Vintage Spanish Cittern

The guy that sold us this piece told us that his family bought it in Spain, but he didn't know what it was called or how it was supposed to be tuned.  A peek in the soundhole at least reveals that it was built in December 1969 by a Mr. Alfonso Checa, a well-regarded classical guitar builder from the town of Baza.  It's not a guitar, though - it's another mystery instrument!

Here it is with our store's spokes-robot, in another flyer I made.

Well, it was.  Somebody sent us an email explaining that this thing was a varation on the Spanish cittern called a "laud."  It's got six double courses, tuned in fourths.  That's what the man said, anyway, and who am I to argue?  When it comes to stringed instruments, it's amazing how many variations there are in the world.  Needless to say, this thing can do a pretty good job of covering all the cittern parts in the band, but what about the mandola?  The oud?  The tres?

Dan E. Lectro

Whipping up another batch of promotional material, and I decided to turn that funky old Danelectro DS-50 amp we've got into an awesome robot buddy.  This will make for a really fun new flyer.  I call our new mascot here "Dan E. Lectro," and I've even set up a Facebook page for him.  Now if only we could teach him how to make coffee in the mornings...

Bizarro World

Good lord - it's a window into a parallel universe!!  It's a strange and twisted place, where banjos have six strings, guitars have only four, and bass players get all the groupies.  Wait, no.  It's just a Johnson Guitjo (or is it a Banjitar?) sitting next to an old prewar Gibson tenor guitar.  Whew!  For a minute there I was afraid that the fabric of time and space had been ripped asunder once again (seems to happen about once a week around here, if the sounds coming from the repair shop are any indication).  Still, these two make a nice, oddball little couple, "American Gothic" -style; or at least Jerry Lee and Myra Brown-style.  

"Madness, I tell you!  Madness!"

Santo vs. Dracula

This is actually an old Kay Starter guitar that a friend of mine had. It would never, ever stay in tune, so he gave it to me to turn into wall art. I've done goofy paint jobs on a couple of cheap, banger instruments - in fact, I also did a mandolin for my friend featuring, per his request, a zombie hillbilly string band. I'll have to dig up pictures of that sometime.



Santo is the most famous of all Mexican Luchadores. Not just a professional wrestler, El Santo spun off his fame into a movie career, taking on all manner of grisly pulp monsters and fiends. One of those movies, Santo contra las Mujeres Vampiro, made it on Mystery Science Theater 3000, which is probably where I first saw this stuff.




Also, you just have to love the motifs in Mexican folk art. Granted, there are already plenty of skull-adorned electric guitars, but most of them are of the angsty, sinister variety. I just love that all the Mexican Day of Dead stuff is full of happy skulls covered in gaudy colors. Hey, these guys don't let a little thing like being skeletons get them down! Strike up the band! Sing another ranchera! Order another round of Tecate! Viva Santo!





SoI didn't know if this thing would ever sell at the store, but it's a moot point because as of today I've donated it to a benefit auction for Ray Evans, who's fighting a battle with cancer.  Ray has worked at a lot of the music venues around town over the years, so he's got a lot of friends here in the Greenville music scene, who are going to be putting on a benefit show this Saturday at Gottrocks.  So come out, bid on this guitar, and rock out for a good cause.

Vintage Ukuleles and other Cool Stuff

Here at Wood & Wire, we've got more than guitars. Today I decided to post a couple of interesting pieces that fall under the "miscellaneous" heading but are definitely cool finds. First off, here's a trio of vintage Ukuleles - the one the left is a Mauna Loa from the forties, the middle one is a Harmony from the fifties, and the one on the right is a Regan (don't know the era). The Harmony has a lot of charm and appeal - it also has a fretboard made of plastic, but it actually plays pretty good. All of these are soprano ukes, and are surprisingly loud and present for their size.


Here's something you don't see every day. This art deco-looking Ampro speaker cabinet may have originally been designed to be used with a PA system or an old movie projector, but it's now loaded with a modern 12' Weber speaker and it wails when you plug an amp into it. You can even unlatch the back to convert it to an open-backed cab for more versatility. Very, very cool.



