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I've been playing guitar for
over 30 years now and amassed quite a collection. There was a time
in my life when I was rich—so rich, in fact, that I
could blow thousands of dollars a year on my beloved guitars. Of course
this "wealth" was only relative since I
was but a lowly sailor in the US Navy. But since I didn't have
to pay rent, buy food, buy clothes, or really buy anything, I could blow entire paychecks on guitars. And
often I did. Sadly, my collecting days
effectively ended the day I left the navy and had to worry about
living the real world. If you're a guitar player and have a
few special axes, let me know. I love talking about guitars as
much as telling sea stories. Contact me at rammary@earthlink.net |
MY FIRST GUITAR:
1982 G&L SC-2
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It was the summer of 1983
and after months of fingering through my local Recycler
looking for a great deal
on a used stratocaster I finally saved enough money ($400 was
the going rate back then) .
However, I bought this brand new G&L SC-2
instead. I got talked into it by a music store salesman
who knew a sucker when he saw one. He convinced
me that Leo Fender's new company was much better than his old
one and this guitar was a thousand times better than a
stratocaster. That
1982 SC-2 (# G010570) was a beautiful guitar and it sure sounded great
when I plucked the opening notes to Stairway
to Heaven on it. When the salesman tossed in 8 free weeks
of lessons I was sold. But the minute I got
it home I had my regrets since I really wanted a stratocaster. This
G&L is a rare bird now. It was
one of the first models made by G&L. (Note that it has the original
G&L style headstock.) This
guitar was only one of about 600 SC-2s made and very few of
them made it outside of Southern California, where I lived then. The earliest SC-2s were cut to look like Fender
Mustangs (like mine) and the later ones were cut to look like a
Strat.) These
early SC-2s were equipped with MFD "soap bar" style
pickups and the tremolo set up was totally redesigned. It
doesn't play or feel like a Strat in anyway.
This G&L has a lot of sentimental value to me since it was the
first guitar I ever bought. I learned most of my early chops
on it. The 8 weeks of free lessons at the music store [where I
bought it] served me well, as my instructor taught me every song on
The Venture's Golden Hits LP. |
1982 GIBSON
LES PAUL GOLD TOP
Right before I joined
the navy in 1984 I moved to Norwood, MA and took more guitar lessons.
By then all I wanted to do was play Blues. My teacher was the now famous Peter
Nathanson who played a red '71 telecaster. I couldn't believe
how great his telecaster sounded. I was almost ashamed of how wimpy my
SC-2 sounded next to it. I swore then that I would get my hands on a
telecaster as soon as I could. It wasn't
until I was stationed in Orlando (going to Naval Nuclear Power School)
in 1985 that I
finally had enough money saved to buy that telecaster. I searched the local music shops for the perfect ax
and finally found one. Just as I was about to pull out my
wallet I noticed this baby—the
most beautiful Les Paul I ever saw! It was a Gibson 30th Anniversary Les Paul Gold
Top (#A0040). I knew I had to have it no matter
what so I made a down
payment on it and put it on layaway. I borrowed the balance from the Orlando
Navy Federal Credit Union. (Imagine me trying to convince the loan
officer that I really needed this guitar.) I love this Les Paul and it is one of
my favorite axes. I've logged quite a few hours on it over the
last 25 years. It is definitely
one of the best sounding Les Pauls I've ever heard. Today's "lighter" Les Pauls don't sound anything
like these older ones. |
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1977 FENDER
TELECASTER
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As
much as I loved my Les Paul it still wasn't a telecaster. So when I finally paid off my Les Paul and saved another few hundred bucks I set out to buy
one. By then I
was stationed in upper state NY. I drove to Albany to look over a place called Drome Music
and found dozens of decent
used telecasters and stratocasters for sale. They were all
nice but I was immediately drawn to a
vintage stratocastor hanging from the ceiling. When I asked
how much it was the salesman laughed and told me that if I had to ask
then I couldn't afford
it. That
day wasn't a total loss, though. I found this '77
telecaster (#S728760). It
was pretty banged up but it played better than all the other
telecasters in its price range. I modified this guitar
right away by adding a custom three-color sunburst body (the
original is butterscotch and I still have it when I want to
restore it). A few years later I added Seymour Duncan
"vintage telecaster" pickups. This telecaster is my favorite guitar
of them all and I've logged more
hours on it than any other. This was the guitar I took with
me on the USS Enterprise. During my Howlin' Ram days I
played this guitar almost exclusively on stage. When I die this
guitar must be buried with me. |
1952
FENDER TELECASTER
I
soon became obsessed with getting my hands on a genuine vintage
stratocaster like the one I saw at Drome Music that day. During
my first cruise (1986 Westpac) I
sent away for everything I could on vintage Fender instruments.
