What’s the shittiest piece of musical equipment you’ve ever owned? We’re talkin’ so shitty that that you swear at it everytime you try to play around with whatever it is.
Up for consideration is any piece manufactured by the Peavey Organization. Now there’s a pack of charlatans for ya! I once had a Peavey Classic guitar amp. Man was it a stinker. The pots began to crackle less than two weeks after I bought the turd. Practices would be interrupted frequently due to the fact that I’d have to adjust the volume just so in order to find that little nitch between crackles and sputters where continuous sound was actually granted. For some reason or another, my brother-in-law was always facinated with the Classic, which was fine by me because he eventually gave me 50 bucks for the thing. Good riddance to bad rubbish. To this day, he’s still pissed off at himself for pissing away the 50 bucks.
What about you? What piece of garbage has had you so frustrated with its performance that you swear at it, give it a good punch, or bad mouth it behind its back?
I don’t recall owning a particularly bad piece of gear, not one so bad that I couldn’t make it serve some purpose. I’m pretty sure I’ve never owned a piece of gear that doesn’t at least Look good – outboard gear excluded. Digital outboard gear is hard to get excited by on most any levels beyond practicality and cost.
I’ve owned some bad clothes and gone on stage in bad clothes. That’s just as bad. Last time we played out I wore a sweater that I had no business wearing on stage. It didn’t hit me until midway through the set how bad a choice I’d made. It took everything I had to finish the set and keep it together.
My very first drum kit in high school. A Japanese Tama Star starter kit that was handed down to me from a friend of a friend’s younger brother. The only thing that I kept from it was the skin on the bass drum. It has all my best stickers! I had to make due with it because it was free, but part of the hardware on it was missing (no tom mount, bracket or arm to speak of), and it only had one tom and it sat on an individual stand that was an extra snare stand cranked all the way up and duct taped – you know, the three prong kind that look like metal claws (severely unstable)? It made the upper tom have this really hollow sound no matter how I tuned them because of the beat reverberating off the metal – which also had to be kinda anchored so it wouldn’t fall over, and the cymbals – pots n’ pans, baby – pots n’ pans. All mismatched hand me downs as well. Sounds like I had to walk a mile in the snow in no shoes or something, right?
Mr. Mod –
was this a Cooosby sweater? 😀 I had to ask!
No, no Cosby sweaters for me. It’s not a bad sweater in civilian life – a Benneton – but it really wasn’t meant for the stage.
I think the worst offenders in the “bad gear” department are amps — though I can easily see how a crappy drum kit would make everything sound like shit, too. Thankfully, I’ve had pretty good luck with my amp gear. In the guitar department, I do pretty well with ostensibly “crappy” guitars — you just have to find out what sound they make well, then stick to that sound. But if I had to pick the crappiest guitar I ever bought, it would have to be an early 60s Montgomery Ward “Airliner” that I found in a down-n-dirty junkshop/leftover musical instrument emporium. I have an old Supro Dual-Tone, like Link Wray used to play, and it sounds awesome — so I figured the Airliner would follow suit (they were made by the same company). Not so! Whereas the Dual-Tone has a raunchy, cheap-ass growl (think White Stripes), the Airliner just plain — well, I don’t know how else to put it except to say that it just plain sounded like ass. Anemic where the Dual-tone is bold, plunky where the Dual-Tone is twangy — and it played like shit, too. Unalterably so. I dumped it a couple of years ago — which, it turns out, was a stupid thing to do, since the whole Jack White cheapo guitar mania/bubble finally caught up to the Supro/Valco/Montgomery Ward guitars, and now, those one-dimensional, poorly built git-boxes are selling for major bank.
I also have an Ovation Deacon in my basement — you know, the ones shaped like a battle-axe? Glen Campbell used to play one. I don’t include it in the “crappy” category because it actually plays and sounds fine (assuming you crave that Glen Campbell Variety Hour tone) — but the neck is one of those rare constructions that my left hand just does not like. As I said earlier, I can (and do) enjoy playing just about any old piece of junk, but I find the shape of that Ovation neck to be useless. Look for it on eBay soon. I still think those guitars are cool-looking, in a totally bizarre 1970s what-were-they-thinking kind of way.
