Awesome work J! Your moniker makes me think you're a nascar fan. Those guitars are works of art.
Hey all!
I just signed up for the forum and I have to say I like what I've found so far. I have a post in the Other Brands, (Reverend), of the Instruments section. Please check it out. I usually lurk, post a little bit to get my two cents in when I feel the urge on other forums.
I sort of made a hobby out of building guitars even though I play very little, and I do mean VERY little. A few chords, half a song....well, that's about it. BUT I can make you a killer guitar! lol
Hope you enjoy these... Please take a look and tell me what you think.
The Flamecaster
The Beatnik Mojocaster
1959 Les Paul
Walmut/Mahogany Stratocaster
Christmas present for my Nephew; Reverend Guitars Sensei
Awesome work J! Your moniker makes me think you're a nascar fan. Those guitars are works of art.
Welcome! Beautiful guitars! Pieces of art!
Steve Thompson
Sun Valley, Idaho
Guitars: Fender 60th Anniversary Std. Strat, Squier CVC Tele Hagstrom Viking Semi-hollow, Joshua beach guitar, Martin SPD-16TR Dreadnought
Amphs: Peavey Classic 30, '61 Fender Concert
Effects and such: Boss: DS-1, CE-5, NS-2 and RC20XL looper, Digitech Bad Monkey, Korg AX1G Multi-effects, Berhinger: TU100 tuner, PB100 Clean Boost, Line 6 Toneport UX2, Electro Harmonix Little Big Muff Pi, DuhVoodooMan's Rabid Rodent Rat Clone, Zonkin Yellow Screamer Mk. II, MXR Carbon Copy Delay
love is the answer, at least for most of the questions in my heart. . .
- j. johnson
Looks awesome!
Welcome to the forum!
The Law of Gravity is nonsense. No such law exists. If I think I float, and you think I float, then it happens.
Master Guitar Academy - I also teach via SKYPE.
Wow! Those are some fine creations. I appreciate the work you put into them. Simply incredible.
Guitar: Gibson SG Standard Natural Burst, Squier CV 50's Tele, Hell Guitars No. 2, Squier CV 50's Strat, Reverend Club King 290, Taylor 522e 12-Fret mahogany,
Squier Vintage Modified Jaguar Bass Short Scale
Amp: Fender Super Champ X2 Head, Egnater Tweaker 15, Fender Mustang I, Acoustic B20 1x12 bass amp
Pedal: Budda Budwah wah, Wampler Ego Compressor, Electro-Harmonix Soul Food, Voodoo Lab Sparkle Drive, Wampler Velvet Fuzz, Seven Sisters Eve Tremolo, TC Electronics Gravy Tri Chorus & Vibrato, Catalinbread Echorec, TC Electronic Alter Ego 2 Delay, Hardwire Supernatural Ambient Verb, MXR Carbon Copy, Catalinbread RAH, Big Muff Pi with Tone Wicker, BYOC Mouse 2.0 Distortion, BYOC Boost/OD-2
I gotta check back in to say that that Beatnik Mojocaster is my favorite! That thing just looks cool! How does it play?
Steve Thompson
Sun Valley, Idaho
Guitars: Fender 60th Anniversary Std. Strat, Squier CVC Tele Hagstrom Viking Semi-hollow, Joshua beach guitar, Martin SPD-16TR Dreadnought
Amphs: Peavey Classic 30, '61 Fender Concert
Effects and such: Boss: DS-1, CE-5, NS-2 and RC20XL looper, Digitech Bad Monkey, Korg AX1G Multi-effects, Berhinger: TU100 tuner, PB100 Clean Boost, Line 6 Toneport UX2, Electro Harmonix Little Big Muff Pi, DuhVoodooMan's Rabid Rodent Rat Clone, Zonkin Yellow Screamer Mk. II, MXR Carbon Copy Delay
love is the answer, at least for most of the questions in my heart. . .
