Smokehouse Guitars

It seems that, over time, I’m starting to become dissatisfied with three and four string gutiars.  This isn’t because they are inferior instruments; they just lack the ability to set up properly and they tend to be limiting to the average player.  For this reason, I’m moving in three new directions.

1.  In the immediate future, unless specifically requested otherwise by a customer, I’m moving primarily to six string instruments.  This will give me the ability to make guitars that are fully adjustable and configurable in the short term and make my guitars more accessible to more players out there in the world.  Moreover, this is a critical step in my path to becoming a serious guitar maker rather than just a hobbiest builder.  I don’t think I’ll ever be what I consider a “Luthier” (from my point of view, you need to build a classical hollow body acoustic before you can claim that title and I’m just not that interested in anything that doesn’t have to be plugged in) but I do consider myself a guitar maker.  In order to get such recognition from others in the industry, I’m going to have to play their game by their rules for a while, which includes a guitar with some of the features we’ve all just come to expect when buying any name brand.

2.  I’ll be moving into solid body guitars very soon.  There is a whole art form and means of expression in this area via exotic woods and figures and I’m really shorting myself if I don’t get my hands into it and really experience it for myself.  I won’t ever be abandoning cigar box guitars as they are the roots of Smokehouse Guitars, but I see a future where the ratio of solid bodies to cigar box gutiars runs about 60/40 or even 70/30.

3.  When my skills as a solid body builder have reached a level that I deam adequate, I will fold all that I have learned back into 3 and 4 string guitars as my ultimate goal is to build an unconventional 3 string guitar that can be completely set up from top to bottom (truss, adjustable pup, bridge, the works).

To commemorate this new direction, I’ve updated my FAQ, which you can access from the top menu on my site.

There is a lot of work to do.

Josh

Sometimes all you want is a top of the line, custom  electric guitar.  Well here you go.

(continue reading…)

Gregg and Don, of Golden Crown Productions, don’t screw around.

As part of our early talks to feature the Smokehouse Guitars brand at their concerts, they invited me down to one of their concerts last Friday to have a look around and see what kind of a party they put on. I went under the guise of “work” but I really just went to have some fun.

Let me rewind one day to the Thursday before the concert. I have just gotten back from an initial meeting with these guys and my wife (Jen) is already excited that they’re putting on a show starring The English Beat, of which she’s a big fan. I’m came through the door quietly, carrying a single humble guitar that I took as a half-assed example of some of my work (the only thing I had on hand at the time was this bizarre little one-off strum stick that I built a year ago for fun – I don’t even know anyone who could play it). She became concerned because of the odd look on my face.

“What’s wrong?” she asked.

I said, “We need to get a baby sitter for tomorrow. You’re coming with me to a concert.” She asked me for further details after that but the only thing I could really come up with was that, “I’m not sure, but we may have just hit the big time.”

On the night of, we both jumped into the car and drove the 20 minutes or so down the road to the Wiens Family Cellars in Temecula. This place is a beautiful winery with an incredibly cozy venue for a concert. The whole thing felt ridiculously exclusive. I had a couple of general admission tickets in my back pocket, which would place us around the bar area in the back. I wasn’t really concerned about this.  We were both just happy for a night out.

After we got into the place, I looked about for a bit trying to find either Gregg or Don, wanting to let them know I was there, wondering if I should at least make a half-assed attempt to talk business. After having no luck, I finally walked over to one of the security crew standing watch over the gateway between the general admission area ($50 a head) and the VIP area ($500 a head). I asked him, “Hey, Gregg or Don around?”

He nodded to me. “Yeah, Don’s right over there.” He pointed back into the VIP area, where Don was standing by a table and talking animatedly to the folks who were sitting there. I asked the security guy if it was cool that I go talk to him and he said sure, since I seemed to know him.

I turned and glanced at Jen, who was standing back looking very shy and very unsure. I grabbed her hand and said, “Come on.” She tried to protest as she thought she was supposed to wait outside the area for me to come back. I just gave her hand a squeeze and brought her along.

