Tuners Drilled

Another amazing day in Phoenix. The weather is incredible... this winter is going to be good.

Quick update... one of the many crucial & final steps in prepping the guitar for the spray booth next week. Here's the headstock with tuner holes drilled:

At this point, all of the necessary holes have been drilled and routed. The next big step is gluing the neck to the body. Some of the other students who are doing a Fender bolt-on style neck got their instruments together today. Pretty cool stuff!

The Dead Weather

Jack White has his head in the right place.

Everyone should witness this video for "I Cut Like A Buffalo," the single from his latest project, The Dead Weather:

Control cavities routed

Today I routed the control cavities for my electric guitar. While it may not seem like much, there is a fair amount of prep and planning that goes into these routing procedures. It's my perception that much of guitar building involves the prep and pre-planning ie. setting up jigs and machinery (in this case accurately routing these cavities to within 1 thousandth of an inch) versus actually executing the task at hand. Because of this, many builders work in batches, producing a group of instruments at a time and executing each step of he building process with groups of guitars-to-be as opposed to setting up each machine or jig one at a time.

It's all about efficiency.

As I've mentioned, I'm also currently building an acoustic guitar but at this point, much of that work simply doesn't translate that well to blog-form. Right now we're carving the internal bracing structure and working on the body of the instrument. I would say we're about a week away from gluing up the entire body: back, sides and soundboard.

Photo of the back of the electric body and the neck. The top right is the 3 way pickup selector and the bottom left is the control cavity for the master volume and tone. Yeah... that headstock looks big! Chock it up to camera angle and the influence of D'Angelico and Ren & Stimpy/Björk animator, John K.

Headstock Inlay

Finished up my headstock inlay for the electric today:

Coming together...

Today I finished carving out the headstock on my electric guitar. I'm pretty happy with it! The neck shape is akin to a nice meaty 50s Tele but not crazy fat like those 'Louisville Slugger' necks. Neck carving is a satisfying experience, time consuming... but sooooo fulfilling. You basically clamp the roughed out 2x4-like neck blank in a vice and have at it with a rasp, constantly stopping to make careful measurements and shaping it to your liking. Carving the neck is a big leap towards seeing the instrument in its final form and is a major factor in the mojo of the guitar. A well shaped neck can inspire the player while an uncomfortable one can kill any desire to play the instrument. I also routed the body for two Lollar P-90 pickups. By next Friday we'll have all the wood work done, neck glued to the body and ready for the spray booth the following Monday.

Janie Hendrix says, "This is just the tip of the iceberg."

Jimi Hendrix's half sister, Janie, is the woman who has been steering the course of the Hendrix estate for the last decade or so, or perhaps even longer if the stories of her manipulation of Al Hendrix (her and Jimi's father) are to believed. She has established her own company, specializing in the embarrassingly soul-less franchising, exploitation and general blood sucking of Jimi Hendrix.

"Boxer shorts!!! Get your Jimi Hendrix boxer shorts here!!"

Read this laughable story, detailing Gibson Guitar's plan to market a Janie Hendrix-approved cheap n' ugly clone of Hendrix's preferred instrument, the Fender Stratocaster, in a sickening and desperate lunge to suck a wee bit more money from Hendrix's bones.

"This is the ultimate tribute to the greatest guitarist who ever lived," says Janie Hendrix.

HA!!!

Yes, he was the greatest but this ill-conceived 'tribute' just plain makes me sick.

Congratulations Janie Hendrix! You have succeeded in presenting yourself as the world's most an unimaginative leech.

Why would a respectable company like Gibson stoop so low? Is the economy so bad? They are a well established and iconic company, having produced some of the world's finest instruments for over 150 years. Can they be hurting that badly? Doubtful. I guarantee their Les Paul model will never go out of style. Why pillage the legacy of a great musician just to make a few paltry bucks at the expense of cheapening a long standing reputation of quality? Are Gibson and Janie Hendrix really going to make a bundle of $ here? My prediction: No!

I'm willing to bet that money grubbing was never on Jimi Hendrix's mind. Today, it's a damn shame that others who never even knew him can so shamefully profit off his image. I guess it is better that someone from the Hendrix family might profit off this crap (as opposed to another Alan Douglas) but I am also fairly certain that the legendary guitarist would simply be embarrassed by this latest turn of events. Janie Hendrix: if you are hurting for money, why not spend some more time creating new ways for fans to experience Hendrix's music in the form of CD reissues or live concert DVDs? Howsabout promoting some kind of musical education for kids in Jimi's name? If you're going to profit off his image, why not do it in a way that contributes to others in a positive way instead of just scraping the barrel with this uninspired junk for your own $.02.

Shame on you.

Roughed in...

Here are my electric and acoustic guitar necks as they currently stand. After we glue the fingerboards to the mahogany necks, we'll be carving these into shape:

A glimpse at the electric in progress: