JeffB

No regerts! None I regret selling, just a few I wish I did purchase. They were right there in front of me every day, I knew what they were.

I worked through a few wahs and have ended up with a Vox. I like it, just a sweeter traditional sounding wah, to my ears. I havnt used it since 2012. Worked through a few leslie type pedals and ended up with the H&K. Its big. I never really used it despite it being such an important quest I was working through. It was kinda like engaging in a long arduous hunt, digging up the treasure I was looking for, inspecting it for a few minutes and then walking off to make a sandwich and forgetting about the whole thing.

Hard to tell. Drugs?

Was Vanishing Point the template for Thelma and Louise ?

I recognized the scene with the blind DJ. I was all like, "Hell yeah, I got this!" . Then clicked over to page 2 and it was all done and dusted. I watched this movie when I was a real young kid, about 6 or 7. I didnt really get all the intricacies of it at the time but the general concept and atmosphere of the film struck me and stuck with me, and so has the movie. I recently smashed into two bulldozers and escaped into the light on the other side. I wouldve done it sooner if I knew that was all it took.

One of the most consistent blogs ever!

Great blog. 5stars. Would read again.

I still believe I can get the number of 6 string electric guitars down to two or three. But Im way past thinking its easy.

Its not really a strat v lp thing. Im comfortable with most guitars. I do like strats though. I have had plek'd guitars, theyre alright. What killed the guit for me was nothing to do with the superb fret work but the refinish. Since writing the OP I have removed the finish off the neck of another guitar and as with the 93 strat it feels great. Im eyeing up my cs strat and weighing up whether to give it the same treatment. Its been a wake up for me. I dont know why I havnt put 2 and 2 together before now. I like unfinished necks and always have. I just forgot. I cant do it to the H150.

One guitar that has been a sticking point for me ever since I started this thing has been a 93 US Am Std strat. I got it on Jan 18 1994. Birthday present. It has been the heaviest gigged out of all of my guitars and is on its third? (I think) re fret. Its put in a lot of miles all over our big state. It was stolen and recovered and also lost at an airport and recovered 3months later. I call it a boomerang. It comes back. After it was stolen a friend and well respected luthier here took it, re fretted and refinished the neck to a lovely and natural vintage amber. When he presented it to me I was over the moon. It looked as sensational as a midnight wine/burgundy and maple strat was ever going to look. (Im not a fan of the midnight wine colour). Unfortunately, it played and felt like crap and I hated it. I actually resented it but couldnt sell it because of emotional attachment. Its been on the block to sell as well as two other guitars that have emotional content attached to them. Before it was taken away to be refinished the neck on this strat was gray. I had peeled the finish off after a tour we did one summer up the top and through the middle of our state. Our state is a desert. Its hot. Paint peels. The neck felt great unfinished and I played it unfinished for over a decade. It was not pretty. It was a dirty grey mess from just behind the nut up to the 22nd fret. But it was the guitar I could not put down. I would go looking for another strat to buy but always walked away thinking mine was better or more suited to my less refined playing style. The refinish killed the guitar for me. The guitar didnt feel right and I couldnt play it the same way. So after a while I didnt play it at all. In fact it has sat unstrung and with out even a pickguard and wiring in it for about two years Last night I fixed it. It had to be done to give that guitar a chance at staying with me. It was a quandary for me to work through. To give it a chance to stay I had to make it less attractive to potential buyers should it fail at the chance it was given. I removed the nitro finish on the fretboard and on the back of the neck. I could tell early on during the process that in terms of playability it was going to be beneficial. By the time I had removed all the finish I needed to but not yet put the strings on I knew that I had uncovered something very cool. After a restring and a few hours of playing the guitar is unquestionably staying. Everything I remember loving about this guitar is back. Its alive. It vibrates and resonates strongly when technique isnt hindered. Its a very direct strat, it makes you play in a physical way and I love that quality. What this means is that I now have four strats that I want to keep. It also means that my H150 is coming up for review in much the same way this strat did but more quickly than I had anticipated. Out of the remaining guitars I have the H150 was gigged the least(with the exception of a recent purchase). It has not pulled its weight(considerable) and put food on the table or fuel in the car. It is the most attractive however and has wonderful classic LP tones and I do enjoy playing it. I have pride in ownership of it. It has a few weeks, or months, to impress me and show me it isnt a redundant fixture in my guitar rack. I am going to have to harden my resolve with this H150. Its cool and I really like it, but I feel the same way about everything its going up against. Onwards.

