Toronado, not Tornado

2002 Fender Toronado in Graffiti Yellow. Previous owner added a graphite nut, saddles, and string trees.  He also added some chips to the body.  Kinda like a jazzmaster with a string thru bridge - no trem.  Stays in tune great and the factory "Atomic" humbuckers sound great clean, dirty, or in between.  This one is currently for sale - $499.  Call 8642320005

Harmony Fender

What? Harmony made Fender from 1970.  Maybe sovereign?  Chunky neck and no pickup......the way an acoustic should.....well, I don't want to set off a debate about acoustic pickups - or lack of. 

Group Photo

DBX Sound Custom "Dark Back" Tele

Here's a truly unique one-off piece, a custom Telecaster-style guitar made by DBX Sound, which is basically a guy named Dave Carness working out of San Francisco.  He calls this the "Dark Back," and it's made out of an exotic tropical wood that I couldn't even attempt to pronounce - Pumajillo, with a Maple veneer on top.  The amp I've chosen for a backdrop is a super-sweet Fender Supersonic.  It has a preamp toggle that lets you choose between a Vibrolux or a Bassman circuit, and a second switch that lets you run either setting in a "vintage" or super high gain "burn" mode, covering just about all the tonal options you could want out of a Fender combo.

Yes, the top is pretty, but the most amazing thing about this guitar is it's weight, or lack thereof.  It tips the scales at just barely over six pounds - very easy on the old shoulders!  Even the neck feels light as a feather.  The pickups are Alnico Tone Riders, which have a nice vintage Tele sound - no one need know that you're not lugging around a seven-and-a-half-pound-plus monster to get that tone.  There's also something just a little bit...friendlier about that lower horn, as well.

The headstock shape just barely deviates from the standard Tele, and the aged tuners are a nice touch.  Overall this is one of the coolest guitars we have in the shop - and until Mr. Carness makes a few more, you certainly won't find another one anywhere else!

Squier Cyclone (with mods!)

I know, I know...a Squier?  But this Cyclone has a little extra mojo, thanks to the Strat pickup in the neck and a special "I meant to do that" wiring mod that puts the two pickups out-of-phase when you flip to the middle position.  Not to mention that both pickups are quite loud by themselves.  So basically, you get the distinctive Mustang body style and some of the extra tonal quirks while only having to contend with a simple Gibson-esque three-way switch.

I have to admit, I often feel cramped when trying to play on a short-scale guitars, but with the nice fat frets this one has I seem to fare a good bit better.  Add in a pearloid pickguard and a Strat-style tremolo bridge and this Cyclone gives you a lot of guitar for the money!

Here's the Cyclone being paired with a cool new gizmo we just got in - the Dan Electrode adjustable power supply.  You can use it to "starve" an effects pedal by adjusting the voltage, simulating the effects of a weak battery.  The end result is that you can pull twisted sounds out of your plain-jane distortion pedals that you'd normally associate with fancy boutique setups and modded-out "circuit bent" stuff.  Check it out!

Competition Mustang Re-issue and '68 Super Reverb

Here's a cool pair.  The guitar is a Japanese-made Competition Red Mustang re-issue, and the amp is a genuine 1968 Super Reverb.  Being a '68 means that though the amp has the look of a silverface, the insides are still the same as an older (and more desirable) blackface model.  I myself play a later Super Reverb from the early 80s, and I firmly believe that if you seek to play rock and/or roll music (as opposed to metal or hard rock), you can do no better than one of these babies.  The ten-inch speakers sound vicious when they break up, and the shattered glass roar you can unload still leaves plenty of room for the dynamics of the rhythm section.

We've had older Mustangs in before, but this one being a reissue puts it in a more affordable price range - ironically the reason why old vintage Mustangs and the like became so popular (and gradually less affordable) back in the 80s and 90s.  Of course, there are more virtues to the "student" offset models - the short scale and comfy slim neck are a boon if you've got smaller hands.  And of course, racing stripes rule.

We often take it for granted, but the amazing thing about Fender is the wide range of players that their products appeal to - from the snooty types whose noses fly up if it isn't covered in tweed and/or nitrocellulose, to the punk rockers scraping up enough to buy some scrappy Japanese Squier.  Of course, here at the shop we try our best to do the same!

Gibson SG Jr and Tweed Fender Champ

A few people were in today just sharing - here's a 1964 Gibson SG Jr.  The guy said it was given to him by his grandfather.  It has some age on it - if you tilt the neck just so you can see a little greenish patina along the frets.  Still, it played pretty good, with a nice, comfortably worn neck.

