Epic New Guitar Day

[Trem]

Ok so it's 27 years (Holy Crap) belated... But wtf.
Been digging through shit looking for some specific things and found this.

Received on my 15th B-day March 15 1985 ...as a total surprise.

As it went,
My mom took me out of the room after cake and gave me this serious story about how she couldn't afford a guitar ( i asked for a guitar ) and how sorry she was, i told her it's ok, i was gonna save up for one myself with my paper route money, told her thanks for considering it, hugs ect, and then we walked back out to the dining room. There's a stream of pictures as i walked in the room which i think she has.
This was sitting in my chair when i walked back out. I nearly shit my pants. Not gonna lie it took me by such a surprise i remember thinking i was hallucinating. I stood there for a sec then started balling my eyes out, lol. She thought i hated it till i could finally speak! lol.


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1985 Hondo RR


She also had NO Idea about the guitar, what it was, though she knew who Randy was cause i talked about him so much, so she said the owner of the music store helped her out with that.
Thanks music store dude. ( And Mom ) I didn't even know about these myself. I was going to save for a black and white strat copy. So Imagine the surprise.

I played the shit out of this thing! Would be cool if i still had it to be able to inspect the build quality of it today, (i'm pretty sure it had real MOP inlays, and look at that fretboard), but i ended up giving it to this younger kid that used to hang around me.
He was pretty poor, really poor, poorer than my family, he lived in a shack damn near. So i really felt bad for the kid.
I do remember he worshiped Cliff Burton and wanted to be a bass player. I remember he always wore a skull ring like you've probably seen Cliff wear in pics.
When i moved away i was packing my room and he was hanging out, he seemed pretty bummed since he had no other real friends that were into metal and stuff. I picked up the guitar and handed it to him and said it's yours. His response was almost like mine when i got it, so it felt pretty good. Maybe he became a rock star never know.

Anyway, so how bout it, anyone else got some first guitar pictures or stories? Let's see em!

oh yeah, being able to scan shit into the computer is pretty cool, i'm acquiring quite a pile here.

[CowboyFromHell]

You passing that on to your friend was a true show of class. That's a great story and I feel honored to have had it shared with us. My first guitar wasn't as cool as yours. It was the one I can't remember the brand of but had the Sustainiac system in it (discussed it in another thread somewhere on here).I do have to say though that I have some great memories of that guitar, and the awesome times I had with my friend Scott back in the day in our first band. Back then Myrtle Beach had a great scene that was super friendly to local bands and up and coming musicians. Charleston was another city that really greeted us with open arms and that environment exposed me to many artists that gave me the encouragement to keep at it. It renewed my faith in people and gave me the motivation to go after what I really wanted.

While not a first guitar story, you giving your guitar to your friend makes me think about a friend of mine that passed away on the 13th of last month. He was the drummer of our band for the last 3 years until a few months ago when his health took a serious turn for the worse. We pretty much saw his passing away coming but that doesn't make it any easier when it finally happens though. Anyway, a few days ago I recieved an unexpected package from Fed-Ex and opened it to find mementos of his like the pocketwatch he always carried, pics of him and his family as he was growing up (going back the the old black and white pic days), even a letter his mom wrote to him back in his childhood. That small box of things that he held dear brought tears to my eyes much as when you saw your guitar. Not tears of sadness, but ones of respect for his family that reallized how close we were and sent me that package, and ones of joy that he considered me so much a brother that he shared with me the things he held closest in this world. While we had to fill his position in the band, our MC permanently retired his seat at our council table. His colors and hat will remain there forever as a reminder to us all of a man that we could all say we never knew a single person that had a bad thing to say about him. How many among us could have that said about us?

[xenophobe]

Wow dude. That was a fucking awesome story. Thank you for sharing!

[axmann]

My utmost respects Cowboy.

[Trem]

Thanks for sharing man. I to lost my best friend in 97. Like your friend he was the kind of person that every body that knew him liked or loved him. Not a mean bone in his body and infectious laugh that you couldn't help but to start laughing along with him. We were pretty much dubbed Bill and Ted, lol. I eternally feel like a douche because when he died i was too devastated to even come to his funeral, i locked myself in my place and lay in the dark for weeks. The police literally kicked in my door with the prodding of some close friends. I quit playing guitar for a decade after. I still think about him and I know he would kick my ass if he knew that so i play again in honor of him, i really do. Every once in a blue moon i have a dream we are hanging out or doing some crazy shit and i wake up feeling like i was really hanging out with him, it's kind of cool for that moment. Well, i'm getting kinda bummed thinking about it, heh. But yeah i can only say i know how you feel and sorry for your loss.