I became an expert. When the cruise was over I had saved a
large sum of money and decided to buy a vintage stratocaster. But there were none to be found! I
searched high and low all over the Bay Area and all leads
resulted in dead ends. Then one day a guy in the SF Guitar Center
told me to check out a guitar shop around the corner. I found a place called Real
Guitars (it was more like a guy's garage than a music store) and
went inside. I had already been to dozens of other "so-called
vintage" shops and assumed that this place would be like all the
rest. But I was wrong. This place was awesome and on the wall hung two Pre-CBS
rosewood neck stratocasters! They
were both '61s with the original three color sunburst finishes.
They weren't exactly what I had in mind but they were
"pre-CBS" (meaning made before 1965, when CBS bought Fender Instruments) and I had enough money to buy
one. When the owner asked me if I was interested I told him
they were nice but that I really wanted a maple neck
Pre-CBS strat (made before '59). He laughed and said that he had yet to find one
himself. When he realized that I was a legitimate buyer he went into the back room and returned with a
genuine '52 telecaster (#5297) that he had just gotten.
It was all original. When I played it I knew I had to have it.
I forget what the asking price was but it exceeded my savings substantially. He also told me
that he had several people interested in it and was waiting to hear
back from them so it was probably already sold. I left the store, went to the nearest
bank, withdrew my entire westpac savings and returned. I then tossed
my cash on the counter and said I wanted to buy
that '52 telecaster. I was able to talk him down a bit
on the price and agreed to return with the balance
in a month. In a month I returned with two more paychecks and some
money
borrowed from my steamin' mates Guido and Dicko. I
walked out of there a poor man but with a genuine vintage telecaster! Everything on this
guitar is original. It even has the "capacitor"
still factory wired in series with the fwd pickup switch (which was done
on very early telecasters and often later modified). I hardly play this
guitar anymore. I'm too afraid to. But I have played it on stage
when I felt the need to blow someone away. It
has the perfect twang to make any blues or country song sound
incredible. I'm not lying when I say this telecaster sounds
better than any other telecaster in the world. |
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1957
FENDER STRATOCASTER
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When I bought that telecaster at Real
Guitars I was placed on their
"A" list and thereafter notified anytime something good
came in. I told the owner to let me know the minute he got his
hands on a vintage maple neck stratocaster and I'd buy it. That was a lie, of course,
since I was dirt poor. But there was a cruise coming up and I
knew when it was over I'd be worth at least a few thousand dollars. As
luck would have it the first time I walked into Real Guitars following the '88 cruise they had
two genuine '57 stratocasters hanging on the wall! One was a refinished custom color
(Clam Pink) and the other was a traditional 2-color sunburst,
beat to hell, but was all original except the front two
pickups had been re-wound. The Clam Pink one played much nicer but didn't
sound anywhere near as good as the one that was beat to hell. I
didn't even have to think about it. I bought the beat to hell one on
the spot. This
'57 stratocaster (#15051) is very unique. It's a
"hard tail"
(non tremolo) with a very deep "V" neck. It's also a
"featherweight" and has mostly '56 hardware (e.g.,
round string tree instead of loops). Since it was already beat up
I didn't mind playing it on stage or letting others play it. These days
I hardly play this guitar since it is so old. Plus, the deep "V" neck
really tires my left hand out. |
1963 DANELECTRO
PRO-1
Sometime
between the '88 and '90-cruises I bought this 1963 Danelectro Pro-1. I bought it for hardly
anything.
