Ruminations of a Rock-n-Roll Accountant

What's in a name?

All the great ones have one - Lucille, Blackie, Number One. Never mind the fact that I'll never be anywhere near the caliber of guitarist that the owners of the aforementioned guitars are/were, the fact remains that a name seems vital to having a good relationship with a guitar.

]]> If you missed my last entry then you missed the conclusion of my guitar project. Stogieboy from our own BADA-NAKA and Club Millican was the first but not the last to ask, have you named her yet?

My answer, thus far, is no. Not because I don't want to or think it's silly but because the "right" name hasn't hit me yet. I'm that way about a lot of things - naming things, shopping, creative endeavors. It just needs to hit me and I'll know "it" when I see/hear "it". The Beeguard is a perfect example - I had long admired the "Screaming Girl" pickguard on Willy's Hamer guitar and I'm not ashamed to say that was my inspiration. However I knew that I had to take the idea & make it reflect me and not just a mindless clone of someone else's great work. Many a fine thought crossed my mind. Pictures of old motorcyles/cars, and an old style Vargas pin-up girl are just a couple of examples. As well as these ideas were received by friends, they just didn't feel "right" so I kept moving and finally when the Beerguard idea hit I knew it was right.

All that said, I'm not in any hurry to name this guitar but it struck me that I could harness the power of the internet and solicit suggestions. So, if you've got an idea, post it down below in the comments section. I don't have any idea when the "right" name will hit me but I'll be sure to let everyone know when it does.

Since many people say that they need to see something to feel comfortable naming it, here's refresher as to how the guitar looks -

Ok, now that I've provided your muse, run along and go about your day. But, leave the image of a butterscotch blonde Telecaster without a name in the back of your mind. I'm sure one of us will stumble across "it" sooner or later - just be sure to come back & post your idea when it hits you.

I made this ....

Tooting my own horn (so to speak) is hard for me to do. Self-promotion is not my strong suit. But in this case, I'm much more comfortable with doing it. With all apologies to dial-up users (large pictures to follow), I present to you my finally finished guitar. It turned out much better than I ever could have dreamed.

]]> Back 9 or 10 years ago, I bought a '78 Fender Telecaster & started to noodle around & play. When my daughter was born, money and time got tight so I stopped my lessons and put the guitar in the closet. A couple of years ago I got inspired & got it back out. What I hadn't remembered is that the reason I could afford a '78 was because this particular one had been repainted a disgusting color I called "Yellow Snow". Having always loved the butterscotch blonde Teles of the '50's that's what I wanted to recreate.

Undaunted by what I didn't know, I ripped it down to just the body & stripped off that ugly yellow color. What I found was most distressing. First off, someone had, at some point, made room for a humbucker in the neck position but instead of using a router or a chisel or anything dignified like that, they used a drill and drilled many many holes side by side to eventually create a crazy uneven humbucker route. Second, I found two cracks in the body - they had been repaired but they were still there and would show through the translucent butterscotch blonde. I decided that rather than try and make a silk purse out of a sow's ear, I'd replace the body - it wasn't collectible or anything as it had been a) refinished, b) attacked by a crazy man with a drill and c) weighed as much as a boat anchor.

I kept all the other parts and began the process ... boy what an ignorant optimistic fool I was back then. I figured I'd take a few weekends and get something pretty good. What I forgot was that I'm one perfectionistic guy (some might say OCD but that's another discussion for another day). Now, much much later, here we are.

For the gearhead freaks, here are the specifics:

1) 3 piece swamp ash body from USA Custom Guitars finished in Butterscotch Blonde with too many coats of nitrocellulose glossy clear to count. The color & clear (as well as some other specialty finishing things) all came from Bill Lester at Guitar Reranch.
2) Original 4 bolt all maple neck from the '78 Tele that I started with including the original 70's Script "F" tuners.
3) New Lindy Fralin 1/2 & 1/2 vintage wind hybrid stagger pickups.
4) New control harness (with all new pots, input jack & 3 way switch).
5) Electrosocket jack cup.
6) Single-ply black 5 hole pickguard as well as the previously displayed (over at BADA-NAKA in the "Not just listening, but playing area) Beerguard for special occasions.
7) Original bridge, saddles, control plate, & neck plate.