[axmann]

My first guitar was at about 12. I had been hypnotized by Hendrix . I needed a guitar, bad. We had no money for stuff like that. My Pa worked 6 days a week. Mum worked part time at a green house. Many weeks passed . It was winter in Wisconsin. I walked the neighborhood and shoveled driveways and sidewalks for a dollar a stop. Came home one night and she said "look , I can get you a guitar , but it has to be very inexpensive , I only have a little money". I brought out the JC Penny catalog (yeah, I am an old cat). In it was a red electric guitar for $35. She bought it for me . Told me to keep my couple dollars I made. I was grinning so hard I almost tore skin. My Mum passed away at the young age of 56. Not a day goes by that I don't think about her and get that same grin.

[xenophobe]

While not a first guitar story, you giving your guitar to your friend makes me think about a friend of mine that passed away on the 13th of last month. He was the drummer of our band for the last 3 years until a few months ago when his health took a serious turn for the worse. We pretty much saw his passing away coming but that doesn't make it any easier when it finally happens though.

I don't really know what to say about that. I had a close friend in a similar situation, but he wasn't a bandmate. That's wonderful that his family knew what to send, it sounds like they knew. Not that it matters, but I've had a lot of loss in my life, and I come here to be not serious at all because life is too short to be serious. It actually offends me when I have to be serious IRL outside of professionalism. FWIW, if I'm an ass or a troll in one particular thread, it generally stays in that thread. I know I'm an ass to you sometimes, and you can not give a shit and that's fine. I'm sorry to hear about your loss and it's really to hear that your buddy's family showed you that respect.

[CowboyFromHell]

No worries Xeno. To me you just seem to be a person that I have to get to know before I really understand you sometimes. Doesn't make you a bad person just because it puts us at odds sometimes. Guess we just come from different sides of the tracks and I'm ok with that.

[vampire dark]

nice stories from you guys. you are nice people.....I was moved from your stories(it was awesome to give that guitar to the boy).....axmann I'm sorry to hear that your first guitar costed 35 $ you and your family must have been really poor, hope things in life are better for you now...

I play the electric guitar for 3 and something more years now.I own an Ibanez grg 270b I paid 260 euros for it and something about 300 euros for my 30 watt marshall,I paid for the guitar and my father for the amp...I am 16 now and I am trying to save money for a jackson guitar that I want so bad...but it looks like it will not be untill I leave home and get a job(which means never)....the economics in Greece are fucking bad man I mean we pay money for the house we built and leave in plus the loan my parents got in order to built it plus they cut even more money from my fathers pension and my mothers job is fucked up...and though I consider myself and my family to be ok, we can make a living

The first day I got the guitar I was hanging out with a friend (and my evil cousin).then i saw my bro coming with his bike (he was going to his friends) and told me to go home...and I asked why , so he said that the guitar has arrived. he could do better.not tell me about it, so that i went home and be taken by surprise.I just wanted to get sometime with it on my own. you know there were the others too(and my evil cousin fuck her!!!) and wanted to see it touch it and shit...anyway I respect my first guitar and hope that I never sell it

[axmann]

Don't be sorry for me dude. That was 40 + years ago. My point was that it really meant something, and it all revolved around a cheap guitar. Thanks.

[Trem]

Hey Vampire thanks for sharing. Yeah man, Greece sounds like it's pretty rough there right now, i feel for ya. Sometimes it feels like things are impossible, but they aren't. I think about the situation there a lot actually, and in a lot of places in the world that are struggling, as well as here at home. It's crazy times.

Yeah we were fairly poor, at least it felt that way, but i always knew there were other people that had it worse. My mom couldn't truly afford that guitar and i'm sure she worked overtime to get it. She worked her ass off to support 3 kids and she took in strays kids too.

I got my first real job when i was 8 years old. Yes, I had my first paper route in the second or third grade. It was 18 people but it was miles of bike ride out of the way. It was on the outside of routes that grownups didn't want to do so that's how i got it. By the time i quit that route when we moved i had subscribed 32 customers, ( we moved a lot ) I continued to work paper routes until i was 15. At one time i had two paper routes at once 300+ customers 7 days a week while in junior high. I bought my own first cool bike myself , a BMX Schwinn, i bought a lot of my own clothes and toys.

Shortly after that pic above i left home ( longer story ) and got a job as a production artist which i had to go in and take a blind painting test to get the job. ( i painted those paintings you see in furniture stores and stuff like that, like 20 copies of a painting at a time.) I passed the test but i actually had to wait until i turned 16 to start working. I then bought another guitar, a Aria Pro Knight Warrior ( cause of George Lynch , lol).
When i was 17 i reconciled with my mom and her new husband which i hadn't really spoken to much in those 2 years, and my mom kinda of guilted me into moving to Washington with them. Probably a good thing because i was pretty wild being so free at that young age. I hung out with mostly much older people. One of them was Will Rogers grandson, or maybe it was Roy Rogers, one of those two.
The guy who was a tv star and had the horse. It was even before my time, can't remember which. I eventually got into all the cool places that i dreamed of on the Sunset Strip like the Roxy, Whiskey and Gazzaries because of those people. The first time i got into Gazzaries was because a friends band was to play there and Bill Gazzaries was at the bar, and he goes "who's that? How old are you?, and my friend interjected and told him "he's our roadie". It felt pretty awesome, i was hanging out where all the bands i liked got their start and being so young and stuff you can imagine. I remember pissing in the unrinal at Gazzaries thinking, man Eddie Van Halen probably pissed in this urinal! haha.