She and I walked up to Don, who was trouble-shooting some sort of seating mix up. I waited patiently for him to notice I was there and said “Hi” when he did. He greeted me happily and told me to take a seat over at the Golden Crown table, which was maybe 20 feet away from the foot of the stage at most. I thanked him and led my wife on.

As we walked by the stage, I noticed that Richard Blade was already up there and doing a pretty fine job of keeping everyone entertained while they waited for the show to start. I didn’t always like the stuff he played when he was on KROQ, but one thing I can say for the guy: he’s one hell of a music journalist. He had these great stories about all the bands he was playing (stories of which he was a participating character more often than not) and had all kinds of sound bites from interviews he had done with them over the years. You could tell how good this guy was because the crowd, instead of just waiting for him to finish and get off, where actually listening to what he was saying and enjoying his presentation. He did a great job.

We found our table and sat down. There were some people already sitting there; either higher level employees of Golden Crown or else personal guests of the owners. One of them introduced herself to Jen and I. She was very gracious and pretty and I forgot her name about 2 seconds after she told me what it was, as I usually do with everyone I meet.

Just a little after that, a waitress came buy and set us up with drinks and took our order for dinner. Jen was afraid to order at first. She kept saying, “I hope we’re not stealing someone’s food!” As if the catering staff didn’t have buckets of everything in the back and had only enough food to support each mouth there and no extra. Cute girl. I finally tracked down Don and had him confirm for her that, yes, we were supposed to be there and, yes, we were supposed to be eating the food. She just wasn’t going to believe it if I was the only one who said it. I think that she was still convinced that the way the night was turning out was way too good to be true.

Eventually, Dave Wakeling and his band proceeded to come out and completely blow the roof of the joint. As someone who typically only has people like B. B. King, Mississippi John Hurt, and Leadbelly playing on his shop radio, I have to say that I was an instant convert to The English Beat. They sound fantastic live and Dave himself has an incredibly soulful and raw voice. I’d love to hear the guy do some blues some time. I’ll just bet he’d be epic.

After the show was over, Jen and I got up and cruised over to the side of the stage where Don was hanging out with some friends. We didn’t say anything; we just leaned back against the wall, smiling and telling jokes to each other and trying to process the show we just saw. During the show’s intermission, they hosted a bunch of raffles and auctions for charity (they auctioned two guitars to two different people to the tune of $7,000 and I have no idea how much they made on the raffle guitar). Each of the guitars that were won by audience members were to be signed by Dave after the show.

Jen and I had finished a bottle of Champaign, so she went off to seek a little refreshment. I had lost site of Don, so I called Gregg up on his cell.

“Yeah”, he said quickly. Gregg always speaks quickly – I don’t know if he does anything slow.

“Hey, it’s Josh. Where are you at?”

“Oh, hey, man. In the back room. Listen, does Jen want to meet Richard too, or just the band.”

“Better get Richard, too.” I said.

Right about then he walked into view carrying an arm load of beer. He handed me one and said, “Get her over here.”

Luckily, we were standing by the lady’s room, and she came out right at that moment. We all got together and walked back to the band’s dressing room. We cracked our beers and made ourselves at home. My wife and I both chatted with Richard Blade for a while, who is an extremely nice guy. Considering how many people he has to meet and be nice to all the time (and the fact that he probably couldn’t pick me out of a lineup an hour after he met me), he does a very good job of making you feel welcome when you talk to him. His wife is also adorable and kept us all entertained with a quirky sense of humor. While I was talking to Richard, Gregg walked by and shot off at me, “Tell him what you do for a living.” Not thinking, I said, “Well, I’m an engineer.” Blade looked a little confused and I corrected myself. Kind of confused myself there for an instant. I don’t build guitars for a living. I build guitars because I can’t stand not to.

