Who are we?

thumpingrug

In the early 80s I was heavily into keyboards and synths but in 1988 I saw a red strat in a shop and fell in love.  Bought it and an amp and have played guitar ever since (mostly very badly).   Gigged in a band for a couple of years in the 90s and my playing improved more than any lessons ever could.  We were good and it was great fun, then I moved due to work from Yorkshire to Sussex.  Tried a few years ago to get into a band again but couldn't find people I was happy / willing to play with at my level (ie not great but happy to have a good time).  

So i have stuck mostly to the bedroom and living room and the occasionally converted dining room (who needs to eat) have built up a fair collection of guitars and am very happy noodling away.

tone1

 My name is John.... no it really is tone. I can’t play for shit but I love guitar. Self taught bar a few lessons early days about 35 years ago. 
I have 3 guitars... Custom shop Cunetto Strat, PRS DGT and a Taylor 714. 
I don’t know any theory and can’t read music... I’m more than happy playing a few riffs and solos to my favourite songs at home.....I never get any better but life’s busy.
I hate spending lots on gear because my playing doesn’t warrant having expensive stuff, so you will find me selling stuff that I’m not using/don’t need.
I don’t get involved in too many deep conversations/arguments on threads here, and I like to keep things humorous, and I have got a dark sense of humour. 
That’s about it.....

chris78

As the username would suggest, I’m Chris and I’ll be 42 next month.
I started having classic guitar lessons when I was 8. Got to grade 5 but frankly never practised anywhere near enough and at senior school, guitar lessons were a chance to avoid my art lessons and a teacher I hated (with the feeling being wholly mutual). 

I got my first electric at 16- an encore strat copy which was a total piece of junk. When I got my a levels, my parents gave me a few hundred quid and I went to our local fender dealer (which has long since shut down) and played a Mexican tele and another tele with a b bender which was priced £200 higher. The salesman did it for the price of the mex and that became my main guitar. When I came to sell it, it turned out to be a partscaster. It had an esp neck, a god knows what body and dreadful routing for the b bender. I got £100 for it.
I stopped playing for around 15 years after uni until I got chatting to a guy in his home who had 3 guitars and 4 wallhangers. Turned out his dream guitar was a tele and he inspired me to start playing again.
I then got the trading bug badly. That was about 2012. I reckon I’ve had over 200 guitars in that time. Fenders have been a constant theme, but I’ve tried pretty much everything out there, plus amps, pedals, multi effects etc. Christ knows what I’ve spent and lost. I tend to buy high as I need to have something then sell it at a loss.
I play in a band which isn’t serious, but is a few friends getting together every 3 weeks for a studio jam. It’s my favourite thing. We laugh, we share our lives, we share music. I’ve also started to give my fellow guitarist serious gas.
Current gear is a tone king imperial ii amp, 2 fender cs artisan teles, 2 fender cs artisan strats, a fender cs custom built roasted tele, a fender cs broadcaster, a prs 594, an acoustasonic tele with a cocobolo top and an Asher gt-3. I’ll have a kemper very soon to add to that!

Balrog68

I'm Jes.. 52.Started playing guitar when I was 6,then piano from 9-12,then I discovered rock music and my first electric guitar. I never had a telly in my house until I'd left home, so I played in every spare moment, got pretty good, did the whole bands, gigs, etc, until I got married first time round. This ended all guitar oriented activities until I fucked her off after 4 years. 
My second wife is actually the one who encouraged me to pick up the guitar again and although I've had Guitars since we got together, it's only since about 3 years ago that I have really pushed myself to the point where I'm confident enough to join a band again and think about recording and gigs.
I have 4 guitars, a classical, a Steel acoustic, an Epiphone LP and a T-bird copy bass, 2 mandolins and a keyboard.
While I'm in lock-down(dodgy ticker) band activity is on hold so I'm messing around with home recording.
Ramble over!

