ok. we all have done it. we dinged our beautiful instruments by accident. they are no longer pristine and perfect.
the dent, paint loss, the sticker glue, the wear marks jump out every time you see your ax.
fess up, what did you do?
me first.
I first real good electric guitar purchased used in the early 90"s was a late 80's strat plus.
the guitar was in perfect condition. about a month after bringing it home I did what I always did when the guitar stand was folded up and stored (why o why?) I leaned the strat against the amp to answer the phone. standing just feet away I saw the guitar start to lean over and then fall to it's side. before hitting the floor ite neck caught the edge of a chair.
now there is a ding/dent about the third fret. the maple neck was perfect, but now after years of playing the dent has gone dark.
I do have an honest wear mark on the upper bout. it's from the pick. I almost worn thru the paint. I can accept that.
during my photo shoot of all my gear I had two accidents.
all my guitars were laid out. some leaning, some on stands. some of you may remember that photo.
after the final shot I saw one of my lap steels lose it's balance and fall to the floor. before hitting the floor it bumped into my brand new Hwy 1 tele and knocked that flat to the floor. I looked it over and saw no marks.
the lap steel was fine too.
whew, dodged a bullet.
it has been a few years now and the tele has been played hundreds of hours.
one day whiole changing strings and cleaning it up I saw the damage that had been hidden. I guess I patinaed the guitar thru use enough for a large semi circular scratch to shopw on the back.
it is a perfect arc mimicing the arc of it's fall during that photo shoot. the tele must have slide across the face of another guitar and got scratched.
my Martin acoustic. truly beautiful and spendy. I am always super careful moving this guitar around. never leaning. either on a stand, in it's case or in my arms.
one day while cleaning I noticed dozens of tiny dents on the back of the neck.
the capo I sometinmes use is a clamp type. apparently everytime I use the capo I dent the wood.
I can hardly feel the dents so it is never a problem.
the problem is always me. careful and respectful of my gear, but dang. I ding. I dent. I scratch.
your turn.
Dropped all of mine a million times, and both have a few dings and dents on tha back of the fretboard and some cracked paint near wher it meets the body, but I don't really have any reverance for my guitars and personally like the looks of a real beat guitar.
Somehow shiny guitars don't scream Rock n Roll to me.
Now anything else that I own cars, TVS, stereos I would die if I messed those up. Go figure.
I had to move my Sony TV about a year ago and it fell off the TV stand and fell right on the screen. I thought it waqs a goner but luckily other than a small piece that broke off in the corner it was OK.
But as long as my guitars are playable the dents, dings and scratches add character.
Note: I don't own any real expensive guitars. If I had paid more then $1000 for any I would be a little more careful..maybe
"It's all about stickin it to the man!"
It's a long way to the top if you want to rock n roll!
Trying to remember...
I believe there was only one major mishap that I can recall of at this point involving one of my guitars.
Mid eighties, I believe it was '86, judging from the girlfriend that I had at the time :roll:
We traveled all over the place, well it seemed all over the place to me, being a teenager at the time, but I guess we covered around 5 states or so regularly. I had just acquired a brand spankin' new pedal steel guitar; Sierra double neck 10, 8 pedals, 4 knees. It was the "sessions" series, if I recall.
My first genuine "pro" steel - probably went for over 2K at the time, we had traded another single neck in towards it & I don''t remember what the final deal was. Anyhoo, since we traveled so much, I took to the habit of leaving the steel "set up" in one of the vans we used, since as many of you may know, it can take quite a bit of time to assemble a steel guitar.
We arrived at a gig. I would usually incorporate the help of a friend to unload the instrument, as it really is a two man operation, but this time I was in a hurry I guess... :cry: I had unloaded it at other times single-handed & it always worked out okay. Well, you can see where this is going...I got into the van to unload it myself; I firmly grasped both ends of the guitar, at the tuning keys & changer mechanism (tailpiece).
Moved it to the rear doors of the van, & from here on out, everything happened in slo-motion... Can't remember what exactly went wrong. My foot may have snubbed a ruffled piece of carpet on the floor of the van from as near as I can tell. Me & the steel started to slowly pitch outward through the rear doors. :shock:
I was pulling backwards into the van with all my might trying to prevent this mishap, but by that time the top heaviness of the steel won out over my futile saving attempts. We are talking a 60 lb. + instrument here that wanted to have its' own way. At the last moment I decided to let go so as not to risk injury to myself.
My beautiful brand spankin' new Sierra fell approx. 2 1/2 feet to the ground, squarely on its' beautiful new face! :shock:
I just stood there in the van, shocked. I finally got out & picked it up, afraid of what I would find...Nothing broken thankfully, as these things are built like tanks, but there was a huge gash in the finish on the left front face of the guitar, opposite the side of the faceplate.
Very, very upset....Well, to make a long story short, a guy we knew at the time who was good at fixing just about everything fixed it for me - sort of. He removed the metal faceplate from the right front side of the guitar & affixed it to the left front side, over the gash.