Ok, just guess.


Still stumped? It's a NOS (new old stock) Conn Strobotuner. This is the heavy-duty ancestor of the electronic tuners you see today, a lunchbox-sized brick stuffed with glass tubes and circuits. It's supposed to be much more accurate, though, like if you ever need to discern the pitch of a gnat's sneeze from across the room.

Well, there you go. Some of the neat stuff we've got lying around - alright now, back to the guitars!

Resophonics and exotica

Here's another one we're trying to research. It's an old resonator guitar - and that's all we know. Just how old and what brand are a mystery - can't really even say when the metal body got painted black. If we can figure out what its worth the owner wants to see about putting it in the shop on consignment. It is worth mentioning that this one seems to be set up for regular, Spanish-style playing and not just lap slide stuff. Also, whoever tried playing it last strung it up with nylons!


There's no name on the headstock, just a serial number on the very top - 896. Or, um, 968. Gee, does anybody out there have any special tricks for dating and identifying old resonator guitars? We were thinking of dis-assembling the cone and looking under the pan, but any advice is welcome. We're going to have to spruce this one up a bit (fresh strings, set-up, etc.) before it goes on consignment, anyway.


Speaking of resonators, here's a Republic concert ukulele with a metal body and resonator cone. Very, very loud for the size, but the nylon strings keep it from being shrill despite the relatively high tuning. Come to think of it, maybe that's why somebody put nylons on that guitar. In any case, given that resonator guitars usually make me think of Son House, and ukuleles usually make me think of Tiny Tim, my brain just doesn't really know how to fully process this thing yet. A strange beast indeed.


The same guy that brought in the resonator guitar also had this odd bird to show off. A Japanese-made Firstman "violin" guitar from the sixties. This things has character!


The pickups have a great weedy twang, and the vibrato begs to be abused, Takeshi Terauchi-style. The lack of nutty switches and superfluous knobs is countered by the just-complicated-enough-to-be-useful bridge, as well as a liberal application of tortoiseshell.


The freaky "hammerhead" headstock is a nice touch, also.

Be sure to check back next week, we'll (hopefully) have some really cool news to share...

Mystery Guitar No. 2

Here's another mystery guitar. This is actually in for repairs; the guy bought it for his daughter at some kind of estate/auction-type sale and wants to try and make it playable. From the sound of it, most of the stuff at this sale was of the rundown, hang-it-up-at-cracker-barrel variety. From these inauspicious coordinates comes this extremely um, orange guitar. Its a no-name that suggests an old Harmony Stratotone, but the build quality veers towards hillbilly homebrew territory.


Once there was a name on the headstock, but now all that appears to be left is epoxy residue and some truly hellacious cracks along the tuning posts. This thing looks to be made of...what, is that pine, maybe? From the feel of the fretboard, splinters might be a concern. The neck is in rough shape (no truss rod) and the action is a mile off the neck.


The pickup looks like it just might wail, though, if we could just get it to work. Getting this thing to play conventionally might not be feasible - but it might make a wicked cool guitar for slide if the electronics and the headstock cracks are addressed. A fine instrument it is not, but who can argue with that nifty pearloid pickguard?


Plus, it's got a cool case. We'll have to see what the guy wants to do with this one. Anybody that recognizes this thing feel free to chime in - I'd be interested in the story of this one.

Mystery Guitar

?????

Here's a mystery guitar that we can't quite identify. It has the word "Japan" pressed into the back of the neck, and that distinctive striped plate under the knobs and input jack practically screams late-60s Teisco, but so far I've been unable to pinpoint the exact model. In fact, I've haven't been seeing any single cutaway semi-hollow guitars made by Teisco, so I may be way off the trail. But when the trail includes digging through Japanese guitar sites with names like Rolling 60's Bizarre Guitars Garage, I think the journey alone is well worth it.

Well worth it, indeed

If anybody can help us out, just leave a comment or send me a message. And of course, even if we never figure out where this one came from, it could still use a good home...