Voxman

I'm Rich, 62 years young, and been playing (well, trying to play! ) since I was 14 when I was in awe of the guys who played in the school band.  Live in North London, married to Rachel (37 years), with two wonderful daughters Lydia (intellectual property lawyer) & Jessica (training to be an Architect).  I'm a compliance manager by day, and a world famous rock god at night ...in my own den! 

My first guitar was a 'spanish' guitar - essentially a cheap plank of wood with strings and with an action higher than the Chrysler building !(  ).  I bought it for £6 from the Arcade Music shop in North Finchley with a chrome bottle neck, a capod (no clue what these were for) pitch-pipes, plectrums and a spare set of strings and a chord book. Came home and my parents thought I'd wasted my money as they weren't musical and said I'd never learn to play. So, my early motivation was just one of sheer cussedness to prove them wrong!

Most of my early gigging was with a Shaftesbury Les Paul Custom copy that I had modified with a Dimarzio super distortion in the bridge, a phase switch, and schaller machine heads. Didn't get my first 'pro' guitar until I was 20 when I borrowed £200 from the bank to buy a 1969 hardtail Strat that I still have and retired from gigging well over a dozen years ago because it was just getting too valuable and I didn't want to risk it being pinched or damaged. 

First love is gigging/playing live which for me is where the real fun is re band and audience interaction (although less frequent over at least the last decade re work commitments etc), Been in loads of different bands over the years, too many to remember, some original but predominantly part or all covers. Did the university tour thing for 5-6 weeks when I was 18-19, loads of pubs & clubs, house parties, and played at some more reasonably well known venues back in the 70's and 80's (nothing huge) including Mean Fiddler in Harlesden, Greyhound in Fulham, 2 nights at the original Marquee (last minute support band), two nights at the Roundhouse in Camden Town (last minute support band again!), and was in the house band for a while at the Torrington pub in North Finchley (fairly well known in its day). My mum and step dad even came to see me play once at the Mean Fiddler and enjoyed the gig which was a real surprise as they hated my type of music.  My eldest daughter Lydia plays acoustic and has a great voice, and was one of the singers in a band I was then with called 'Undercover' doing her first live gig with us when she was only 15.  So that was really nice to have some father/daughter bonding there. And then she decided to go off to Uni and that was it...no band loyalty! (OK, it was Cambridge!)

Have dabbled with a little bit of studio/session work over the years but at a more amateur level - nowhere near good enough to be a pro-session player, & I can't read music. At around  18-19 I had a chance to go over to Germany with the band I was then with (called Phoenix) but my parents were wholly against it and persuaded me to get a proper job. I stayed in touch with the guys for a while and they were earning just enough to live (but not well) but had two line-up changes in the first 4-5 months and changed their name twice, and I lost touch with them - so probably getting a job was the right thing!  But I always wondered what may have been! 

Self taught so not a technical virtuoso by any means but hopefully a reasonable 'bread & butter' player that's fairly versatile and able to improvise & hold a tune to most things.  Main love is classic rock & blues but also play a little jazz, country, funk, acoustic, slide etc - not into 'heavy metal' though. Playing guitar has been a love that's stayed with me, grounded me and been a great outlet/stress release since I was 14 and its been great socially too. 

Gear wise I've had a ton of vintage amps slip through my fingers (who knew then that some would be worth a small fortune today!) including a Vox AC30, Fender blackface, Silverface dual reverbs, Selmer Zodiac MkII, Sound City 50w, Marshall JTM45, JCM800, 50w Plexi, and a Marshall 18w 1974 2x10 combo that I should never have sold!  Current gear includes 6 amps, 2 extn cabs, 13 guitars (technically, although my daughter has adopted my 1970's Yamaha FG140 acoustic), 4 MFX units, a conventional pedal board plus a few other pedals I no longer use inc a nice chrome plated Vox V847 wah, and a vintage Coloursound volume pedal and Vox Superphaser.  

I have a you-tube channel that has some 45 plus vids inc gear demo's, playing to backing tracks, live gig clips etc, i think in total I've had around 470,000 hits so hopefully not too shabby for an amateur player.  Soundcloud has some better quality sound clips (with bands & solo), links below. 

