Monthly Motivation-Take Off Guitar
When I heard The Rovers ‘’Passport to Summer’’, it was my first time hearing Roy Lanham play guitar. I can still remember coming home from the thrift store with my bag full of records and putting this one on. I could barley sleep for weeks, it pretty much changed the way I wanted to play.
Up to this point I was content trying to copy Scotty Moore, Cliff Gallup and a few others. From that point on, I wanted to learn how to improvise and play more like a Jazz musician. I’m still trying today. I soon learned the style I was obsessed with was called ‘’Take Off” guitar. I think a good definition for the ‘’Take Off‘’ guitar style would be… to solo as if you were half genius and half mentally insane! (Jimmy Bryant and Speedy West trading fours on Rock City Boogie, comes to mind.)
Around that same time I started hanging out with Robert Williams, aka Big Sandy. Robert, and another friend, Jason Goodman both had excellent record collections and were always finding new hillbilly and country records with hot ‘’Take Off’’ guitar solos. They were constantly making cassettes compiled of their latest record finds. I always looked forward to getting the latest cassette from them. They were some of the first recordings I’d heard with guys like Lanham, George Barnes, Jimmy and Speedy, Jimmy Wyble, Noel Boggs, Junior Bernard, Grady Martin, Thumbs Carlille, Buddy Emmons, and countless others, playing the “Take Off‘” guitar style. I still have most of those cassettes. Hope this recording inspires you too.
Smith Specials
Here are a few photos of the two finished Smith Special guitars that I’ve been working on for a number of months. I started mine over a year ago. When Hiro sent his Kay, I decided to build both guitars at the same time. I refinished the body on mine and Hiro’s has the original finish. You can see the process of both here. Hiro’s is finally ready to ship to Japan and I can just enjoy mine for now. You can see photos below. Read The Rest
Custom Vibrato Arm
I’ve been using this type of arm for about twenty years now. I originally made it because I had an old Bigsby vibrato with a Travis type arm that I couldn’t get used to. I wanted something similar to what Chet was using but didn’t want to change the way it attached to my old vibrato. After using it for awhile I found that it was handy having the pivot point closer to my hand. It makes it really easy to access while playing. It’s also is very easy to adjust. Using set screws, the arm swivels at three points. Just loosen the set screws and rotate the parts until it’s in the right spot. Tighten it up and your good to go. Hand made in the U.S.A. Available in our Store now.
Test Run
Here’s a quick test run with a pole piece pickup at the bridge and a blade pickup at the neck plugged into an old Gibson GA-30. The strings are Thomastik-Infeld JS112’s
And here’s one with the neck pickup only