Ah – I do own a piece of especially shitty equipment: I was given a 12-string acoustic guitar years ago. It was a no-name brand, but I thought I could make some use of it. When the girl who gave it to me and I were through, she wanted it back, and I had the nerve to essentially accuser her of “Indian giving.” So, I kept the 12-string. Then I strung it up and tried using it. First of all, I’m not a 12-string kind of guy. Second, this thing couldn’t keep tune. Years passed, and pack rat that I am I held onto the thing. I was playing in an acoustic folk-rock band. I figured this would be the time to get that 12-string working. Well, the first two faults were still in place, and then the only guy in the band who ever wanted to play it was a friend who liked to play the intro to “Blackbird”. Man, that tarnished the 122-string acoustic forever. I’ve still got it in my attic. Haven’t opened the case in 10 years. I feel guilty about stonewalling the woman who gave it to me and then wanted it back, but moreso I regret not letting her take it off my hands.
My parents bought me a red Ovation acoustic when I graduated high school. I felt like frickin Kenny Loggins whenever I tried to play it. Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth but don’t accept an Ovation as a gift.
Mr. Mod said:
“I was given a 12-string acoustic guitar years ago… When the girl who gave it to me and I were through, she wanted it back, and I had the nerve to essentially accuser her of “Indian giving.”
Question: is the “Guitar from an old flame” common? I have an old cheap classical guitar that sits in the basement. Never know when you’re gonna need that “extra wide neck, hard to play, crappy nylon string” sound on something!
Mr. Clean wonders:
Question: is the “Guitar from an old flame” common?
My “Amplificator” lap steel was found in the closet of my old girlfriend’s bedroom. I saw the headstock sticking up out of the debris, and jumped on it. She said it had been her grandfather’s. I asked if it was the same rat bastard that had never contributed a positive moment to a family gathering, let alone a slide guitar solo. Knowing it had come fr4om him gave me extra oomph in redeeming the karma of that guitar as justification in keeping it to this day. Jim will attest it is a thing of beauty. I also grabbed the accompanying amp, which I have yet to rebuild. It’s blue marble formica with red felt letters that say “Marvel.” A 5″ speaker or so. Lovely. I think Suzanne made noises about getting it back, but there’s no way!
My Vox Hurricane guitar. I paid $175 for it in ’93 or so. Man, what a piece-o-crap. It couldn’t hold tune. If I bent the high E string too far (more than a half-step), the string would pop off the nut and slide behind the headstock. It did have a cool sound – little did I know the sound was caused by the gradual disintegration of the pick-ups.
My favorite moment with this instrument came one night when I was practicing. Since it was summer, and I was playing at home, I had my shoes off. At some point, the tremolo bar (which was already unusable as it would send the guitar into some new area beyond out-of-tune) inexplicably fell off the guitar, and landed on my foot, nearly breaking my toe. I’m glad the damn thing is gone.
Scott sez:
At some point, the tremolo bar […] inexplicably fell off the guitar, and landed on my foot
I say:
Hey. Nice running into you today, on a rare visit to the Penn area. I’m glad to see Avril is still there. The way things are going I thought he’d be a Starbucks by now.
Anyhow, you reminded me of an experience I had when I was 12 or 13. I had just gone from 21st out of 23 trumpets in the Jr. High band to 2d out of 2 tubas. Or, from 3d to last, to last. But I didn’t look at it that way. In any case, they gave me a big plastic sousaphone to practice on at home. For days it was a labor to get a sound out of the thing. One evening, I was sitting in my room playing the sound of a fornicating goose on speed 16, as per usual. After an especially successful exertion, stood up in triumph. The bell of the sousaphone went right up to the ceiling and smashed the light fixture. I wavered in the sudden darkness, with glass tinkling all around, and felt as much like a ’68 Pete Townsend as a pubescent newest last tuba player could. Is it any wonder I never gave the thing up?
A lot of you must have bought choice equipment over the years!
Actually, yes. I’ve always saved up and gotten decent stuff. The thing is, as Hrrundi alluded to, a cheapo guitar has some sort of sound that is worth something somehow; a cheapo bass isn’t. I’d rather have a $1000 bass than five $200 basses; with guitars, vice versa.
My personal shittiest piece of equipment? I guess it’d be a DOD phasor. Sounded beautiful when it worked, which was for about six months. After that, every six months or so it would work for a few bars. For some reason, I kept it in my chain for about two years.
Rick calculates:
I’d rather have a $1000 bass than five $200 basses
I know what you mean, there. But last year, with a bunch of bass gigs coming up and not even owning an electric anymore, I called a friend to borrow one of his many basses (“Gummy Joe” Quigley.) He said he had just picked up a Squier Jazz bass for $199, and said they’re fine. I went and bought one. He’s right. One set of flatwounds later, and it sounds great. Partly it’s about being old enough and beyond the pale of hipness so’s not to mind being on stage with something that says “Squier” on it, without even needing to put ironic or deprecating stickers on it or anything. So the $200 bass becomes ownable!
