If you can remember the 70`s then you`ll remember a time when Eric Clapton used to wear faded jeans and black waistcoat. He was still smoking, drinking and crashing the odd Ferrari – but in one biography I read he claimed to be given an envelope of cash for wages at the end of each week. Well those were the days…
Here`s Eric’s croc skin $100,000 dollar case for his signature Martin 00028 EC acoustic guitar with a rich matte-finish croc skin adorning the exterior of the case. The shell of the case is made from poplar wood source from Nazareth, Pennsylvania and is completed with a blue silk velvet liner. Estimates for the case’s cost are tabulated at approximately $100,000. The guitar is only $4349.00.
GUITAR SPECIFICATIONS.
000 size body, rosewood back & sides, sitka spruce top with vintage toner, scalloped braces, ebony bridge, maple bridge plate, herringbone trim & rosette, ivoroid binding, 24.9″ scale, 1-3/4″ nut width, V-shaped neck with adjustable truss rod, open vintage style tuners, ebony fretboard with diamond & square inlays, EC’s pearl signature at 19th fret, standard saddle (not long), 2-1/4″ string spacing. Vintage “Geib” style archtop wooden case.
If youve a little less to spend but still desire the quality and protection of a case that can tough it out at the airport or on the road then have alook at ROCK HARD CASES.
Is the path to blues perfection one note , played underwater in a glass of lemonade with a mouth full of petrol?
FREDDIE KING: Freddie King (1934-1976)
After finding an online video teaching the two-fret (whole tone) string bend as a fundamental blues lick, there has been a certain degree of disagreement around the office as to whether this simple bend can constitute a blues fundamental.
Does the simple two fret, tone long string bend qualify as a lick? Well I think it does and Dave thinks that it can`t.
So, we`ve grabbed an acoustic and tested the hypothesis.
How can something as simple as this elicit so much passionate debate?
Well, it`s all about emotion, passion and technique. A simple string bend is, although fundamental to guitar playing, nothing, without emotion. This emotion comes from experience. Some people claim to move the molecules rather than the strings and at the end of the day the TRUTH about guitar playing is that it`s in your hands… in every sense.
For me the ultimate blues lick would probably have to consist of only one note and some might say that maybe no-one has played it yet. On Texas Cannonball Freddie King’s “Pack It Up”, and “Shake Your Booty Baby” King takes this simple single bend technique and pushes it to its emotional maximum. The Album Freddie King 1934-1976 proves just exactly what a master guitarist can do with timing & expression and exactly why Eric Clapton has always considered Freddie the true master of Blues Guitar. Both Eric and Freddie get together on this album on “Further on up the Road” and this track is worth the price of the album alone.
If you wanna hear blues playing that just really, really cooks like a blister burning on the surface of the sun this album is the real deal. If you play the guitar and you`d like to develop the kind of passion and string control that will take you somewhere then this is one of the top ten albums in your list of must haves. King squeezes each note like a lemon from start to finish on this record and the result is pure blues lemonade of the highest order.
The instrumental “Hideaway”, Clapton`s tour de force with Mayalls Bluesbreakers Beano Album is actually Freddie King`s track and you can hear more of the three King`s and Buddy Guy’s, wonderful influence on Clapton`s phenomenal Just One Night Album.
The ultimate blues lick consists of just one note, your hands and ensuring you`re on fire every time you play.
Call me old fashioned but the only thing I`ve ever thought was a great romantic, gothic and truly bluesy use for used guitar strings involved a tall tree, and a precariously balanced stool to dance with the devil upon…for a short while. Emo huh?
Or maybe I`ve just been listening to too much Beck Hansen…for awhile there he was definitely throwing down some Dylanesque skills both lyrically and instrumentally. I draw your attention here to Beck`s rough house cover of Dylan`s Leopard Skin Pillbox Hat in all it`s steampunk lo-fi, harp-dog magnificence. It`s great but covering Dylan is a bit like trying recreate Picasso with your local painter and decorator…scruffy!
With the rerun shows
And the cocaine nose-job
The daytime crap of the folksinger slop
He hung himself with a guitar string…
Are you feeling the fluidity inherent in a particular view of the universe? Or the united states of consciousness? I am.
Back in 1983 Eric Clapton released the Album Money and Cigarettes supported by the stellar backing band of Ry Cooder, Albert Lee, Donald Duck Dunn, and Roger Hawkins. Duck Dunn`s contribution to popular music beginning with Booker T and M.G`s and the Stax label in around 1965 is absolutely phenomenal and he must be one of the greatest unsung heroes of the popular music cannon. Here is his discography.
Anyway I digress, it`s a great record, and I managed to get my hands on an A1 hardboard copy of the cover album art which features a very heavily modded stratocaster appearing to melt in Dali-esque fashion from a table.
What a fantastic guitar to own – a bit of a dog to play unless you`re built like a paralellogram though - Salvador Dali meets Eric Clapton for a cup of rhythm and blues. It`s a tight band- no shadow of a doubt – on this album, but, Clapton`s efforts songwriting in the Stax genre just don`t compare to his earlier 461 Ocean Boulevard efforts or the subsequent Behind The Sun album where the guitar playing re-enters the limelight and Clapton`s songwriting takes a backseat. It`s interesting to note that the absolutely stellar drumming of Jamie Oldaker appears on both 461 and Behind The Sun.
It might even be pertinent to suggest that Clapton`s career fluctuates heavily between his role as songwriter and all round musical explorer and that of guitar hero and blues pioneer. What you like about E.C. will determine exactly where on this spectrum your favour will fall, but it is perhaps healthier to consider the length of Clapton`s career and the broad depth of his contributions to music.
From the groundbreaking sounds of the Bluesbreakers, Cream, and The Dominos together with prescient cover choices such as JJ Cale and Bob Marley , Dylan and Martyn etcetera through to his highly emotional songwriting capabilities evidenced on such great songs as Layla, Bell Bottom Blues, Let it Rain, Easy Now, Presence of the Lord together with tour de force guitar pieces such as Blues Power, Double Trouble, Slunky, Crossroads….and the rest Clapton proves again and again that he`s got the mettle, the daring and the skills to pay the bills on all fronts.
Anyway the fact of the matter is YOU CAN own a dali stratocaster courtesy of the wild mind of Brian Eastwood guitars. Brian makes a series of highly unique and visually surreal but playable guitars in the form of his Bender series. Check them out here.
Smooth! Leopard skin throughout.Brian makes some even crazier pieces than these so check out his site here.
I`ve been to plenty of great gigs since back in the day and I`ve seen some hot guitar players – Jeff Beck, Eric Clapton, Alvin Lee, Carlos Santana, Jeff Healy, Johnny Winter, Jennifer Batten, The Edge, Joe Satriani, Ron Wood and Bob Dylan, Keith Richards and The Rolling Stones, Pete Townshend and The Who, Martin Barre (Jethro Tull), Joe Satriani, Zappa, John MacLaughlin, Jack White, and those are just the guys I can remember.
What actually makes them great guitarists, in my humble opinion, is the levels of individuality and personality in their playing – yes there is a certain degree of technique in their playing styles, with Satriani definitely being very highly accomplished. But of all these acts although Satriani was undeniably good his show was the least engaging. If you want to communicate it`s all about feel and in this sense substance above and beyond style. That`s why Neil Young really cooks on the guitar.