In those days old Danos were the poor man's vintage guitar (since
they were so cheap) but soon came into demand (the
price almost doubled on some models) because people started pulling the "lipstick" pick ups out of them and using
them in other guitars.
I love the sound of this guitar.
It is very bright and twangy. I do admit, however, that this guitar is hard to
play because the neck is so small. Believe
it or not, since I've had this website up, this is the guitar
that I get the most correspondence about. And no, it's
not for sale! |
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MY FIRST
ACOUSTIC
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I bought this guitar
between the '88 and '90 cruises. This
Ibanez Concord 671 is a great sounding guitar with a nice rich
tone. When I bought it I was doing a lot of 4-track
recording and wanted to do songs like those on The Rolling Stone's Let
it Bleed or Beggar's Banquet albums (you know, acoustic rhythm
guitar stuff with nasty distorted leads on top). This
guitar now sits at the foot of my living room couch so every night when I'm watching
TV I usually have it in my hands. |
1991 FENDER JAZZ
BASS
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My
wife bought me this bass when I was in college. It's a
wonderful sounding 1991 Fender Jazz Bass (#N000095). I was still doing a lot of
4-track recording in those days and was basically using a guitar
played through an octoplus to lay down my bass lines. Sadly,
once I
had this bass I stopped doing 4-track recording.
During my last few years in college I was in a band called The
Low Rent Blues Band and the bass player often used this
bass since he liked it so much. This guy's
name was Lawrence something. We were originally called
The Lawrence [whatever his last name was]'s Blues Band (since
he was also the lead singer and owned all the PA
equipment). When we got fliers printed up for our first
big gig the printer misunderstood the guy and printed out
"The Low Rent Blues Band." The name stuck. Our
drummer in that band was really good. I forget his name but he had
a drinking problem. I remember we'd all wince when we
saw him arrive, set up his set and then unpack the case of
beer near his stool. It never failed that halfway
through our second set we'd hear his beat fall off and then disappear
altogether amidst the sound of crashing cymbals. Then he
was passed out cold! The other guitar player would have to run
back, grab the drum sticks off the floor and finish the
song. That was the end of the show. |
AN INCREDIBLE
GUITAR
There are few things I cherish as
much as this guitar. It was bought in 1936 from Sears
and given to Mr. William Freisleben by his mother when he was
a boy. This guitar followed Mr. Freisleben to the South
Pacific when he served onboard the USS Savo Island
during WWII. Together, they saw plenty of
action. I first met Mr. Freisleben in the summer of 1985, when I
came home with his son Dave after we completed Nuclear Power
School. Since
I had my Les Paul with me, Mr. Freisleben and I often jammed
during my brief stay with the family. He played jazz and
I played blues. We sounded pretty good together.
My friend Dave was killed in a car accident while we were at prototype and I was
asked by his parents to be his military escort home. I
remained close with the family ever since and I visited them
often. Whenever I was over Mr. Freisleben always brought this
guitar out for me to play because
he knew how much I loved it. I never played another arch
top that sounded or felt better. Before he passed away last
year Mr. Freisleben asked his family to make sure that if anything ever
happened to him that I got this guitar. This guitar now
sits at the foot of my bed and I play it every night before I
go to sleep. |
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MY MAIN AMP
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I have a few amps laying around but
none compare to this mid 60s "black face" Fender
Super Reverb (1967). This was probably one of the last
"blackfaced" Super Reverbs made (#A25441) as the
latter 1967s had the chrome faces with green lettering. This is the real-deal: all tube, 4
ten-inch speakers, massive reverb, deluxe vibrato and speed
control. Whenever I played live, this was the amp I
played through. Yeah, it sucked to have to lug this
heavy thing around all the time but it sounded so good.
Since it was built before the age of modern electronics it is
quite noisy (background wise) and hums pretty good
when it's plugged in near fluorescent lights. And, since
it isn't grounded, I have nearly electrocuted myself with it a
few times. But I still wouldn't trade it for
nothing. I bought this amp right before
the 1990 World Cruise. The guy who sold it to me told me
it once belonged to Robert Cray. (I have no idea if that
was true or not.) If it was I can't imagine how Robert
Cray could part with such a great amp! |
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