Sadly, just begun to get a touch of arthritis in the index finger of my left hand but so far I'm coping with that but a sad reminder that I'm just getting to be a sad old rocker!  

This one has a few of my guitars and some different styles (the Vox was a loan)



And a couple of rockers on Soundcloud:




https://soundcloud.com/richard-birch-1

https://www.youtube.com/user/Voxman5/videos

Vibetronic

Nice idea, and been really interesting reading everyones stories I'm Ben and I've been playing for 32 years now. I first heard guitar music when dad had Buddy Holly on in the car, then when a friend lent me an Iron Maiden tape at junior school, and after that I had to learn. I've been playing fairly seriously ever since and teaching on a casual basis since I left uni in 1997, until about 3.5 years ago when I decided to jack in my proper job and do it full time. I was fortunate to have two absolutely brilliant teachers through school and uni, and I love passing that stuff on and helping people out - it's going great, or it was until recently, but I know it'll be fine once this thing has passed  Aside from that I've been in loads of bands, have done some decent sized gigs, have played at Download (always an ambition since the Monsters of Rock days!), and done some demoing/recording work along the way. I've always found playing the guitar very therapeutic, especially the technical side of it....I guess in the same way some people enjoy going to the gym, I just love it - but really enjoy trying to be more musical too and not just shredding. Hopefully I'll pass on the enthusiasm to a few more people along the way 

Funkfingers

I am, in the words of Alexei Sayle, a Santa Claus-faced Old Bastard.

Roland

Roland is my real name. In the summer of ‘69 I actually did get my first real six string, and I’ve been messing about with guitars and equipment ever since. Playing, maintaining, modifying, and making. I must have built my first pedal in ‘69, and an amp a few years later. In the last five years I’ve been focused on making my own guitars, focusing on trying out design “improvements”. I’ve never been a collector. Of all the guitars I’ve acquired some have been given away, but only one has been sold. The rest are still here in the house.

Over the years I’ve been in and out of bands, but never wanted to tour because I could make more money out of IT. Live music is where the excitement is, both playing and other people’s gigs. I’ve done some recording, but don’t find it as rewarding as live playing. Despite the 50+ years playing I remain an enthusiastic amateur, and glad that I’ve never had to rely on music for income. Besides playing I enjoy transcribing, and arranging songs to suit a particular group of musicians. For me it’s more about making the whole thing work than being a virtuoso.

Before retiring I used to manage IT projects around the world. Whilst I was living out of a suitcase this forum, and its predecessors, helped to keep me sane. Nowadays it’s a pleasure to be able to pay some of that back by helping to moderate the forum. 

boogieman

I’m Larry. Got my first acoustic in 1966 after I badgered my parents to buy me one for Xmas; I wanted to play like the Beatles. Worked my way through Bert Weedon’s Play in a Day and nearly gave up at that point but luckily I met a guy who could play to a decent standard and he gave me some pointers and a few lessons. I finally got an electric guitar in the early 70s and never looked back. I was in a few bands but haven’t played out since the 80s. Got a man cave full of gear now but I’m crap at playing these days (not that I was much cop in the first place). I still love guitars though. 

thegummy

Stew, 34. Been making music for 16 years purely as an artistic endeavor (i.e. no desire or attempt to make it a business).

Was only keyboard and vocals (and programming drums etc.) until 4 years ago when I got a guitar and bass to add to the mix (had a Squier Strat and could play the basic chords and scales since primary school but never sustained interest in practicing over the years).

Within a couple of months guitar and bass took over as my main instruments, just love how expressive and tactile they are.

Also play in a small time rock band as singer and bassist but don't play guitar in that at all.

Enjoy this forum for learning from people as well as helping others; being in possibly an unusual position of still being relatively new to guitar but having a lot of experience with music making in general.

thegummy

Kittyfrisk said:

Hi, I'm Bryan.

I got my first real six-string, bought it at the five-and-dime.
Played it 'til my fingers bled, was the summer of '69.

