnish was about a micron thin, so no problems removing it. The foto shows the headstock and neck with a first coat of Danish. I'll do a few more over the next day or two. I have also got some quite treacly varnish, but I think I'll stick with the oil to be honest.

One final job, is to route out the body so that I can fit the P100s or Sustainer electronic gubbins in. Again, on the foto I've marked out the wood I'll be removing, as well as the scratchplate outline - well, roughly anyway.

I've had a quick look at doing this, and my trusty chisels seem up to the job, but I tell you what, I don't know what wood this is made from, but it is rock solid. Nothing like the lightweight stuff the Paisley One is made of, that took a few minutes to route out, this might entail hard work.

Bearing the work angle in mind, I'll maybe do it tomorrow, depending on time and all that. You can't push yourself too hard, after all.

So there we are, Day 3 and we're in the biz. Lovely.

£100 Challenge - Day One

Well, nobody else seems to be doing anything yet, but I think today marks the start of the Music Radar Forum, £100 Challenge thing, and as I'll no doubt be going on about it for the next month, I figured marking the event would be good.

Saying that, it is more of a non-event as I probably won't do anything today.

But before the 4th of April, I plan to have built a guitar with parts costing less than a ton.

It is as simple as that,
truly.

If you look over there, you will see all of the parts, and they have cost me less than a hundred quid, so as long as I get it built,
lovely.

I'm in the quid seats.

For the record then, I've bought a cheap telecaster clone, flogged all the bits off it and plan to pimp it up - with the emphasis being on the pimping, using velvet, gold, gold and more gold.

I have Gibson P100 pickups, and am aiming to put a DIY sustainer on it too, assuming I have the time and can turn my Heath & Robinson, Jookified R&D into something that will last longer than the battery once it is stuck to a guitar.


Other than that, I was going to call it "Nouveau Riche One", but I think "The Pretty In Pimp One", is more fitting.

There are also lots of other people building guitars too, so I'll put links to them and their work as we go along.

Lovely.

Last one until I build it, Promise

OK, the gold scratchplate

- admittedly not looking as gold in t' foto as it does in the confines of real life -

but here it is placed lovingly
on top of the green velvet,
itself placed hap and hazardly
on top of the guitar,
with some other bits
liberally chucked on for
context.

I took hours over this foto, truly.

I think we can start building next week,
which will be fun,
but I fear that a fair old bit of preparation
might be the order of the first week
or two...

La la & la

I'm thinking maybe purple velvet...or
is that a wee bit
OC&D
even for
me?

Golden Slumbers

As a quick follow on to my colourific dilemmas of yesterday..

I've been trying a gold scratchplate idea on for size..

This I see going over the green velvet which would be the main body colour - but how to make one, when you want something like a squier thinline tele thing, but don't want to spend any pennies?

First step is to cut the shape out in cardboard

Second is to glue some of the golden suede stuff on

Thirdly, I shape it as though carving the very thing from pure spun gold..

After that?

Well, it's still drying, so that is it so far.


The P100s arrived today too, which is cool as a cool thing.

That's it, really.



Can you see what it is, yet?

Insight Into The Workings Of My Mind

So, here I am, getting this here tele build bobbins together.

I've sort of got a sustainer working - on a breadboard thing - which is amazing and I can't wait to start to build it properly and put it in a guitar. I mean, for me, this is truly gob-smacking, I've made something that first of all works, and secondly works properly, as far as I can tell anyway.

This is really cool.

Amazing in fact as I didn't copy it off anybody, I just read some posts on a forum about how the Fernandes one works and some people talking on a blog about ones they have made. There used to be tonnes of information about DIY sustainers, but apparently that got deleted due to inter-nicene warfare over who is cleverest or something. Which you have to say is a bit pathetic. If I get it working well I'll do some proper plans and stuff so anybody can have a go at it.

Anyway, I'm pleased, kinda proud and itching to do it for real.

And I've got a guitar to put together in March that is waiting for it.

It is perfect timing, for once in my life, and everything is coming together.

I'm so excited at the prospect that I've not even thought about a cool name for the sustainer - they all have to have one, of course.

So here I am and what am I thinking about?

What am I spending my time doing?

Yep, I can't make up my mind on whether the guitar should be covered in gold suede or green velvet fabric.

Really.

I've got a Ferrari to make and I'm picking out the curtains.

Beyond sad.

I'm turning wench, there is no denying it.



So which do you think - green or gold?

Blah blah

Oh, one bit of good news.
I've managed to get a pair of Gibson P100 pickups, which are like soapbar P90s but doubled-up so that they are humbucking. I'm not sure whether they will both go on this guitar or not - if I do the sustainer they probably won't, but we'll have to see. Also I'll have to do a bit of jiggling on the £100 front if I use both of them as at the moment I'd be over budget.

Decisions, decisivenessly am we.

Really though, green or gold?

The Golden & The Green

I have to admit, at times I can be pretty indecisive. Very in fact. Not when it comes to important things, but when it really doesn't matter I can take forever to decide what I want to do.

Sometimes longer,
just depends really.

Anyway, my £100 challenge guitar, The Nouveau Riche One, I mentioned before that it was going to be gold suede covered with a '70s Di Marzio Dual Sound pickup,
but, well,
now it won't 

The suede looked nice, but not as striking as I'd like and the pickup I've sold on to a fella who is going to put it in a Jagstang. No big deal, and no real reason for the change other than it just didn't feel right. I couldn't even begin to think about mentioning that I wouldn't be able to tell you why that is was or may well have been.

So where does that leave me?
The colour now then, I think will still be given by some cloth and I've ordered some British racing green crushed velvet, which should look opulent by anybody's standards.

As to the pickup, well, I don't know. On one side I'm thinking P90 as I love the sound in the Paisley One, but then it is meant to drive a sustainer, so maybe a hot, high powered humbucker would make more sense, ignoring the fact that I've already bought and sold a rather brilliant one of those.

So what to do, who can say.

Getting My Bobbins Together

Not a lot to report, other than that I have a few wee boxes I'm putting together at the moment.
Might even finish them if the school hollibobs ever end...

I've decided on a bit of a Rock 'n' Roll tribute theme - The Beatles, The Stones, The Pistols and The Clash, and maybe even The Floyd...we'll just have to see.

Oh, they will be pocket sized amps or maybe some of them will be fuzz boxes even.
Still working it out, to be honest.

Other than that, some of my bits and bobbins showed-up today - some faux suede in a nice gold colour, and then some other parts - a bridge and tailpiece, which I think will prove to be, err, golden. I also got a pickup at the weekend. Not the P90 I thought, instead a genuine 1970s Di Marzio pickup, which should be higher output - to help the sustainer - and yet quiet and hum-free.

Maybe.