Sadly, though, the Bigsby vibrato had been dismantled somewhere along the line.  I guess most players just don't dig a vibrato on an SG, though I've personally always thought an SG and a Bigsby go together like peaches and cream.  That single P-90 still sounds fat and sweet, though.   

Here's a 1954 Fender Champ!  Behold the mighty, mighty tweed.  A little roughed up, but miraculously intact.

 Just think, when this amp was being built, Elvis was just a poor cracker truck driver trying to break into recording and performing, Johnny Cash was an appliance salesman in Memphis, and hell, Chuck Berry had only been to prison once!

1979 Stratocaster

 

Here's a nice pair - a newer Marshall and an older Strat.  A '79, to be precise, with a well-worn cherry burst finish.  There's something about a Fender Strat, though - the more beat to hell it looks, the more compelling it becomes, at least in my humble opinion.  As for the amp, it's a JCM 2000; Marshall's latest and greatest, paired up with a sweet 1960A 4x12 cabinet. 

 

If you get a good look up close, you can see why we call this one our "Mommy Dearest" Strat.  An array of cigarette burns dot the top, though I don't see any coat hanger marks.  Ah well.  Still, a guitar this uglied-up has the potential to be somebody's "Number One" someday, so come check it out!

Amps, amps, and more amps...

We've just taken in some very cool amps on consignment.  This one might be the crown jewel - a blackface Fender Bandmaster.  Slam this thing with a pair of humbuckers and it produces a ferocious broken glass roar worthy of the snottiest punk riff.  In addition, the amp is in fine cosmetic shape, without any cigarette burns or missing hunks of tolex (you know, like my amp. Sigh...).

A Silvertone Twin Twelve head and 2x12 cabinet.  This one didn't stick around very long; a customer snapped it up just this week but I still had to show it off.  Very clean, especially for a Silvertone, and complete, a rare treat considering how often the head and cab are found separate.

A Fender Reverb Unit.  Here's the secret to true surf-rock righteousness.  Hook this tube-powered reverb tank up in front of the amp and then get ready to Shake N Stomp.  This is a re-issue, not an original, but it still drenches your guitar and your formerly sad, non-reverberating amp in a tidal wave of springy goodness.

Another cool sighting - the guy that bought that Twin Twelve brought this sweet electric Kay archtop in to show off.  A hollowbody Kay through a Silvertone amp!  Ah, what lewd sounds these two will make together...

'71 Competition Mustang Bass

Here's another Mustang - a bass this time. Beloved of punk kids and rock icons alike, and the last bass designed by Leo Fender before he jumped ship. This one is part of the later "Competition" series, with the cool/cheesey racing stripe along the side. Short-scale playability and classy Fender looks have made the Mustang Bass a perennial favorite.

Merry Christmas from Wood & Wire

l to r: Mid 60s Gibson Explorer, MIM Nashville Tele, MIM Strat, Silvertone 1482

Well, Christmas Time is here again - its been a fun three months that we've been open here, and we're looking foward to a full year of cool gear and even cooler music. We're still stocking up - vintage tube combos, pedals, and guitars, from freaks and oddballs to true classics. We're also working on carrying a few newer lines that fit in alongside our old favorites - check back soon for some big announcements. Everybody have a happy holiday season!

Showing Off

See, this is why you need to hang out at the guitar shop all day. About once a week or so somebody brings something in just to show off. Case in point: this amp, a Fender "Pro-amp" that the owner dates to 1953. 53? Where's the tweed? What's with the funky diamond pattern tolex? Gee, I dunno - I plugged our '59 Jazzmaster into it and from then on I was too busy drooling to nitpick.

I gathered that the current owner acquired this baby in a swap a long time ago, but I didn't hear the whole story of why it isn't a conventional tweed amp. It certainly isn't a blond, brown, or blackface, either, so I'm stumped. For all I know this was a one-off, a custom job, or some kind of prototype that's worth more than my kidneys.

I think it melts Nazis, too.

Tolex mysteries aside, this thing is sweet. Dig the "Mic" inputs next to the instrument inputs! I think that these things were designed to power whole bands full of hillbilly boogie cats back in the day - guitar, bass, singer - hell, that drummer don't need his own microphone! What are you, crazy? Yep, this is another piece out of history, from a different place and time. And even though this one isn't "ours," I think its well worth sharing. The same guy that owns this has quite a stash, so hopefully I'll have another chance to post a few more pieces soon..



In other store news - check out our raffle this month! Buy a $5 ticket and this PRS SE could be yours come Christmas Eve. A great surprise present for your favorite guitarist (or aspiring guitarist). Right now your odds are pretty good, and really, for five bucks, how could you go wrong?

Amazing Find!

