Christmas guitars

"And so it is Christmas"

Just wonder what copyright holders had to say about that song by John Lennon, as its easy to recognise the melody from the song "Stewball". shit happens and it might be that Lennon knew all about his grand theft and actually bought the rights to use this melody.

A bit of "Christmas without You" suits better this Christmas as my love was in Stockholm with her daughters and I was in a way stuck at the island of Orust and our summerhouse.  So instead of baking christmas cake´s and other forms of cocking I contintued with me two DIY guitar project´s.

As I´m no kind of Luthier Pro, I´m forced to test my DIY guitars every other minute or so in hope the the design and contruction will work out properly. Leading to a load of extra work to be done. Well the bass is partly ready for the finishing touch, but with the guitar there was much more problems.

  

Cutting out the inside with a jigsaw meant a lot of work, until I finally was satisfied with the result. Then putting all the parts together and testing it with out any kind of elctronics involv´d. 

Next step was this particular part of the build. Three singecoil DiMarzio pickups was used to start f with, but my intention has all the time been to use not 2 or 3 but 5 pickup system. all in hope to obtain a bit of useful Burns sound in the  guitar. Those pickups do need an amplifier that also is going to be installed. It´ll give both passive and an active system in the guitar. With the possibility to choose a lot of different pickup settings. 

2 volume controls and 2 tone controls was fitted together with one 4 way selector and one 5 was selector, all ending up in a Master volume control. At this very moment I wait for delivery of the remaining 2 pickups.

In hope to obtain a little Christmas spirit I went out and found me a Christmas tree, and as it doesnt have much more then its light-candles and a few red balls as decoration I used a couple of me guitars to lighten up Christmas.

the two DIY project together with my new monitor cabinet

and volumepedal. This uit started its life as a sweller and speaker

for a Yamaha organ. But has been totaly transformed with a buildt in amp

Here at one of many test runs of this guitar.

Birthdays and guitars

About time to add some words in My so called musical chronical. 

Recording session with "Elinor" will hopefully soon reaach the end of the line. in the meantime I went down to the basement in hope to create not one but two guitars. 

Both with body styling based on well known Burns guitars. 

to start of the was the 12-string guitar that i wanted with a body styled from the famous Burns Vibraslim-TR4. As soon as the body was saw´d I realised that it wasnt going to be a 12-string, but a ordinary 6-string guitar. 

The 3 plywood parts was grinded into the shape I wanted, in hope to reduce its weight the hole inside was cut out. It´s neck was fitted with strings just to get a small test of the guitar. It seamed to work real good. My intention is to mount not 2, not 3 but 5 singelcoil pickups in the guitar. It may work and might give this guitar a very special kind of sound.

As soon as i got hold of a proper bass-neck the to be Burns Bass body was cut upp for fitting the new neck. As a choice of pickups there is at this moment a pair of Fender Jazz Bass pickups and one set of P-bass pickups. Still im not sure if this will be the final  sollution of the bass sound system. I do  think i would like to have at least 3, maybe a 4-pickup configuration on this bass.

A phonecall to Sanden Guitars in Gothenburg gave a real surprise. The Sanden Guitar No:400 was under construction and will be a "Vindö 28 special". Made out of mahogony taken from the old Vindö 28 yacht.

Not to forget my freind in Canada Rob "numubu" who celebrated his birhtday 

and Bruce !!! of "MUG" guitar shop in Gothenburg.

 

by the way, on sale in His shop Bruce do have a nice if not completly

original Burns Split Sonic in unusual Satin Black.

To all of You from all of Me-Us

a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!!!

Johnny

Recording ELINOR

the sale of a huge mixer also made me learn more about a group of people arranging "Elinor spelen" just some 15 km from Uddevalla. I still dont know who Elinor really is, but the band is also called Elinor. 

Elinor-spelen

David in action with me guitar.

Ronja playing the flute 

And the main caracter of the band, David playing the xylofon

in pure Rock´n Roll style.

All leading to a couple of recording sessions with this band. David the main figure in the band show´d up with different guitar-bass-banjo-ukulele projects. 

Davids 2-string bass and ukulele

the new 3-string bass made out of a teak fruitbowl!!! for sustain.

At this very moment two different songs in prerecorded and will soon be ready.

 Oscar recording lead and rhytm in today´s session

while the bands headprofile hides behind an Ipad 

with Björn.

 more in regards of this recordings will be found here soon.

project inpossible?

So at last I did find the right parts for me 12-string guitar project. 

The brand new 12-string LesPaul-ish guitar is going to lose its neck and hardwear. a new body is under construction that will  make me 12-string a Burns Clone. 

A new body in the style of a 1965  Burns Vibraslim will be fitted to the neck, and hopefully it all will end up as a guitar more of my liking.