I'll get me coat...

That is funny but do a real one too

Cookiemonster

the_jaffa said:

I'm Matt,

In 1989 at the tender age of 14 I heard the Stone Roses for the first time and things changed. I went from dancing about with a tennis racket as a faux guitar to actually wanting to learn to play one so I could be as cool as John Squire.

I picked up my little sister's 3/4 nylon strung acoustic and started trying to work stuff out. I didn't even know how to tune a guitar so everything was on one string to start with. I "borrowed" a book from the school library that I still have and started to learn a bit more. Things like tuning, the pentatonic scale shape and how 12 bar blues work before getting a Hondo Les Paul copy for Christmas 1990.

From here I tried to learn more and listen to stuff to try to figure things out before starting a bit of a band in 6th Form. We played one gig in the bass player's living room for his brother's 18th birthday and that was it.

After that I flirted with a number of local bands but never went anywhere and before too long I was resigned to playing at home. I had a few lessons for a bit but they weren't great.

When I moved to University at 26 and from my own house into a student room guitars were not really playing big part of my life and were a big thing I could leave behind and save space. Eventually I sold my stuff off and that was that.

Fast forward to 2012 and somewhere I stumbled across Squier releasing their VM Jaguars and as I had always wanted a Jag after seeing John Squire with his (although I subsequently found out more about this) I went to buy one. Except I actually preferred the Jazzmaster and bought one of them instead. Plan was to just get that and twiddle really but ended up buying a Vox VT20+ too.

Anyway, through that I found myself really enjoying playing again and with the internet now being a thing started learning way more about playing, gear and music. Ended up going to a couple of jam nights and eventually got up enough courage to play at my local blues jam doing some improvs and some covers.

From there, my Squire obsession has developed and I now have a Gretsch Country Gent and a pink Strat, I've built my own copy of his Jaguar hybrid thing and am currently trying to build a replica of his splatter painted Hofner. I've got a silver face Vibrolux (should really be a Twin) and a pedalboard that pretty closely resembles his 89 set up. I regularly get to act out my homages at a local jam night and have even done a couple of proper gigs.

I'm far from amazing at the guitar, I lack any originality and I struggle on but I enjoy it and it's a fantastic distraction from real life. Once my kids are little bit older I will hopefully get something more proper going as a band which might even be a tribute band. Who knows.

Do you have photos of the Squire Jag ? Also what pedals are you using for his sound ?

Neil

Hi, I'm Neil unsurprisingly.

Back in the '60's I loved the Beatles, Stones et al and wanted a guitar, unfortunately the best my parents could do was a £3 Spanish acoustic which was pretty shoddy but me and a couple of pals tried to make music together learning as we went with no internet in those days. I guess you could say it was band.

Eventually in the early '70's got myself an Avon Les Paul and a kindly old jazzer chap I vaguely knew showed me some chords and let me play through his H&H amp. 

Got married and was then pretty flush in my business so bought a new 1989 US Strat which I still have. Then three boys came along and all thoughts of guitar playing were forgotten.

A few years back the Strat was pressed back into service and getting an interest in playing once again I added a Les Paul Junior, Les Paul Standard and a '60's Strat to the fold.

So I'm basically a bedroom/dining room/living room type player.

Not very good but it's a nice hobby, amongst others. 

Flanging_Fred

I’m Julian.

I got my first electric guitar (a Kawai Aquarius) for Xmas 1987. Was influenced by Iron Maiden, Scorpions, Michael Schenker. That sort of thing.

I now play lead guitar in a covers band and I haven’t yet been booed or bottled off.  I sometimes gig with a Hello Kitty strat to cover up the fact that I’m dead inside.

Bucket

I'm Connor. Coming up to 25 in a couple of weeks.

Been playing since I was about 12 and posting on forums with you lot since 14.

I'm now a professional musician, although it doesn't feel much like it at the minute. I gig, and sometimes record, with a number of different projects on guitar, bass and lately also vocals. I also teach - teaching is my biggest source of income, although I'm trying to reconfigure what I do a little bit so that I can do more of what I like once this lockdown business is over.

