Old Friends

Well, I know they say you should never go back, but a fair old while ago, I picked up a lovely Epiphone Dot with a broken neck, and fixed it with glue and to make the repair invisible, covered it with a Mr Bump Plaster.

Typically, I then passed it on to a nice chap called Simon in a motorway services somewhere, and there we are.

Anyway, after something circuitous in the route dept. I seem to have it back. No Mr Bump, unfortunately, but with the pickups upgraded to a pair of IronGears - a Blues Engine and a Dirty Torque - and rather lovely it is too.

In fact (forgetting the obvious why-did-I-ever-get-rid delusions) it is all good fun and the guitar I'm picking up most at the moment, and the ironGears are doing the trick quite nicely too.

And I do seem to be going thru a semi phase at the moment (I know it could be my age,, and that doctors have tablets for such things), but this and the Artcore Jazzer I got a few weeks back are edging everything else out at the moment. The AC15 might have a little to do with that, of course, as nothing sounds cooler.

As for The Busted Dot, well this time I am going to keep it (ha - I heard the sharpish-in-took-breathing) and I think I will put a Bigsby on it at some point too, and maybe even  find a new Mr Bump plaster. And that will be that. Apart from that I'm going to put some flatwounds on it. Or maybe that was the Jazzer, can't remember.

La la laaaa

The Glued-Up Epis

Well, I found the camera and here are the glued-up Epis.

And wouldn't that be a great name for a band?

The Dot will soon be off to new fields, sorely missed and all that, but I am trying to be grown-up about it and so here I am, awaiting UPS once-more-for-luck.

I have realised that I need loads of parts to get the Riviera ship-of-shape, so that will have to wait until I'm a bit flush - three P90s and a Bigsby for a start, sheesh. Need to re-mortgage the re-mortgage again.

But the SG I'm going to start to refinish today with a load of sanding and then a mixture of gubbins because sometimes you just need to express yourself and let people know what you've got on your mind. And as mine is a bit befuddled at the best of times, it could get complicated and yet blurred around the edges.

One thing though, I've always preferred full fat of face scratchplates on SGs so I'll maybe go with one of those - mainly because the little one I had was from a Gibson and doesn't fit, I have to admit, but there we are. Call me Zappa's mate.

Or not, as you like.

But whatever.

As for pickups, I'm struggling to decide to be honest, which is odd as I'm normally so decisive and sans ditherment. I might get another of Marcy-boy's Mojotrons and put it with a PAF of some sort, that could be fun, or even just a couple of P90s. Decisions, bleurgh. Hate them.

All of which sounds stunningly familiar, I'm sure. I need to be clear and say that this most definitely isn't a Jooky, despite how it may look, as I plan to keep it and if it was a Jooky even by accident - I couldn't.  (I've fallen into that trap before, let me tell you.)

So it will still say Epiphone on the front of the newly stabilised headstock, because then everything will be OK. Even if it does cheapen me in ways I can hardly describe.

And it wouldn't be a Jooky anyway, as it will have a repaired neck, worse, repaired by me, and I'm not sure I could sleep at night for fear of flying woodchunks killing random audience members in random ways.

So basically, as the Riv is in the same coracle, I'll have two guitars that I can't move-along-please-sir, which is awful but I'll just have to cope really.

The plan today had been to finish chopping and drilling The Fabulous One, now that I have the magnifique Mojo Toaster-tronic pickup, but it depends when UPS arrive, I guess. Assuming they might in some parallelogram of a universe. I've kinda forgotten what I was planning to do and can't be arsed to go look back at the blog, but I'm thinking stained and oiled back and sides and bronze-of-top. Though I have some gold leaf which might be nice, but no, I think it will be bronze.

There, a decision of sorts. And so quick. this doesn't normally happen to me.

La la laa

Adventures In Glue and Stickiness

Well, woodwork is again out today for waiting-around-reasons, so I thought I could have a wee play with the broken necked Epi SG.

Looking at it, the break looks quite an easy one to fix (words you think you'll never utter, part deuxieme), so as that is the crux of things, I broke out the Titebond and some clamps and gave it a go. It went together beautifully, which feels a result right now.

I'm in a total quandary about the finish. I've always loved glossily-cherrified SGs, but I am tempted to give it a corroded copper blue finish. As I say it isn't going to be a Jooky, but it doesn't stop me wanting to play. Other than that, I have all the parts and even have an SG wiring loom out of a Gibbo I picked-up somewhere for some reason, so it is just pickups to decide on. I'm thinking PAF plus P90 as per my default usual setting, but then I always am. Maybe I should try something different just for appearances sake.

Plus I see it as a bit of a test bed of a geetar, and getting back to the finish, corrosionificationing it would let me try out the hard wax over corroded copper effect over a period of time. For longevity and all that.

I've tended to use lacquers of some description, but the hard wax appeals as in tests 8 out of 10 cases it has preserved the corrosion a little better. Or differently anyway, which is another colour for the pallet truck and all that. I don't know.

But anyway, the neck is drying and I doubt I have the paint anyway, and well, whatever.

As I was flushed with succesfulness, and had a load of clamps looking under-utilised, I also glued the neck back on to the Riviera. This is also drying and seemingly went on straight and everything. Most odd.

I still haven't decided whether this means that I'll let the broken Dot go now or not, but I've run out of clamps so it is still tattered and torn.

Other than my adventures in glue, The Kooky One went this morning, to a nice geezer called Richard who's playing of it raised me 74 notches on the neighbours-impressed-by-my-meagre-ability-de-musique scale.

Well, so I hope.

They probably saw him arrive and hoped he was here to teach me something other than that there cacophonous-meandering I tend to specialise it.

Still, nice to see it off to a good home.

Other than even that, I also received some lovely pink paisley in the post and a rather splendid looking toaster pickup from Marc at Mojo Pickups. All of which means that I have more stuff, not less than I started with.

Forgive the lack of fotos of all of these exciting things, but I can't find the camera.

La la laaa