A guy came in today and this was his story: he had a guitar when he was ten. He played it for a few weeks and then the instrument cable crapped out. He must not have been that into it, because after that it got slid underneath the bed at his grandmother's house. And there it stayed, until about three years ago when his grandmother passed away and he found it again. It is, of course, an archetypal "grandma's attic" story - the kind that is becoming increasingly rare in the vintage guitar world. Sometimes it seems impossible that there would be anymore buried treasure like this out there in the world...

So anyway, the guy decided to sell it to us.

Drumroll please.....

Ladies and gentleman, I present to you:

Holy...

A cherry-red 1965 Fender Mustang. Showing some signs of age and those few weeks of use, but otherwise in fantastic condition. Original case - hell, original everything. Original strings. We happy?

"Yeah, we happy..."

Wait, it gets better. The guy also had the amp that his family bought with it, which just happens to be...


A 1964 Blackface Fender Vibro Champ. Original tubes. It works. It's getting hard to find these little puppies without cigarette burns in the grill cloth and big holes in the tolex. But the thing that, to me, really makes this a perfect "time capsule" find is the little extras...

A couple of old-school Mel Bay instructional books and some sheet music - "It Won't Be Long" from Meet the Beatles, among a few others. It won't be too much longer before finds like this are completely unheard of. This is a little slice of history. Here's a cool pic of everything...


And a few more:

L to R: Donnie Duncan, our in-house amp and guitar repair tech, local musician Allen Glenn, and Wood and Wire owner Mike Goe

We'll be checking and generally going through both the guitar and amp in the next few weeks, and hopefully we can document the process here. Check back soon for updates, and more sweet gear finds...

Los Tres Twangueros

Here's a good shot of a couple of different pieces we have. That's a 90s-era Danelectro U2 re-issue up front, and yes, that's a P-90 in the bridge position. This is another guitar we have on consignment from my friend Mike McMillan, and it's also one of my favorites. The P-90 sounds about as greasy as you'd expect sitting on top of that glorious, glorious Masonite, and the fact that it's wired out-of-phase with the lipstick pickup just adds to the freak factor. Like most Danos, this guitar is a nasty, nasty choice for blues, but the mods really push it to a new level. If a battered old Cadillac hearse ever pulls up in front of your house with Tom Waits at the wheel, THIS is the guitar you want to grab when he rolls down the window and yells, "let's jam!"

Everyone will envy you as you both drive off into the sunset, laughing manically.

Behind that, we've got two Telecasters - the Tele with the dark wine finish is a totally solid "mexi-caster," and the one with the burst is an American standard with EMG active pickups. It's a cool guitar, but my boss says we need to swap that mirrored pick guard for tortoiseshell...

This is the Gibson amp that you can see off to the left in the first photo. It's a "Falcon" combo from 1964, and even though we acquired it with the reverb tank missing in action, it still sounds fantastic. These old Gibson tube-amps have vibe to spare, but they can still be had for a song when compared to the Fender amps of the same era.

Hopefully we can take some videos sometime so everybody can actually hear this stuff. Maybe next time...

Hello from Wood and Wire

My name is Max and I work at Wood and Wire Guitar Shop here in Greenville, South Carolina. Since I'm surrounded by a bunch of used, vintage, and sometimes downright bizarre gear all day, I figured I'd snip a few pictures and share with everybody. So first up...

Homina, homina, homina...

This, believe it or not, is a 1959 Fender Jazzmaster. The pristine appearance is due to the body having been refinished and the metal pickguard having been re-anodized. My boss, Mike Goe, scored this all the way from California, where it was used by a guy in a regional surf band. The refinishing knocks off a bit of collector value, so you kinda have to wonder just what this guitar must have looked like before. Still, just a millimeter or so below that finish lies exactly what rolled out of the Fender factory about 51 years ago.

The Jazzmaster is justly famous as the guitar that flopped completely with the jazz players of it's era, only to emerge as a "sleeper hit" when guys like Tom Verlaine, Elvis Costello, Thurston Moore, and J. Mascis plucked them out of pawnshops and, you know, made music history with them. The un-jazziness of the Jazzmaster is so ingrained into guitar lore that a girl came in today and asked if we had any "jazz guitars," and of course neither me or Mike mentioned this at all.

Ah, but there is at least one actual jazz player that took up the Jazzmaster:

A smo-o-oth one

Okay, so Roy Lanham also played plenty of country as part of the Sons of the Pioneers, but he also peppered his albums with nimble swing lines and lush chord melody playing. His awesome hepcat/exotica recording of "Brazil" consists only of bongos, a little acoustic guitar in the background, and about a hundred or so knuckle-busting chords being pumped out of Roy's Jazzmaster with laughable ease. Highly recommended.