A few of us hardened fans of the Red Special held the annual meet up over the weekend, we had around 20 high end Red Special copies there ranging from BGM Super's to home builds and other builders commercial copies, Nigel and Pete, Brian's guitar tech's came along and did a Q & A which was wonderful, lots of tech talk about the guitar, its history and keeping it running. Then a band session with members of tribute bands and other musicians blasting out some well known tracks!
How wonderful. And of course Pete is stealing the show in the group photo.
I haven't seen so many nerds in one place since the last Comiccon ! Glad you guys had a blast.
Togg wrote:
A few of us hardened fans of the Red Special held the annual meet up over the weekend, we had around 20 high end Red Special copies there ranging from BGM Super's to home builds and other builders commercial copies, Nigel and Pete, Brian's guitar tech's came along and did a Q & A which was wonderful, lots of tech talk about the guitar, its history and keeping it running. Then a band session with members of tribute bands and other musicians blasting out some well known tracks!
Hi Togg, souns like a good time was had Sorry i wasn't there, work commitments. Did Pete bring along anything of interest. The last one I attended he brought along a rather old guitar!!!
Great to see so many RS's. Is that your drum kit? it definitely looks the part.
Yes the Strat is converted to have the same switching system and PUs, it sounded amazing through the full rig, actually bloody close to a Red Special.
Vocal Harmony, I assume you are in the RS forum? what's your name there?
Yes my kit, we did a band section and just played a bunch of Queen tracks, Nigel played my kit as well which was a real honour
Pete didn't bring anything this time, just the Q&A was very interesting!!
Mainly tech talk, about repairing the guitar and keeping it running, basically how they HATE the guitar because it's so difficult to keep running, some interesting stuff about working with Paul and Adam, Paul was less easy... Sounds like Brian plans to keep playing for a while yet or at least until physically they can't due to issues like arthritis which they both suffer from. Brian has basically zero interest in how the guitar runs and with what pedal board or effects rack these days, he just knows what he likes and is happy when it sounds the way he wants, he only looks forward never back so the old rigs and stuff have zero interest to him.
re:
>basically how they HATE the guitar because it's so difficult to keep running
Yes - like Trigger's Broom. I wonder exactly what percentage of the guitar is original........
dudeofqueen wrote:
re:
>basically how they HATE the guitar because it's so difficult to keep running
Yes - like Trigger's Broom. I wonder exactly what percentage of the guitar is original........
It's still the original guitar. Like any old gigged instrument some parts have been replaced, the machine heads were replaced some years ago, some repair was done to the veneer on the rear of the body. Surprisingly the frets, apart from the zero fret ( to the best of my knowledge ) are still original.
Anyone who has been lucky enough to play it will tell you it's a very solidly built guitar, quite amazing for a 54 year old home built instrument. There are several copies in Brian's collection built by Andrew Guyton (Guyton Guitars) and Greg Fryer.
Well it's been re-wired, never re-fretted, and re-finished a couple of times, the PUs are original, the body and neck are original and the switching system is original.the scratchplate is original.
But its used constantly, so like everything it falls apart from time to time, it's not easy to take apart because some of it is delicate and can break, Brian had a PU fall off or at least the leg holding it on break which is the type of thing that happens on tour. It's been around the world a few hundered times in different climates and temps, so wear and tear is always an issue.