- j. johnson
Thanks for the kind words all. They all sound different, since I had that goal in mind when I was in the designing stage for each. I wanted to make a guitar that sounded as good as the last, but different, and I pulled it off. The sound of each varies as much as the look.
Guitarhack: I am A NASCAR fan. I've been watching and going to the races since the late 80's early 90's.
Sunvalleylaw: Like I said, I don't really play so it would have been hard for me to tell you how it plays but... I've had several players play all of them. As I type this, they are at a friends house who has been putting them through the paces for a month or more now. He and another friend of mine are in a band, Your Drunk'n Uncle, (Shameless plug), and he keeps going back to the Mojocaster. He'll be talking about one of the other ones, and then he'll point at it and say, "...but that thing really does this or really does that very well. I love the way it plays and sounds".
The reason it sounds the way it does is in part due to the pickup spacing. The Flamecaster has two full sized humbuckers and a single coil sized humbucker in the middle, it seems that the middle pickup gets in the way of the pick. When I made the Mojocaster I wanted to get the p.u.'s as far from your pick as I could. Both p.u.'s are just about as far as I could move them to thier respective ends; close to the neck and close to the bridge. When you strum or it the strings, it's like playing an acoustic w/o the sound hole. There is nothing anywhere close to the pick. Mission accomplished.
Ahh! What great stuff! Being a person who really enjoys building and bastardizing guitars to suit my needs, my hat's off to you. I wish I had a fraction of your woodworking skills to realize my dreams. I have resorted to modifying old guitars to the Nth degree due to lack of fine craftmanship skills...and the required patience. Hence the gravitation towards more bastardizing.
Guitar world needs exactly this kind of iconoclastic and unorthodox approaches. You do realize pickup relation to bridge/string lenght is one of the key aspects of electric's sound? But, I definitely dig the approach. I really really dislike guitars with too little clearance to pickguard/pickups under the strings...even on strats I like to shim the neck to get some clearance and/or eliminate the mid pup. I'd so like to see and try these instruments in the 'flesh'.
Do keep posting about your stuff, I'd love to see and hear them in action as well!
Dee
"When life's a biatch, be a horny dog"
Amps: Marshall JVM 410H w/ Plexi Cap mod, Choke Mod & Negative Feedback Removal mod, 4x12", Behringer GMX110, Amplitube 3/StealthPedal
Half a dozen custom built/bastardized guitars all with EMG's, mostly 85's, Ibanez Artwood acoustic & Yamaha SGR bass, Epiphone Prophecy SG, Vox Wah, Pitchblack tuner plus assorted pedals, rack gear etc. for home studio use.
Those guitars look incredible. I love the bridge on that Flamecaster, too.
Funny you should say that about a Strat. The Flamecaster.... The guy who has it right now had me back the middle pick up back 6 full turns which puts it right above the body. He loves it now, and he may be on stage with it this Saturday evening.Originally Posted by deeaa
Originally Posted by Commodore 64
That bridge is NICE and neat looking. The reason I put it on there is because it is fully adjustable. It's a Hipshot Baby Grand. I like it.
That guitar sings and sustains forever. The bridge has a lot to do with that I think.
Nice to know. I've seen that bridge in the StewMac catalog and was wondering about it. Looks like a great wrap-around bridge upgrade.Originally Posted by J_48_Johnson
Guitar: Gibson SG Standard Natural Burst, Squier CV 50's Tele, Hell Guitars No. 2, Squier CV 50's Strat, Reverend Club King 290, Taylor 522e 12-Fret mahogany,
Squier Vintage Modified Jaguar Bass Short Scale
Amp: Fender Super Champ X2 Head, Egnater Tweaker 15, Fender Mustang I, Acoustic B20 1x12 bass amp
Pedal: Budda Budwah wah, Wampler Ego Compressor, Electro-Harmonix Soul Food, Voodoo Lab Sparkle Drive, Wampler Velvet Fuzz, Seven Sisters Eve Tremolo, TC Electronics Gravy Tri Chorus & Vibrato, Catalinbread Echorec, TC Electronic Alter Ego 2 Delay, Hardwire Supernatural Ambient Verb, MXR Carbon Copy, Catalinbread RAH, Big Muff Pi with Tone Wicker, BYOC Mouse 2.0 Distortion, BYOC Boost/OD-2
I did the final work on the Sensei and got her strung up. I needed to ground all of the pots together. I finished that, and put the cover on it. Here are a few other pictures for your enjoyment...