But i was doing a lot of the things that were popular in the 80's at that time *sniff. I could have ended up dead or in jail eventually so it was probably a good thing reconciling with my parents and moving at that time.
When i moved to Washington is when i gave the guitar to my young friend, i had my Knight Warrior and i figured i was lucky to even have one guitar so..



Well that's a lot of rambling.

Hoping more people post first guitar stories, or cool stories ( old pics would be especially cool too! ) and it's fun, i like reading autobiographical stuff myself. Anyway, Carry on...

[Hellbat]

My first guitar was a wierd Strat/Jaguar morph clone thing. I don't honestly remember how I got it. It was a hand over from someone. Possibly my brother or a friend.

Every other guitar I've had was bought by myself. My first real guitar ( also paid for with paper route money ) was an Aria ZZ but I couldn't bond with it and returned it after 2 days and got a knight warrior. It also started my personalization/modding habit. I pulled the neck and removed the finish and sealed/oiled it and put in an aftermarket pickup. (Fury brand from Saskatchewan, that Canadian pickup wiring Mecca.)

My parents did get me a dirt bike for my 11th birthday which was kind of beyond their means so that was cool of them but they never really encouraged any musical pursuits after I gave up trumpet in the 6th grade. Much to their relief. I don't think they really thought about volume levels of a practicing trumpet player hehe.

[Trem]

Hellbat, i so wanted a ZZ after seeing Vivian play the one in the Dio live concert back then

After playing my Knight warrior for a short time i realized a pickup change was in order, and the guys at the music store recommended a Jackson JC90 or whatever they are called (derp) ceramic . What an improvement, plus i thought it was cool that i at least had something Jackson, lol. I also sanded the neck finish down a bit and scalloped the fretboard, but just the bottom three strings worth up the neck, and eventually sanded it down and painted it Neon green with shit can. My first experience with that, and it didn't go well obviously, it never felt like it dried, looked cool though.

Yeah if i had a kid that wanted to play a horn i think that would drive me nuts, lol. I'd be like, why don't you listen to rap or some shit like all the other kids, rofl, muffle that fucking thing! lol.

[guitarguy2237]

nice stories from you guys. you are nice people.....I was moved from your stories(it was awesome to give that guitar to the boy).....axmann I'm sorry to hear that your first guitar costed 35 $ you and your family must have been really poor, hope things in life are better for you now...

I play the electric guitar for 3 and something more years now.I own an Ibanez grg 270b I paid 260 euros for it and something about 300 euros for my 30 watt marshall,I paid for the guitar and my father for the amp...I am 16 now and I am trying to save money for a jackson guitar that I want so bad...but it looks like it will not be untill I leave home and get a job(which means never)....the economics in Greece are fucking bad man I mean we pay money for the house we built and leave in plus the loan my parents got in order to built it plus they cut even more money from my fathers pension and my mothers job is fucked up...and though I consider myself and my family to be ok, we can make a living

The first day I got the guitar I was hanging out with a friend (and my evil cousin).then i saw my bro coming with his bike (he was going to his friends) and told me to go home...and I asked why , so he said that the guitar has arrived. he could do better.not tell me about it, so that i went home and be taken by surprise.I just wanted to get sometime with it on my own. you know there were the others too(and my evil cousin fuck her!!!) and wanted to see it touch it and shit...anyway I respect my first guitar and hope that I never sell it

I feel ya man, i have a similar story with my guitar, just a cheap little peavey, single hum,21 frets. but its my child. i will never get rid of it. I had always wanted to play guitar,ever since i first head For Whom The Bell Tolls when I was four. Skip a few years and im 13. My parents had just divorced,and I was living with my mother. My mother is disabled,and were were barley living off child support. so I had asked her about a guitar when she was talking to my uncle,and he overhead. My uncle has always treated me like a second son of his,so without telling anyone, he and a guitar freind of his picked this peavey out and bought it. Come Christmas morning, i wake up to the sound of a jimi hendrix song playing, and i ran downstairs, to find my uncle sitting there,playing said guitar. Ive never felt happier than that day. That guitar diddnt leave my hands for a week. And the first song i played on it was for whom the bell tolls.

[Trem]

^ Awesome story man. Was it a Peavey Patriot?