MyRareGuitars.com

If you somehow missed this story at Winter NAMM 2011…well…it’s time you heard about the George Harrison Tribute Duo Jet from Gretsch Guitars. They have made one of the most awesome replica guitars you’ll ever see. It is limited to a run of 60, and it will be available in May 2011 with an MSRP of $20,000.

Have you ever watched your favorite guitarist and wondered how they got so fast? You may think you’ll never get there, but that’s not true. With guitar, just like anything else, you get out of it what you put into that. That’s the first and most important thing. But there are things you can do to help the process along and progress faster to the speed licks you’d like to be playing.

Although I’m very passionate about my music, my guitar playing and blues, I don’t in any way consider myself an expert on any of these topics. I’m always open to new artists and a lot of artists that have received high praise from other musicians I simply haven’t had the chance to listen to yet. This will explain to some why I had never listened to Roy Buchanan till recently.

Just got back from an 8 day trip to UK. I will have more details in next months newsletter – including exclusive video interviews – but here is a snapshot of what we were up to. Our first day in London included a visit with Chris Spedding, who was messing around with his Airline Town & Country before heading off on a European Tour playing guitar for Bryan Ferry.

When you talk about great authentic white blues guitar players, you are surely talking about some rarified company. The key word being authentic, and in my estimation authentic white blues guitar player means that when you listen to this person playing you think it’s a black man playing. Stevie Ray Vaughn a great blues guitar player always tried to get that real blues sound. When I saw Stevie Ray for the last time a few months before his death we spoke backstage at one of his shows and I told him “man you sounded like Albert King”, Stevie smiled and said that was the biggest compliment I could have ever given him. That is what we who strum the strings in the blues strive for, to sound like our idols, the great bluesmen. Johnny Winter did this as well as anyone, and proof of this is that he was accepted amongst the great bluesman as an equal, and shared the stage with many of them with great dignity and restraint.

Greetings my friend and fellow strummers in this months column I will discuss that in my opinion that Artist recognition is one of the most important aspect of guitar marketing. That is a statement I truly believe, and in this column I will trace the popularity of certain guitars and the artists that I believe are responsible for their success. I will also list some guitar players and the guitars I found to be intriguing. I will list the guitars first and the artists that were associated with it. Remember my friends knowing what guitars your favorite players play is part of getting a sound similar to them, but it is only a small part of it.

Eddie Cochran was only 21 years old when he died in an auto accident while on tour in England on April 17th 1960. In his brief but illustrious career Eddie recorded some of the most influential early rock and roll, tunes like, Twenty Flight Rock, C’mon Everybody, Too Much Monkey Business, and Something Else, but Eddie’s Summertime Blues was a monster hit. Summertime Blues was also covered by Blue Cheer (a Billboard Top 40 hit) and the Who (Live at Leeds) but neither version could match the magic and originality of Eddie’s version.

This is the story of a personal journey through the world of music that begins humbly and ends just as humbly as it started. The fact that your reporter (should I say “moi”?) has experienced it at all is amazing enough, for under any other circumstances I might not have found myself in circumstances that presented so ripe an opportunity to learn and understand that most sensuous, invigorating, physically challenging and just plain righteous of musical instruments: the guitar.

Mike Stern is one of those lucky few: a guitarist who can do it all. Though he’s known for the depth and precision of his jazzy ballads and rip-snortin’ fusion instrumentals, he’s equally respected for the woozy bends and woody tone of his paeans to the greats of blues and rock. Listen to any of his many excellent releases (all of which remain active in the Atlantic catalog), and you’ll caught by the power of his deceivingly subtle blend.

Last month guitar legend Link Wray passed away at his Copenhagen home at the age of seventy-six. A master of raw tone and minimalist riffs, Link Wray was the great grandfather of the power chord.