Take your guitar into battle

[Spudman***]

I found this qute little story. Guns into guitars:
Should be able to get them cheap and it makes a whole new concept out of "battle of the bands."

Thursday, Sept. 14, 2006 Crafting guns into guitars
BOGOTA, Colombia (Reuters) - Polished rosewood and an artist's deft touch are all Colombian craftsman Luis Alberto Paredes needs to turn tools of death into symbols of hope.
One of Colombia's top musical instrument makers, Paredes has branched out from traditional methods to fashion electric guitars from shotguns and AK47 rifles once used by fighters caught up in the country's lingering guerilla conflict.
"This used to hit a target at 800 meters (yards)," Paredes said holding up one of the guitars which still has a Kalashnikov rifle's distinctive, banana-shaped magazine. "Now the target will just depend on the concert stage."
In a workshop above his modest family home in Bogota, Paredes has created the "escopetarras" -- shotgun guitars in Spanish -- since he was approached by local musician Cesar Lopez with the idea about three years ago.
Colombian rock star Juanes has been given one. So was Argentine singer Fito Paez and Paredes is crafting another for Carlos Vives, the local pop star who has revived the popularity of the Colombian Caribbean rhythm Vallenato.
Violence, crime and kidnapping linked to Colombia's lingering insurgency has declined under President Alvaro Uribe who was re-elected in May after voters applauded his U.S.-backed security crackdown against left-wing guerrillas.
Thousands are still killed or forced from their homes yearly by conflict with the rebels who control parts of rural Colombia, the world's top producer of cocaine.
Lopez says the idea came to him after the 2003 rebel car bombing of a Bogota social club that killed 36 people. Facing a soldier with a rifle outside the wrecked club, the musician noted the similarities between the weapon and his own guitar.
CONVERTING "BAD ENERGY"
A self-taught artisan who made his first guitar in 1959 while still in school, Paredes now works with three of his four children in a family business cluttered with tools and sawdust from partially made guitars, four-string cuatros and violins.
His instruments are sought by musicians worldwide.
As part of a United Nations program to promote peace, Paredes receives the decommissioned rifles with the working parts wielded together for safety.
After stripping the soldering and gutting the trigger mechanism, he crafts a polished wooden handle over the barrel and his son installs microphones in the stock. The process takes a week to ten days.
"At first it was a challenge," he said. "It's a paradox to take something that kills and transform it into something to please people."
Under a peace plan initiated by Uribe, more than 30,000 illegal paramilitary fighters have handed over their weapons and demobilized. But the Marxist rebel group the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia or FARC still has 17,000 fighters.
Authorities say hundreds of demobbed militia combatants have returned to criminal gangs dedicated to cocaine trafficking and extortion.
Musician Lopez, who plans a concert for peace with the shotgun guitars in November, says seven of the instruments have been donated so far. One is at the Bogota mayor's office and two more in U.N offices. Several more are in the works.
"Weapons have a bad energy... and when we take one apart it starts to change, when we put on the handle and installations, it changes its energy," Paredes said. "It is not what it was and that makes you happy."

[Iago]

oh yeah.. I remember seeing that on tv.. probably on the latin channel here in Florida. I bet they would sell alot in the U.S. hehehehe

[SuperSwede]

Really a better use for machine-guns and rifles! I dont think a Kalashnikov strat would suit me tho...

[Tone2TheBone]

I have a hard time believing an AK-47 would hit anything at 800 yards. Cool story though! I wouldn't mind having an AR-15/M-16 guitar machine gun....or better yet the Gibson Byrdland Weekend Warrior assault rifle!!!

Attachment 556

[SuperSwede]

Oh yeah! Ted Nugent, I havent listened to him for a while..
I saw a converted machinegun-guitar (dont ask me what kind, I never did any military service) at a guitar expo. I think some 80´s band had used it for a record cover or something similar.

[Tone2TheBone]

SS - That album btw rocked dude. There was some killer riffing on that one. I liked the tracks "Need You Bad" and "Smokescreen" very much. Smokescreen is quintessential uncle Ted. This of course was way before he became a televised loud mouthed right winger.

[SuperSwede]

OOhhh.... let me know the album name

[Tone2TheBone]

OOhhh.... let me know the album name

Name's on the image posted my friend. Weekend Warriors.

[Justaguyin_nc]

In times of trouble..we all need one..

[SuperSwede]

Name's on the image posted my friend. Weekend Warriors.

Ah... sorry Tone.. My brain aint exactly in overdrive mode with pinched harmonics right now.

[Tone2TheBone]

Ah... sorry Tone.. My brain aint exactly in overdrive mode with pinched harmonics right now.

LMAO. Yeah it's in Marshall land right now so go out and get yours!

[SuperSwede]

Acthung baby! Thats what I suggested to my wife. But unfortunately she didnt understand why I need one........ "CRUNCH FROM HELL!" isnt a working slogan at my house...