A week in to the smaller abode. Smaller spaces get messier quicker. Shouldnt seem surprising but it was/is. Smaller spaces require less heating. Again, it seems like it should go without saying, but here I am continually turning down the heat. Not even 1/3 power is required. The closer the amp is to your ears the more noises you can hear. Its very easy to get over analytical of......everything you are hearing! Can just imagine OCD personalities blowing ,000's in sheilding, pickups, speakers, amps and noise gates. Fortunately Im not OCD. Yet. It could become a problem though.

Thank you skydog52. Im glad you are enjoying my journey into uncharted(for me) territory. Y'know, it could be a bunch of wrong moves and foolishness strung together. Nah! The transition from large space to small space was finalised tonight. I got home to find the carpet guys had come in and blitzed the place. My bigger old room looks amazing. It also smells kind of new. My daughter had already started with the move and had all her furniture in there and had started organizing where it was all going to go. Some paint, new carpet and curtains according to a young womans taste and sense of colour has transformed the room in to a lively and exciting room. There seems to be a sense of possibility and excitement in there. The room now seems to have purpose and flow. I felt quite a profound sense of happiness and of weight lifted by seeing the transformation. My move into the smaller room was easier. I set it up as I imagined I would, as symmetrically as possible. There is no way around that for me. My new desk is a little under 1/2 the size of my old desk. Every other item remains the same size. Once I had all the essentials set up I was surprised at how much space was left over. This is not going to be cramped in anyway. There is plenty of room for a Greyhound to stretch out. We could actually make do with less space. I did a volume test by turning up Cat Scratch Fever and walking around the rooms in the house and going back and making adjustments to suit. I will be able to play loud enough to suit my purposes. My guitars sound different in here, or rather, my amps do. Im really happy about this stage of the downsizing. It feels incredibly right. My wife is still trying to wrap her head around what Im doing and why but I think she is enjoying the changes and the journey as both a travel companion and also as a spectator on the sideline of a sport they cannot fathom but can see that the participants are having fun. and now on to the next phase

There are several pointy bits. The starting bit, the couple of bits before the middle bit and several bits toward the end bit. I havnt made it to the end bit yet. I still have 9 gizmos with strings on them not including the mandolin or ukes. It doesnt matter how I stack them all they collectively take up about 1.135sqm or 12.21sqf with amps and cab included when all clumped together. I have this clump of stuff stacked in a corner. Its quite a dull lump, just a corner of boring looking stuff. Mainly black cases and black rectangles. I still have some electrified stringed gizmos I want to sell but I dont know which ones to make gone. The strats do my head in the most. Always thought they would be the easiest. Good strats are so cheap and easy to get it almost seems weird to have an attachment to them. The next stage of this thing, once Im safely set up in my new place to be is to take note of what I use out of the remaining electric stringed objects over the next 6months to a year and then cull the items that get the least use. I have a fair idea of what items they may be but I want to give them a fighting chance. They were once much loved and much played dooverlackies. Two of the nine whatchamacallits are acoustically inclined and one of the nine doohickeys plays low noted and none of those three are on the endangered list. I sort of covered it all in a reply to another blog but, Im roomless. I cant get out of this room until the carpet and curtains are done. I feel quite discombobulated and out of sorts. Ive had the same some where to be for the last 20yrs. Its all different now. Nothing is where it normally is. I havnt even got my desk. The room I have retreated to for the last 20yrs, or hid in, planned world dominance in, broadcasted from, conducted and cataloged sonic experiments in, deconstructed and reconstructed things in, took things apart and then thrown them out because I broke them in, sat and did nothing in, sat and looked like I was doing nothing in, the room where manic energy was spent in, the room I would fall asleep at my desk with a guitar on my lap in, the room where I blissed out on repeated riffs and momentary flashes of unusually and uncharacteristically cool shit is now just a space. Stripped back like this, its just another room where as before it felt like a destination. I feel kind of sad to be giving it up and happy to be free of it at the same time. More excited to be moving on than sad. There were times I was my own warden and the self imposed isolation was a killer. displaced slacker and his clump of stuff.

