Had to share this: after a lot of work and a long journey for this instrument, I have now built and designed myself the coolest (looking) guitar ever; behold, "Cherry Axe!"
Combining the paint job of Jimi Hendrix's Monterrey Strat on the front with the the look of Eddie Van Halen's Frankenstrat on the back, I beg the question; will I now sound as good as both of them combined when playing this guitar!?
Yes. I think I will.
Kidding aside, this was my first guitar, I got it back in high school, and it already had a history with local people and bands before I bought it from a friend. Now, don't let that fool you, it was a total piece of shit made in God knows where. This thing was as cheap as they come, and went through many different iterations before arriving here (at one point it even had a maple neck and blue fringe on the body with an American flag pickguard =). Anyway, back in '04 I put all the original shit parts back on it, spray-painted the body half-white, and my then girlfriend (Onyx Magnolia here) was nice enough to paint it for me based on the Monterrey design. At that point, it was basically a showpiece and nothing else. Literally hung it on my wall.
Until... last week.
When I finally decided to do what I'd been thinking about for years and fix her into a player! Arriving at that decision is a long story in itself, but needless to say, a nice guitar was scrapped for parts, but hey, it wasn't my best, or my
first, so tough shit. Anyway, except for the neck plate and pickguard, I took everything off Cherry Axe; neck, hardware, electronics, knobs, buttons, everything; even the screws were replaced with all American Strat hardware, electronics, and pickups, and a nice special edition Fender Mexi neck. This thing was so shitty that after soldering the real electronics, I actually had to rout the cavity further so they would even fit and let the pickguard lay flush with the body. After that, I plug in and wait to hear the telltale signs of either total silence, or hum like a vacuum cleaner. Silence, could be very bad, or very good. So, I throw on the neck, a string, plug in, still silent, not good, pluck, and... VRRRRRRRRMMMMMMMM!!! She roars to life! Success.
Since then, it's just been a matter of playing and tuning/setting her up the way I want. As for today, I wasn't happy with the back, it was all fucked up from my beating up my shitty old guitar phase, and had some duct and electrical tape covering some of the damage, which looked okay, but still, kind ugly on what would otherwise be a nice guitar, despite all the other superficial damage. But, that electrical tape reminded me of something, and gave me an idea; with some white electrical tape as well, I could make it look like EVH's Frankenstein and the back of my guitar would look cooler the front of most. So, I did.
And that's how I made my first piece of shit guitar into a respectable player, and the coolest looking guitar ever. Or the most cliched one... whatever, it's my first and I love it. =)
The end.