Here´s a Burns Bison-62 reissue been fitted with a Double 6 neck. A nice clone.

swap

In order to get economic possibilities to buy a Vocal harmony gadget. Me pride and joy since 1974 was advertised and sold. Natuarly I did hope to get a much better-higher price for it, but as it was an auction it was sold to the one and only bidder.

The door slammed, in the same moment I missed me  Ibanez "law suit" Jumbo Concord 1972. But thats history today.

Instead I went out shopping for something new, the Voice Box and a 12-string guitar. Contact was already taken with a small comapny that advertised a Les Paul,ish 12 string at what might be a bargain price. Left his "at home-shop with the guitar, a 3-part guitar stand, some straps and strings. The guitar didnt seam bad at all, the other things was bonus.

Next stop was JAM-guitars Sthlm with the intention to buy a Voice Box. I brought the new guitar inside, tuned it and got me first chanse to play it thrue an amp. At this moment the guitar seamed much more value for the money, in fact it was good. Even if it was in need of adjustments. 

A guitar made in China imported to Jordania and further to Sweden!! Anyway the new Electro Harmonix VoiceBox was purchased and natuarly I took the chanse to look at all other guitars in the shop. 

I was stunned!!!! A monthe ago wisiting the shop they did have 7 different Burns guitars for sale. Today they was all gone. Who have bought all those guitars, all within a month????

An hour was spent well in adjusting the neck, suddenly this cheap guitar was a real bargain even if its neck is very narrow and possibly the same size as a standaard 6-string.

I´ve got all the time in the world

And so I was back in Stockholm, with almost nothing to do exept a few things that me lovley Lise-lott wanted me to do. With no car I took a stroll from home to JAM musicshop where I spent almost 2 hour testing / playing various Burns guitars they had in stock. 

The Burns Nu-Sonic in metallic blue or black, same guitars exept for the colour but with totaly different price?!?

Then there was the Burns Marvin Signature in Fiestared, and a Burns Shadow in white. 

Not to forget a couple of Marquee´s also at various prices. The Fiestared one priced at 6995,oo skr and the shadows white one at half that price?!

Anyhow it was extremly pleasant to fool around with those instruments. In me mind is a dream of finding a Burns Bison-64 reissue with the real Rez-o-matic tremolo system. Those guitars seams real hard to find today. The search goes on.

During the last weeks I also tried to find out what a voice harmony  gadget could do with me recordings. Found a couple of different units the Digitech voice 2-3-4-5-6 wich seams fantastic and teh electro harmonix unit. 

The last of those two makers voiceboxes was tested at the shop. I was stunned by the fact and its performance. Even my old voice sounded great and in harmony both with the guitar and my own voice. 

So this kind of gadget is a must have for me collection of music gadgets. That darn thing made my voice sound low as Paul Robson singing Old man river and sweet sounding bright as a great female singer.

one thought came into mind, could this kind of gadget be used to play guitar in harmony with me self??

more music thought´s

At this very moment I´m in our Capitalcity, came here by train and brought the Ovaation guitar. A phonecall to a freind of mine gave this result. So yesterday afternoon my Ovattion found a new home, and so far I could se the new owner was very happy for his purchase. He didnt even think it was ugly.

Me almost next door neighbor also the latest addition to our band, has finally  got him self a new - old amplifier. It was advertised at swedish "blocket". After testing my two Orbit amps Göran asked me to help him by a similar amp. This one was said it was an Orbit Double 12.

Yesterday it arrived to him and was unpacked. Already before the deal was completed we knew that both the tremolo and the reverb was not working. well time to time it may do it. Unpacked and photograph´d with pics sent to me, I realised that it was´nt a  Double 12 at all. Instead it was the larger more powerful model Orbit Three Double 12! So Görans purchase of this amp seams to be a much better deal then we first thought.

I also came across an almost funny conversation between me and a former female vocalist in the band. She was to use my music as backing and perform a demo of a song I written. I wondered if she might still be interessted in becoming a part of the band. Later in the conversation this seam´d impossible. Somehow she was regarding my song as something that she hade produced. And yes she did her version of this song, but still the rights to it belong to me its author. Also that any kind of alteration of the song has to be approved by its right ful owner.

So the band still search for a third lead singer, and maybe there soon will be yet another version of my song.

Left our "paradise" for Stockholm on thursday, but before that nothing could stop me from taking e few pics of me  gear.

 my Burns Orbit Collection. Orbit Three Double 12 -1964

& Orbit Two-1962

 Bison, Marquee, Orbit Two, Orbit Three Double 12 +

some more guitars.

the new main studio power amplifier.

Sharp 2 x 300 watts.