I started on one of my dad's Teles but got *my* first guitar, a Dean Baby ML, in late 2007 (I think). My most important early influences were Gary Moore, Steve Vai, Dimebag Darrell and Alexi Laiho - not that I could do any of that stuff. Now I try and expand my horizons in as many different directions as I can, although I'm still grounded in rock music really. My primary influences now would probably be Paul Gilbert, Steve Lukather, Greg Howe and John Mayer.

the_jaffa

Cookiemonster said:

the_jaffa said:

I'm Matt,

In 1989 at the tender age of 14 I heard the Stone Roses for the first time and things changed. I went from dancing about with a tennis racket as a faux guitar to actually wanting to learn to play one so I could be as cool as John Squire.

I picked up my little sister's 3/4 nylon strung acoustic and started trying to work stuff out. I didn't even know how to tune a guitar so everything was on one string to start with. I "borrowed" a book from the school library that I still have and started to learn a bit more. Things like tuning, the pentatonic scale shape and how 12 bar blues work before getting a Hondo Les Paul copy for Christmas 1990.

From here I tried to learn more and listen to stuff to try to figure things out before starting a bit of a band in 6th Form. We played one gig in the bass player's living room for his brother's 18th birthday and that was it.

After that I flirted with a number of local bands but never went anywhere and before too long I was resigned to playing at home. I had a few lessons for a bit but they weren't great.

When I moved to University at 26 and from my own house into a student room guitars were not really playing big part of my life and were a big thing I could leave behind and save space. Eventually I sold my stuff off and that was that.

Fast forward to 2012 and somewhere I stumbled across Squier releasing their VM Jaguars and as I had always wanted a Jag after seeing John Squire with his (although I subsequently found out more about this) I went to buy one. Except I actually preferred the Jazzmaster and bought one of them instead. Plan was to just get that and twiddle really but ended up buying a Vox VT20+ too.

Anyway, through that I found myself really enjoying playing again and with the internet now being a thing started learning way more about playing, gear and music. Ended up going to a couple of jam nights and eventually got up enough courage to play at my local blues jam doing some improvs and some covers.

From there, my Squire obsession has developed and I now have a Gretsch Country Gent and a pink Strat, I've built my own copy of his Jaguar hybrid thing and am currently trying to build a replica of his splatter painted Hofner. I've got a silver face Vibrolux (should really be a Twin) and a pedalboard that pretty closely resembles his 89 set up. I regularly get to act out my homages at a local jam night and have even done a couple of proper gigs.

I'm far from amazing at the guitar, I lack any originality and I struggle on but I enjoy it and it's a fantastic distraction from real life. Once my kids are little bit older I will hopefully get something more proper going as a band which might even be a tribute band. Who knows.

Do you have photos of the Squire Jag ? Also what pedals are you using for his sound ?

@Cookiemonster ;
 
There's a thread from my new guitar day here:

https://www.thefretboard.co.uk/discussion/83655/ngd-custom-build-jaguar-strat-hybrid-inspired-by-john-squires-original/p1

There's pics in there and a link to the build thread too.

Pedals wise, the main ones are a Fuzzface, TS9, CS9, BF2 and a DF2 (although that is pretty niche and only really for the feedback bits at the start of Standing Here). The main extra addition and pretty important to the overall sound is an Alesis Midiverb 2.

LuttiS

I'm Chris and I'm classically trained to rock your socks off. 

Teen Chris heard Gary Moore and became a little obsessed so had to learn guitar. His parents got him classical guitar lessons...

But I was really bad at reading music and as a young teen it really didn't interest me so i jacked that in pretty fast. 

Fast forward a year or so and I discover Iron Maiden. I get a squire strat for Christmas and set about learning myself.. unfortunately Iron Maiden is the incorrect thing for a just starting guitarist to learn to play.. 