This is what it started like:

And this is what it looks like now:

Here's the beerguard -

Like I said, it came out so much better than I could have ever imagined. I guess that's what following the instructions can do for you. It's a good thing I don't do this for a living and get paid by the job - I'd be living in a van down by the river - it took me the better part of a year and half with real life & other procedural mistakes getting in the way all the time.

When I finally plugged it in, it was sweet, sweet redemption. Twang and snap sang forth from the amplifier in spades. For those considering a pickup upgrade, I can't give Fralins high enough praise.

It wouldn't be a big project and a happy outcome without some special thanks (liner notes style) so here goes.

Special thanks go out to: David Abeyta for your interest, encouragement & guidance, reh, Andy at Guitar-Mod.com Dan McCarthy at Dallas Guitar Repair, Mass Street Music, Bill Lester at Guitar Reranch, Tommy at USA Custom Guitars and last but not least, Tracy for her support, encouragement & patience in this long process. I couldn't have done it without any of y'all.

Now that I'm sitting around in the evenings instead of spending them in the garage sweating in the summer heat, I'm strangely missing that time. I'm probably just crazy/stupid/brave enough to try another one. Anyone got a suggestion for what color it shoud be?

If you need me for anything, I'll be the fool sitting in his house playing his new guitar 'till his fingers bleed. See ya down the line.

P.S. - If you've got something to say, use the new comments feature down below. It's another great new built-in feature of MovableType.

What In the Name Of Tarnation ...

What in the name of tarnation is all this you ask? Well, it's all courtesy of MovableType - a super rockin' personal publishing platform that makes for easy updating.

]]> For those of you who have been around since the beginning, you'll remember the pitiful photo galleries we used to have. For those who haven't been here since the begining, let me recap. "In the beginning, Good always overpowered the evils Of all man's sins... But in time, The nations grew weak." No wait, that's Motley Crue. In the beginning of our site, our original photo galleries were sad. We had to hand edit each picture & hand code each page to show off the photos we took. It was painstakingly, mindnumbingly boring and tedious work. As a result, we usually chose the best 10 or 12 pictures from each show and that was that.

Then, we found the greatness of a program called Gallery and all was right with the world. It automated the process of storage, archiving, sizing, display, captioning, and almost everything else. It pretty much does everything but go to the show and take the pictures. Gallery is pretty much responsible for the photo gallery being so extensive. Now, think of MovableType as the equivalent of Gallery except for the written word. Seriously, it's that good. I'm hopeful that the ease of updating now will allow all of us here at D-A.com to update much more frequently.

Plus, it gives us the ability to easily add new content - which we're working on. I don't want to give it away just yet but I think it will be very interesting.

So, stay tuned - now that I can login, type my message, press a few buttons and have it all be magically updated, archived and all that jazz, you might get sick of me.

Where It All Comes From

Well, howdy y’all! I figure that since this is the first occasion I’ve written something other than a show review or a note, I should start and offer a bit of insight into where all this comes from – some background if you will.

]]> I mentioned this before, but I’m not originally from Texas. While I was born in the U.S., I spent much of my formative years living in western Canada, and only moved to Texas when I reached my early teens. I say this because I’ve become more and more aware of how that fact has influenced my perceptions and tastes. Growing up where I did, country music (in the most traditional sense possible) was the major player on the radio. In fact, until I was 12 or 13, I hadn’t ever listened to FM radio in my little hometown – we didn’t have an FM station! There were 2 major AM radio stations and the one with the stronger signal played country.

In one of those “I vividly remember but have no idea why, as it’s not important” moments, I remember riding with my Dad and a friend of his in this guy’s pick-up and listening to Johnny Horton’s “Battle of New Orleans” on the radio and loving it. By the time I reached my early adolescence, I was (of course) too cool for country – it’s one of the things that my parents liked … how was I to enjoy country knowing my parents approved? I had to do things my way - like any 12 year old will. I embraced rock & roll – not just the flavor-of-the-week rock, but I developed an obsession with KISS (who clearly had their own way of doing things).

