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Saturday 8 April 2017

Showcase: My first guitar and amp


I still haven't got my guitars back from my luthier - which resulted in my deciding to bring this one out of my basement to play with in the interim. This is the first guitar that I've owned.




I bought it for $50 from someone in highschool, and used it with an old Traynor solid-state amp that I was given by a friend of my dad's.



This isn't my specific old Traynor amp, but is a picture from the internet that looks the same as the one I had, and I think it's the same model. I gave mine to away when I bought myself a better amp (that I didn't really like and ended up selling to buy another amp).

One slight issue that I'm encountering with the guitar since taking it out of its hibernation, is that it doesn't pass any sound to an amp. I'm guessing it still worked when I last played it, but that was many years ago. I guess something of the electronics might have corroded away, or maybe it's just a simple dust issue preventing the pickup selector switch from making proper contact.

Let's check out some of its sweet features.





Just a bit more than half of a pickup selector switch-cover.


Rusted pickups that I couldn't adjust the height of because I just couldn't get the screws to turn. Don't know what's holding them in so strongly. This is authentic vintage rust, and none of that artificial "relic'd" stuff.




Well-aged tape to protect the player's shirt from being torn by the screws' jagged metal.





Guitar strap-holder that slides out for easy replacement, and usually constantly while trying to play the guitar. For a bit, if I just kept tightening it up every 5 or so minutes, it would stay in there for all the other minutes. But now it's just sliding right out any time the guitar headstock is tilted a bit upwards.



Also, I'm pretty sure the guitar's fretboard was covered with green-grey mold when I brought it up, but it seems to have died off in the drier, brighter, warmer upstairs. Oh well, better for playing this way, anyway.


Here are some tracks I made many years ago, while still learning to play the guitar, played using both the silver guitar and Traynor amp - and they're among my first attempts at coming up with music and recording it. I recorded them into my computer with some cheap plastic microphone that I had found lying around.

track 2, track 3, track 4, track 8, track 9


C~ Soundscapes