So I bumble along learning a few bits here and there, no real structure on what or how to play. At University I meet a guy in halls who has similar taste in everything and actually learnt guitar properly. We spend most free time playing together and start a band. My playing level goes from nowhere to somewhere very fast. I'm playing every day and gigging regularly, band only lasts a year but it was a good year.. 

New band, guitar friend is now the drummer/vocalist, I'm the bassist and new friend is a Paul Gilbert enthusiast who can play most of Paul Gilberts repertoire. We play, we gig, we tour. Lasts a good few years. Happy times. We all move to different areas, and band falls apart.

I move around a bit play in various bands, record a bit, did a couple of festivals, end up in North Wales with Mrs. L. Go to join a Kiss covers band as the drummer. Turns out it's an originals death metal band, they still need a drummer so did that for a bit, but never got anywhere... split off with the singer and get a proper drummer and form this. That's me fucking up the guitar.

We're not technically going any more, but it was a lot of fun being North Wales's premier long haired, beer fueled rock bastards. We played in a lot of places, and for some reason got asked back..

Now i mostly play at home, which is pretty boring. I've met quite a few of you through the jams, and they are still a highlight of my calandar.

thegummy

Bucket said:

Been playing since I was about 12 and posting on forums with you lot since 14.

Weird to think there might be children on here.

skippy76

I’m Toby,

Originally from Aus (hence the name) but have lived in the UK since the late 90s. 

Grew up listening to dad playing, Dire Straits, credence clever water revival, Neil young, Springsteen and the Beatles. A teenager through the grunge era so my influences were Nirvana, Weezer, Violent Femms, greenday, Chilli Peppers and loads more. (metalica, sepultura, Danzig and some more heavy stuff)

A mate got me into Black Sabbath and Zepplin as a young teenager so have a lot to thank him for!

I’ve wanted to play since as long as I can remember, after seeing Back to the future in 85. Started playing at age 12 on an old Strat copy. 

Played the same stuff badly For about 25 years! Then my oldest son started to play and I got into it again properly and started learning how to play stuff properly from YouTube.

Ive got a modest player grade vintage collection, a nice refinished 61 Strat and a 56 Les Paul Special are the highlights. And I play in a band with a mate of mine, my son and one of his mates.

Interesting to see everyone’s stories on here  

McToot

PhilKing said:

Surprisingly my name is Phil.

Was in a cover/originals band in the early 70's and got to do the Germany US bases tour and then played in a couple of original song bands and then a pub cover band.  At the same time as this, I was managing JSG Music in Bingley.  I left that and got back into IT and after a few years migrated to the States, where I've lived on and off since then.

No way!! If you were at JSG (later Spectre IIRC) anytime from about '83-88, then I would have been one of the manky teenagers who used to come in with enough money for a Mars bar and a plectrum and stay for hours. 

Anyway...

I'm Jules (one of several Julians I know on here) and I'm getting on a bit, though not as close to retirement as I'd like to be. 

I started plinking away on guitars in 1983, but lacked the inclination to ever actually learn properly, choosing instead the '100 monkeys in a room on typewriters' method instead: eventually, I thought,  I'd stumble on something that sounded good and might get me laid. I kind of did and it kind of did. 

Like a few of those that have posted I played a lot until Uni with friends and in a couple of bands, but then kind of lost the ambition (ie I had to sell my gear to pay for beer). But I picked it pack up half-assedly in my late 20s and then properly in my late 30s.  I think I was one of those that enjoyed buying/selling the whole GAS thing more than actually learning and improving, but one way or another I did both. 

I still mostly play at home for my own amusement but have really enjoyed the jam days put on by this wonderful community - both for the music and the camaradery. I have also met many forumites and would even count quite a few as friends (though I'm not sure how they would feel about that). 

Last year I drifted away from the community and from my 6 guitars and took up golf: a healthier obsession for someone of my vintage with a dicky ticker and a loathing of gyms, I thought. The course is now closed and I'm working from home in the room that has all of my gear in it.

So I'm back. Get used to it bitches.