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
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 🙂
oh well, live and learn i suppose. it doesn’t sound awful at least. definitely needs some more setup, but since moving it in from the hot and humid garage back into my cool, air conditioned office, the neck is going all wonky. so before i crank on that truss rod any further, i’m gonna let it chill for a couple days.
i guess on the plus side, the tuners i got are fucking great. and the pickups this thing came with, although not spectacular or anything, are perfectly serviceable. pots and switch are kinda junk, but whatever.
here’s what it sounds like out the spark in my office into the blue snowball. the last time i played this song is when i had my first explorer i think, so please, forgive the shoddy playing, i’m surprised i actually remembered the chords 😛
edit: so after playing around on this guitar all afternoon, making little adjustments here and there, it actually plays pretty good. gave me an idea for a song too, so maybe i don’t hate it THAT much. i’m not sure if i am accidentally copying something though, and of course this is not finished at all, just a rough idea at this point.
listening to the hotelier today. i’ve heard them a few times before here and there, but never really paid attention. both the youtube algorithm and a new friend are now recommending them, so this will be my background today.
got some other musical recommendations yesterday from k8 too, with the possibility of more to come. i’m looking forward to it!
there’s more i need to say, but today is one of those days that i am booked all damn day, even through lunch. and then after work i am booked too… so it’s going to have to wait. ok, lets do this, big day. go go go.
ok. well… here’s where we’re at. i think i hate it?
problem 1. i did not do nearly enough prep work on the headstock. the finish on it looks… not great. i’m really hoping with enough wet sanding and polish and then having the tuners and strings in place will camouflage most of it.
problem 2. i did not do nearly enough double and triple checking of the masking job i did on the fret board. i did a bunch of touch ups already, and if you don’t look too closely, it’s not THAT bad. but i will never be able to unsee the imperfections. hopefully, with some scraping, wet sanding and polish i can smooth out a lot of it and make it passable.
problem 3. i did not do nearly enough careful thinking and consideration before i chose this color. i don’t know what i was thinking when i chose orange. for real. can i plea temporary insanity? there really isn’t much i can do about it now. so i guess i better just learn to love it. on the plus side, the finish itself turned out way better than i was expecting. i do also have a plan for the face of the body which will cover up the orange almost entirely… but i’m not sure i can go through with it. we’ll see.
before i can do anything else, this paint and clear coat need to completely harden. that’s going to take a while. maybe up to 2 weeks even. it’s hot and muggy in the garage. if i try to rush the sanding and polishing, i’m just going to make it a million times worse. so, now we do the thing i love most in life… wait.
lastly, i still need to come up with a name for this guitar.
i’m struggling to even put words down this morning.
through out the day yesterday and into last night i felt like i was in a sort of trance. going through the motions of daily responsibilities, not outwardly showing anything other than my normal self, but inside my head, things were anything but calm, cool and collected.
i was asked recently “what is it you actually want to happen?”, which of course sounds like an easy question to answer, right? the problem is, it really isn’t. and the more i dwell on it, the more complicated and unreachable the answer becomes.
the truth is, at least i think, i don’t really know what i want to happen. i feel like i’ve painted myself into a corner and what i want to happen is just no longer an important consideration. it’s a lose/lose proposition where it’s no longer about what i want, but what am i prepared to give up? what can i afford to give up?
shit. i think i fucked up. no wait, i know i fucked up. i sprayed color on it this morning and immediately had regrets, but the process had already started, so i just went with it and hoped for the best. 3 base coats, 4 clear coats. the paint itself is really well applied, but the color… oh god the color. so much regret.
i pulled the masking tape off the fretboard, and of course, to add to the injury of picking a color that has no business being on this guitar, i also fucked up the masking job and there is a big ol’ bare patch along the entire neck… aaaaaaaaargh!
i’m not even going to show a picture… this is a problem that i need to fix before i can share. it’s going to take like 5 days for the paint to cure, and so it will take at least that long before i can sand down the affected area and respray it. god dammit!
also the headstock looks… weird. i probably shouldn’t have painted the neck. at least to fix that i think i will just paint the face of it black. in 5 days…
not feeling exceptionally inspired to write much today, maybe tonight that will change…
i do however really need to stop getting lambasted the night before band practice. oof. nothing like jamming at full volume with a raging hangover! brain splitting pain aside, practice was good today! p joined in for the second time, i think we’re all pretty much agreed that he’s part of the band now. unfortunately y choked at the last minute though… i guess it’s forgivable, he did just get back from portugal so he gets a pass. THIS TIME!
couple of new songs are coming together, we’ve almost got the pretender down, well other than the ending, that’s still a mess, but we’re almost there! we also played a few tracks from incesticide which we never jammed before and they all turned out pretty dang good.
j has big dreams about how all of this works too which is both adorable and annoying at the same time. he got all excited about recording our jams again, but he doesn’t realize that for every 5 minutes of recording there’s gonna be at least 2 hours of fuckery that *I* have to deal with to make it sound acceptable. none of these guys have ever even touched a DAW before, nevermind done any kind of audio engineering. i tried to explain to him how it works, but he didn’t get it at all hahaha. in his head it’s just plug the microphone into the computer thing and then press record, done! magic studio quality recording finished! god, i would love to sit him in front of cakewalk for an afternoon and watch his head explode, but i know he doesn’t have the patience for that. p actually said he would be interested in learning though, so maybe i can get some help there? we’ll see.
crusty glue cleaned up, grain filler applied, sandy sandy sandy and finally some coats of primer going on.
for color, i picked something i was not expecting to pick.
i still need a logo or something for the headstock. so… if you are one of the very few who know of this blog’s existence, please help me. give me some ideas. i was thinking of maybe doing something with the whole sad mac theme i have adopted over the years, like the logo for this site. but the shape of it doesn’t quite lend itself to the shape of the headstock. alternately it could be a word, or something, but i don’t know what. maybe this guitar should have a name?
it almost feels like trying to pick a tattoo. of which i have none, because i simply cannot bring myself to pick something so permanent.