I picked up a $200 DiPinto K&A bass to take on tour in Spain back in February after I decided the late 60’s Harmony I’d been using wasn’t up for an international flight (and that’s putting it mildly). It worked great. Cheap instruments are better now than they’ve ever been.
Slocum,
That’s exactly what I plunked down for my Squier bass at Zapf’s. Remember Zapf’s music store in Olney? With all those annoying deadhead sales reps? Everytime I’d pick out a guitar or bass to try out, they’d hustle over, take it out of my hands, and play lightning fast Dimeola runs. One of those dudes was ultra legendary for that tactic. I think he played guitar for “Living Earth” (automatic billion years in hell for even a single night checking out that pack of clods).
Sorry for getting off track. You’re dead on about the Squier. I’ve had one of their P-basses for years, and I’ve never had a problem with it. Cheap, effective, and respectable looking, especially if you can get past the moniker.
Talk to ya soon,
E. Pluribus
That Squier E. Pluribus plays is rock steady. Definitely a tasty, affordable bass.
Living Earth! (They were a local Dead cover band, for those of you not from the Philadelphia area.) Ugh. There’s a Last Man Standing Made in Hell: Local Dead Cover Bands.
I’m reminded of my greatest regret purchasing musical equipment: the day I bought my Strat, which I love (’78, not the super cool version, blonde with blonde neck – not the seat-absorbing kind cool guys favor) I could have also bought a late-’50s Danelectro that was shot to hell (chipped up body, dirty, etc) but sounded fantastic for $50. I saved all the 16-year-old money I could to buy my $175 Strat with the Seymour Duncan bass pickup. There was no way I could squeeze out another $50 for the sort of guitar Jimmy Page had been known to play. I still love my Strat, but I should have saved more $$$ from my summer job that year.
Slokie, Plurble: Good calls on the Squier thang. One of *the best* guitars in my assortment is a Squier Tele knockoff, made in China, that cost me $130. It well and truly outplays Teles I’ve played that literally cost 20 times as much. Now, all the componentry is scheduled to rust or dent its way into uselessness in about five years, but during that time… wowsers! Those of you who caught the extremely dodgy Sour set at the first RTH confab will have heard it in action.
I have a theory about cheap-ass guitars: I call the good ones “Tuesday Guitars.” I call ’em that because, on Tuesday, Mr. Chang *didn’t* have a splitting hangover on the assembly line, felt extra good because his wife got him laid the night before, a particularly nice, solid piece of wood (how’d *that* get in here?!) rolled down the line, and he actually cared enough to do a good job putting the thing together. Et voila! Le Tuesday Guitar! The fact that all of Mr. Chang’s other instruments suck total ass is immaterial if you manage to find a good one. And good Squiers don’t just fall off the trees; in my experience you gotta go through a lot of turds to get to the treasure.
Now, the Hondo II, on the other hand…
Come to think of it, other than Deep Purple, has any good music ever been made by anything with a roman numeral in its moniker?
Speaking of Strats, Moderator, how about Fingeroff’s silver 80s Strat? Now THAT was a turd!!!! Played like shit, sounded like shit, looked liked shit, i.e. was SOLID SHIT!
Am I right or what?
E.Pluribus
I was hoping that Fingeroff would step forward to take responsibility for that atrocity. You think you didn’t like it in Autumn Carousel? You should have felt how much worse it worked with the Head. He used to pull that thing out of its case and it was like dear your friend showing up with a girlfriend you couldn’t stand. Made me sick in the stomach. We’ve all made a lot of fine music using less-than-sterling equipment, but I don’t think anyone ever squeezed a good note out of that silver Strat!
I thought his Gibson Les Paul blew too. Heavier than a mack truck, never stayed in tune. . . .Come to think of it, I don’t think he ever owned one decent dependable guitar. The blonde Rickenbacker sounded great, but I recall that being a tech’s nightmare as well.
Am I off base here?
E. Pluribus
You can’t judge the Gibson by his work in Autumn Carousel. Let’s face it, that band was much more suited to acoustic shows. The Gibson was KEY to the Nixon’s Head sound, heavy weight, poor tuning, AND – let’s make this clear – the surprisingly effective use of that dreaded Peavey amp! I actually used that Gibson to record a rhythm track on a song and, I believe, a solo. Man, that thing weighed a lot, and man did it not stay in tune for long. I think playing that thing made a man of Mike.