Moving to Texas was nothing short of “country come to town” for many reasons. Sure there was the “new kid on the block” thing but primarily I felt like an outsider because I didn’t have any Texas in me. Looking back, I wasn’t ever treated rudely or anything of that nature - it was more that I didn’t understand what living in Texas meant. Since then, I’ve lived in Texas for all but 2 ½ years and I now understand things better.

I’ve embraced Texas and all that it has and embodies. I love the state pride, I love the geography, I love the history, I love the people and most of all, I love the “outlaw” spirit that I think resides in everyone who truly loves the state. It’s that “I’m doing things my own way on my own terms” attitude that appeals to me. I’ve always had a hard time accepting the status quo … I’ve always had admiration for those who did things on their own terms. Texas & Reckless Kelly are all about that.

For me, finding Reckless Kelly was a fortunate accident. It’s actually all due to Cowboy Mouth. RK was to open for Cowboy Mouth at an arts festival or something like that. I hadn’t heard of any of the other bands playing so I hit the link to the RK site and was hooked in about 14 seconds. I can’t remember how many revisions of the official site ago it was, but no matter, I was in. Plans were immediately changed to make sure I saw RK and then Cowboy Mouth. CDs were obtained and that was the start of it all … and now look where it’s taken me.

There have been all manner of threads over at Club Millican about why we love the band and I’m not going to get all meta and repeat it. Simply said, it fills a spot inside me. It’s not just music for music’s sake … It fills that AM radio, small town, Texas-loving, "do things on your own terms with a rebel attitude" spot in me. Whatever label you put on their music, (Americana, Roots Rock, Hick Rock … take your pick) it’s not about the label - It’s about the music that they play.

Getting a place to put my thoughts in print is suddenly much more daunting than I ever imagined it could be .. That said, I’ll try and offer up something worth reading every couple of weeks… I’m going to start out with part of an e-mail I got from one of the great new friends I’ve made since starting the site. One of the great things about the fans that I have met is their collective nature – we all seem to be friendly, accepting and open to meeting new friends. We all know we’re at the shows for the music - not to be seen, not to show off our newest outfit or anything else … we’re there for the music. At the core of it all is the music of Reckless Kelly. I think this e-mail shows just how that core is bigger than any of us knows …

Train rider's lament... found out that two fresh batteries will play M&MC's twice before they need to be replaced. Took 3 RK's and the M&MC's on the 40 hour train trip to LA and fell deeper in love with Which Way From Here if you can imagine that!

Everything I've done so far on my vacation has had an either MMC's feel to it or a RK connection. Proof... today went to Santa Anita to bet on the horsies and my best friends J and his wife T - were making our bets and then T went to settle in on a bench while J and I went inside. Well, she struck up a conversation with a infield attendant who mentioned he was a singer-songwriter by trade, along the lines of Steve Earle and my friend T mentioned that I was a huge fan of his (SE) and then she said but "she really loves Reckless Kelly" and he freaked out and said that he knows of them well and when I finally came out between races (I won $38 on the 2nd race) and it became sort of an interesting, magical, fun interaction between the four of us.

Talked music and horse racing and when we went home I went to his website and he turned out to be who he said. He recently won a Jim Beam songwriter contest. He mentioned that he really wanted to write a song with Willy and he just seemed genuinely enthused about RK's new CD and I came away thinking how cool life can be!

I went out to the desert the other day and MMC's songs just kept coming into my head, and not just the songs on the CD but stuff they have been doing live. I've been so lucky and ever diligent about seeing them now while I can because you never know what tomorrow may bring. I definitely love the music and soul of both bands and each offers something the other does not. So my lament for not being around Austin has turned into a never-ending appreciation, and acknowledgement that our lives are connected in so many wonderful ways if we pay attention. Hope everything is going okay on your end and I just wanted to give you a shout and wish you the best. Always the best!

Thanks to everyone for the support you’ve given us so far in this adventure … I look forward to meeting as many of you as possible.

Take care and I’ll see ya down the line …