We hung out for a bit as Dave signed guitars and BS’d with various members of the band. Those people who won a guitar actually thanked Jen and I as they left, as if we’d had something to do with the whole experience they just had. They were looking at us as though we were really there with the people who had just put on the show. Then I realized: we were. We weren’t really with the band, of course; those guys didn’t know us from Adam. But we were with Golden Crown. I started to wonder to myself, “Is this sort of thing going to become normal for me in the future?” I sure hope so.

We happened to catch Dave as he was running around shaking hands and talking with his fans. He let me shoot a picture with him and Jen (I didn’t get one with him because I wasn’t thinking very clearly anymore at that point – I was up way past my bed time). Two things I noticed about him. First, everyone on the damned planet was trying to feed this poor guy alcohol. Given that he’s been a performer of some note for 30 years now, his liver has probably taken a herculean beating and he has adjusted his lifestyle appropriately. All water for our friend Dave. One thing about a drunk: they ain’t happy unless someone is drunk with ‘em. Dave, bless him, had to keep shaking his head and politely telling everyone that, no, this water will do me just fine. I know he get’s tired of repeating himself but he doesn’t let them see it.

The other thing. As I was talking to him, I mentioned that I was never really that much of a fan of his music given the kind of stuff I usually listened to but also explained that he had made me an instant fan that night with the kind of show they put on. He mentioned in passing that the only time he ever really felt like he got to be himself was when he was on stage performing. On the top of things, that’s a nice little boiler plate thing to say to a fan. Underneath the surface, it kind of bummed me out. You could tell by watching this guy play that the only reason he makes music is because he has to. It’s what he loves. If he wasn’t getting paid to do it, he would still do it. This fame that he now has, while not at it’s height as it was in the 80’s, is almost like a by product. It’s like if I did my job really well and as a result, random strangers were walking up to me and stopping me all the time wherever I tried to go to tell me how great I am at my job. Sure, it’s nice here and there, but to such a degree where the only time I can be myself is a few hours out of one or two nights every month? Holy shit.

One thing I wouldn’t mind: getting Dave Wakeling over to my place for a home cooked piece of BBQ’d steak. He wouldn’t have to be The King of Ska and I sure wouldn’t be trying to pour vodka down his throat. He could just be Dave and hang out for a bit. I think that something like that would be the least I could do to repay him for the incredible performance that he treated Jen and I to that night.

Then again, he might just feel like farting in the bathtub as he reads a book without anyone bothering him. To each his own, you know?

I was recently contacted by Golden Crown Productions in Temecula, CA about being a regular part of their upcoming shows.  These guys keep a very limited and select group of vendors at their shows to ply their trades, and they always keep the vendors local.

The guys at Golden Crown put on concerts for plenty of name bands such as The English Beat, The Gilby Clark Band, Flock of Seagulls, and many more.  They do all kinds of stuff for charity and I’m very honored and excited to be a part of what they do.

So what does this mean for the Smokehouse?

Well, it means that I’m basically swamped for the next couple of months building up an inventory of show guitars.  I’m very excited about this work and I have a couple of cool ideas that I’m working on with others to put together some really special instruments.  I can’t give a lot of detail right now as we’re still in the very early stages but it’s going to be hot!  This also means that any new orders I receive will unfortunately have to be put on a waiting list until after the show guitars are completed in order to let me concentrate.  I actually have 3 or 4 that I’m trying to finish up right now.

I’m taking my wife to a concert tonight that these guys are putting on.  The English Beat are playing.  I’m much more of a Blues and Southern Rock man myself, but my wife loves 80′s pop, so we’re both going to have a lot of fun.  I asked the owners of Golden Crown if my wife could meet the band.  They said that she and I would be hanging back stage with the band sipping wine and chatting up a storm.

Everything is very surreal for us right now.  A year ago I had never even heard of cigar box guitars.  Today, they seem to be changing my whole life.  We’re just working on taking things as they come and enjoying the ride.

Josh