Never occurred to me that changing rooms would mean being with out a room for a while. I havnt had a place to be for a week or so and no end in sight. The decontamination process of my old room has begun. Carpet half removed, ceiling and one previously dark brick wall painted, lighting done, electrician done 1/2 the power unwiring and 1/2 the rewiring, double glazing deglazed, doors that hadnt opened in 20yrs set free and made to swing again. Me being me I got right into it and ended up paying the cost in pain killers and sent to sit on the side lines. Meanwhile curtains are 3weeks away and carpet another 2weeks. If I was trading rooms with a teenage boy It wouldve been done and dusted 2months ago and cost nothing. Im sitting in here now and its really bright. Its quite light and airy. I dont know why I didnt do all this while I inhabited the room. There was a bar in here made from the same bricks as three of the walls. It was about 10ft long 4ft high and about 4ft behind it. I made panels that closed it in and made the perfect amp isolation both. You could crank a 100w JCM800 through a412 in there and talk easily at conversational levels in the room Ive knock all that down. I thought of all the people I knew who were envious of this facility and how the room had been used by others just so they could record their guitar tracks. Theres been some cool amps shoved in that cave and had mics stuck in front of them. It all seemed important and crucial at the time. I cant remember even one of the songs or tracks. So much energy spent, so much important business going on. I dont even know who some of those people were. I cant even remember some of their faces. Wonder who they were. It was an intensely busy room and no real sign of any production for all the time that was spent in there. Couple of songs I can remember that I like. They couldve been recorded in any room. Im hanging out for the move to be complete so I can be in another room and spend intense hours doing nothing.... I really hope I dont let it work out that way.

Hey Marty, some things Ive taken on have been plain dumb and the rewarding part was extracting myself from the situation Maybe start a blog or thread on these guitars you have been building. I'd be into it.

Ive seen/heard people with great ability and musicality get awesome sounds out of guitars and amps using thin strings and die hard guitar lovers with out a skerrick of ability get the worst possible sound out of great sounding guitars and amps using heavy gauge strings. I have also noted that people with ability and musicality can also get amazing sounds using heavy gauge strings and people that lack any ability can sound quite bad with thin strings. The conclusion of these observations is obvious. Its obviously the pickups, nuts and stoptails, caps and pots, that are the real tone generators not the string gauge.

@ myoldfriend. "Rightsizing"!!! Beautiful. Thanks for that. Ive been contemplating that term ever since you posted. It is the correct term for this thread?blog. Pondering the difference between downsizing and rightsizing has had a positive affect on me. Cheers

I had a funny moment today. I went looking for a nice desk, filing cabinet and book shelf to go into my new room. Just checking stuff out. I need a smaller desk to fit in the smaller room I saw a home office package I really liked and it was the right size. It was set up as a display. Sitting on the shelf at eye level was a home crafty looking sign that said "All you need is less" !!!!! Really struck a deep and resonating chord. I walked out and came back home. What a funny sign to put in a retail store showroom. @ Beagle216 Love that quote. Thankyou.

Ive recently sold a lot of gear including PA's, guitars, amps and cabs, pedals, recording gear, pick ups and anything that resembled an unused or unnecessary piece of gear. Its been a rewarding experience. I havnt finished the purge and still have stuff to get rid of. It will happen. There have been a few things that happened that I didnt really think about when I first started selling my gear. One of those things is space. Room to move. No clutter. Another is time. I dont have projects lying around to finish. Other people have them now. Theres no spare pick ups or wiring harness's to try in another guitar. No (insert guitar guy name here) pedal board to put together. No speakers to swap out and try and no box's of tubes to sample and obsess over. I seem to have spare time and a very strong feeling of spare time. There are no projects occupying my vision or my mind Space and time plus extra cash is a combination worth having over bits and bobs it turns out. It gives you options and time to think about the options. My space is two rooms 8mtrs by 5mtrs each. Its not a little space. It takes a bit of effort to fill it up and reduce it to a small amount of space. It takes some effort to empty it also. But I did it. This space I have is now too much space. I sit at my desk with a 5 space guitar rack next to it running along one wall and two amps running at 90degrees to it along another wall at the end and realise I take up less than 9sqm's of the 40sqm's in this room. Its not cosy. It has been sound proofed so there is no outside noises, its very quiet and to be honest, it seems quite lonely and cold. With all the gear gone this space seems to have less purpose. I think its more that it no longer serves my purpose. 31sqm's of redundancy and I want out of it. Ive negotiated a deal with my 18yr old daughter. I have her sunny 10sqm room and we clean, paint, re carpet and make more cheerful this room I have inhabited for 20yrs. Probably have to burn incense or go through some kind of purifying ritual as well. Hopefully she will get a few years use out of it before she moves out. She didnt say no. She has already picked carpet, curtains and colour scheme. Ive done like wise for my new little room. I wouldnt have guessed a few years ago that I would be this excited and happy to have less gear and less space. I also would never have guessed that there could be so much spare time in one day. Even though guitar takes up all my work day and most of my down time I feel less defined by it. Its a great feeling. Have a sensational day.

The above was the initial spontaneous post. Just want to add that I really like your music, songs and tunes. There are a couple here that are just plain cool. Good work. I like your style.

Whoa!!! awesome. Im in if I may.

Enjoying this Blog Barry. Thanks for keeping it up to date.