A friend of mine is in a band. I took the guitar over to one of the last practices they had and let the two guitarists rip on it a while to put it through the paces. Larry has a rack mounted Mesa Boogie, 100 watt, (I think), amp ran into a 4x12 Mesa Boogie cabinet. Eddie was pounding on it using a Mashall amp. The sounds Larry was pulling from it from the 2nd switch position were just over the freaking top. He was just messing around making some sweet blues stuff up as he went. Tony, (drums), and Donnie, (bass), jumped in for an improv and it was incredible. How sweet that must be to have two guys who know your playing style so well, (they don't play blues music), that they can jump in and play behind your lead and it SOUNDED GOOD!
Once Eddie got there, he tried to get it to distort with the gain all of the way up and the Marshall couldn't get it to break up. My Nephew wanted a smooth sounding guitar, and from what the two of them showed me, this thing is smooth as a flat panel of glass.
Wow, that guitar is special.
Hey, do you need some more nephews to build guitars for? Where do I apply?
Guitar: Gibson SG Standard Natural Burst, Squier CV 50's Tele, Hell Guitars No. 2, Squier CV 50's Strat, Reverend Club King 290, Taylor 522e 12-Fret mahogany,
Squier Vintage Modified Jaguar Bass Short Scale
Amp: Fender Super Champ X2 Head, Egnater Tweaker 15, Fender Mustang I, Acoustic B20 1x12 bass amp
Pedal: Budda Budwah wah, Wampler Ego Compressor, Electro-Harmonix Soul Food, Voodoo Lab Sparkle Drive, Wampler Velvet Fuzz, Seven Sisters Eve Tremolo, TC Electronics Gravy Tri Chorus & Vibrato, Catalinbread Echorec, TC Electronic Alter Ego 2 Delay, Hardwire Supernatural Ambient Verb, MXR Carbon Copy, Catalinbread RAH, Big Muff Pi with Tone Wicker, BYOC Mouse 2.0 Distortion, BYOC Boost/OD-2
One's enough, but thanks.
Got any pics of builds in progress?
I'd really like a look at your shop, too.
Those are some sharp looking guitars.
Originally Posted by Rx Tone
Shop?
Um, no shop really, I work out of my basement. All of my wood working tools are there.
As far as the build threads, I can help you out there...
Flamecaster
http://forum.fendertalk.com/showthre...d-Tribulations
Beatnik Mojocaster
http://forum.fendertalk.com/showthre...y-second-build.
Neck through hollow body Les Paul
http://forum.fendertalk.com/showthre...llowbody-Build
Black walnut/mahogany superstrat
http://forum.fendertalk.com/showthre...ve-it-bad!-GAS!
Sensei Build
http://forum.fendertalk.com/showthre...one-else!-Woot!
Originally Posted by J_48_Johnson
WOW...VERY impressive! That's an excellent series of photos!
You, sir, are a true craftsman.
FenderTalk is a great site, BTW... real good people there.
That's really a fine work and the wood seems all very nice and shiny ! How did you get the kick for those projects and what was the guidance on which wood for which guitar is it just aesthetics ?
I'm curious about the little Fender amp on one of the pics ?
Guitars:
1978 Fender Telecaster Thinline Custom USA, New Nash TL-72 Thinline Telecaster, 1965 Harmony Meteor, H71, 1986 Fender Telecaster Esquire MIJ, New Martin J-41 Special, 1933 National Duolian, 1941, New Eastwood Mandocaster 12 strings
Amps:
Tweed Vibrolux Custom Denis Manlay, 1976 Fender Deluxe Reverb Silverface