Category: ♫

i really wish i could sing.

does your mother tell you things
long, long when i’m gone?
who you talking to?
is she telling you i’m the one?

it’s a grave mistake
and i’m wide awake

drive in’s rained out
weatherman wet fingers the sky
he pokes it out, he pulls it in
he don’t know why

it’s the same mistake
it’s been a long time running
it’s been a long time coming
it’s well worth the wait

we don’t go anywhere
just on trips
we haven’t seen a thing
we still don’t know where it is

it’s a safe mistake
it’s been a long time running
it’s been a long time coming
well, well, it’s all the same mistake
dead to rights and wide awake
i’ll drop a caribou
i’ll tell on you, i’ll tell on you
tell on you

you’ve got a boatload of nerve
but i would say you’ve been told
you work me against my friends and you’ll get
you’ll get left out in the cold

it’s the same mistake
it’s been a long time running
it’s been a long time coming
it’s been a long, long, long time running
it’s well worth the wait
it’s well worth the wait
it’s well worth the wait
it’s well worth the wait

glue is holding… starting to look like a guitar!

first stain i bought was supposed to be red, but is most certainly was brown. i almost gave in here and just did it brown. but at the last minute i decided that i couldn’t live with myself if i just gave up on this project and made it brown. so i set back out again to a different store to see what i could find.

definitely more red this time around.

oh my…

the picture is not doing it justice. in real life it looks completely stunning. once i do the little touch ups, and then a few coats of poly, this guitar is going to look pretty amazing.

time to sand this puppy down.

lovely.

glue and all the clamps i can fit…

not so bad this time around. a lot more even and i managed somehow to actually put glue in all the places that needed glue.

now we wait.

unlike the explorer, i didn’t wipe anything down with a wet cloth this time. the amount of sanding required increased exponentially due to that. i think the wet cloth trick is either horseshit, or i don’t have the right technique.

once the face was relatively clear, it dawned on me that i REALLY should have tinted the grain filler first. i think had i tinted it black or very dark brown, it would have made the red stain i plan on applying really highlight the grain in a pretty way. instead now the grain will be more red. too late now!

this part was the worst. absolute nightmare. sanding the inside of these horns took longer and burned through more sandpaper than the entire rest of the job.

in the end though, it turned out pretty good. and when i said before the finish felt like glass, well, i was wrong. NOW it feels like glass.

time for the neck. sandy sandy sandy.

grain fill applied.. time to wait.

started work on this guitar last night. the garage was HOT. i think it must have been like 35c in there. and humid as heck too. yuck!

the mess left behind in the garage was thankfully all guitar building mess. so although i should have cleaned up after myself, it works out because i need all the same mess for this build too 🙂

with just a bit of sanding 320 and then 800… this body is already feeling like glass. not sure if i just got lucky or if the unfinished bodies from solo are just higher quality wood, but i’m impressed.

grain is not too bad. the plan is to stain it cherry red. only one slight discoloration by the bridge. the seam between the different chunks of wood is also somewhat noticeable and nor exactly straight, but with all the hardware installed i’m hoping that won’t be too noticeable.

grain filling… gonna let it completely harden and then sand dry this time instead of what i did with the explorer when i wiped it down with a wet rag first before sanding. not sure which method will work better, but i wasn’t satisfied with the outcome of the explorer so we’ll see how this goes.

i still hate how that explorer came out, but i don’t hate what i learned in the process. so it’s time to try again, and this time make something better.

after consulting someone who i suspect may have a slightly better eye for design than i do, the plan has been decided. SG style, cherry red stain, silver hardware… today i sourced and placed the first bits of part orders, so it’s happening.

i’m going to use the same locking tuners i put on the explorer, they were cheap AF and work amazing so far, so that’s a done deal. pickups… i would really like to go with P90s, but like the look of humbuckers better. so i gotta do some research on P90 style pickups in a humbucker format. i got time to get that sorted out though.

i have an idea for a design element as well that i want to copy from Jacob Fink. the bass guitar he uses in the foster the people tiny desk has a quote from plato written on it:

“music is a moral law. It gives soul to the universe, wings to the mind, flight to the imagination, and charm and gaiety to life and to everything“

i really like that quote.

perhaps i know someone who has a knack for fancy hand writing or calligraphy and i could have them write it for me and then i could transpose that onto a decal or vinyl sticker or something. (hi a)

there is no way i can pick just one. there are too many that are just too perfect. i’ve been on a bit of a binge with this stuff lately. what a beautiful nostalgia bomb it has been. so in no particular order, here are some of my all time favorites. i’m sure i could post a ton more too, but i think this is a good start.

this fucking song. i can’t even begin to explain how many times i have listened to it and how many times over the years, decades even that it has rang true.

I’ll wait until tomorrow
Maybe you’ll feel better then
Maybe we’ll be better then
So what’s another day
When I can’t bear these nights of thoughts of going on without you?
This mood of yours is temporary
It seems worth the wait to see you smile again
Out of the corner of my eye
Won’t be the only way you’re looking at me then

eugh. chris carrabba, are you me?

i have a guitar that has been by my side longer than any other material item on this planet. it’s been severely mistreated, used and abused, neglected, ignored and loved intensely.

a few years ago it started failing, specifically the bridge cracked in half. at the time i had not yet started my adventures in lutherie, so i glued it back together with gorilla glue… which kind of made it worse. i didn’t know gorilla glue expanded when it cured, ok? simultaneously, the neck started bowing pretty badly, i’m not sure why. this guitar does not have a truss rod, so there is no way to correct the bow. other than a neck reset…

this week i have decided to start making my #1 playable again. this is absolutely not cost effective in any way, shape or form. i can likely buy a far superior replacement for way less… but it wouldn’t be the same.

here she is before anything done. in this state, the guitar is largely unplayable. the action above the 12th fret is probably close to 1cm, maybe even a bit more.

with some 99% isopropyl to loosen the gorilla glue, and some gentle prying, i managed to remove the bridge, revealing some weak ass looking wood underneath. i gave it a light sanding to remove any high spots and reached inside to feel the state of the backing board underneath, which thankfully feels ok. replacing the face of the guitar is out of the question, but i will try to fill any of the more serious cracks with some glue and then clamp the whole thing down.

new bridge drilled, and glued down. fancy clamp in place to keep everything in place. i used the right kind of glue this time 🙂

and now we wait for the glue to do it’s thing!