A beautiful job, no one would have ever known anything was different except another steel player who may have realized that the faceplate was on the wrong side! :lol:
That is about the worst thing I can think of that ever occurred to any of my instruments. I am very very careful with all my gear, & as a rule these things never happen to any of my equipment. All of my gear that I own now pretty much looks like new, except for some normal wear & tear on amp/speaker cabs./ etc.
Love the stories, hope you guys post more! :mrgreen:
I got over the incident, but doing that to a new instrument can really scar you for awhile! :mrgreen:
katmetal. having owned a pedal steel I can visualize your nightmare really well.
'oh, the horror'.
Well, I've had a couple oops...the one that happens most often is when I pick up my guitar my ceiling in my practice area is sloped, and the headstock hits the ceiling, happened more than once.
The biggest was I bought a throw away guitar about 4-5 months ago to just have with me in the car where ever I go. I had just replaced the strings and it was leaning on the side of the couch. I left to go get a drink and the next thing I hear is my son by the couch, then the guitar goes BANG on the floor. I figure okay, I'll pick it up in a second. He was new to pulling himself up at that point, so the next thing I hear is CRUNCH!! I walk back into the living room, and my son is.....IN MY GUITAR!!! Good thing the guitar was only $40 and was a 3/4 size guitar.....I just shrugged and cleaned my son off and threw it away.
Now I"m more careful around him with my guitars LOL.
In Space, no one can hear me sing!
I walk back into the living room, and my son is.....IN MY GUITAR!!! Good thing the guitar was only $40 and was a 3/4 size guitar.....I just shrugged and cleaned my son off and threw it away.
That's hilarious, Joe - good job it was only a cheapie!
I've never had a serious mishap with any of my guitars - the worst accident any of them's ever suffered was to my Squier Tele. The jack plug kept falling out of the socket, so I took it out (the socket) and tightened everything up. Too tight....a couple of weeks later I was playing for one of the grandkids and he stood on the lead. The jack plug came out....pulling the socket with it and leaving a hole in the side of the guitar with protruding wires!
Fortunately, it cost next-to-nothing to fix - took it to the shop, they soldered it back together in five minutes flat.
As for dings, dents, bumps and scrapes - I'm with Dan on this one, if it ain't roughed up a little, it ain't rock'n'roll!
:D :D :D
Vic
"Sometimes the beauty of music can help us all find strength to deal with all the curves life can throw us." (D. Hodge.)
Two of my guitars had already been dinged pretty good. I got them for a good price and they play fine. I am always banging my Taylor on things. I hit the desk the last time. Still no damage. (knock on wood)
The only damage I caused was adjusting the string height on my Ibanez GAX-70. My screw-driver slipped and now I've got a slight dent from it right beside the tail-piece.
The only other thing that happened to me was a guitar stand tip over face first with a guitar on it. I walked into the room and there was my guitar laying face down on the carpet. It was my Floyd Rose guitar that I got for $100, so I wasn't that upset. No damage either.
Roy
"I wonder if a composer ever intentionally composed a piece that was physically impossible to play and stuck it away to be found years later after his death, knowing it would forever drive perfectionist musicians crazy." - George Carlin
and my son is.....IN MY GUITAR!!!
if you have ever gotten a seed catalog there is always the photo of a baby lying in the center of a giant cabbage.
I can see plainly you kid IN your guitar.
funny, Joe. good story. :lol:
and my son is.....IN MY GUITAR!!! :lol:
Do you have a pic?
Do you have a pic?
I WISH that I did. He was just sitting there hitting the fret board like he does when I'm trying to play. I took him out right away because I wanted to make sure he wasn't scratched or cut. Hindsight says that I should have thought that if he wasn't crying he wasn't scratched up and get a camera.
In Space, no one can hear me sing!
put him back in (after you have smoothed all sharp bits). :wink:
Stuck the headstock into a moving ceiling fan blade. It did more damage to the fan blade but left a small mark on the headstock. :oops:
Tim Madsen
Nobody cares how much you know,
until they know how much you care.
"What you keep to yourself you lose, what you give away you keep forever." -Axel Munthe
I have dropped mine or hit them against a door frame/wall several times but no real damage was done. The only sort-of bad thing that has happened to any of my guitars was when a butter knife was accidentally catapulted into the air and then stuck in the front of my cheapo beginner acoustic. Had it made it into the sound hole I would have been very impressed.
All my life I wanted to be somebody. Now I see I should have been more specific.
how did the butter knife get to the point of catapulting? knife fight gone wrong? :lol:
Stuck the headstock into a moving ceiling fan blade. It did more damage to the fan blade but left a small mark on the headstock. :oops:
The headstock is a lost cause. Seems like I'm always hitting something with it, usually the edge of a table. Dings and chips on the headstock don't even count. I guess I'm a klutz. For me it's as unavoidable as fretwear.
