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all
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oh
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the electric guitar is like an artist’s
brush or a sculptor’s clay it’s an
expression of human beings desire to
reach out with their senses it expands
our sense of hearing sight touch even
taste that is if you play with your
teeth hey I’m Kevin bacon like a lot of
you I love guitars if you’re a player
you already know what I’m talking about
the way they look the way the strings
feel under your fingers it’s almost as
if they’re
alive you learn how to play the
instrument then the instrument plays
you when you’re really in the zone it’s
like God is playing you know you’re just
the
conduit so where does this passion come
from and the power why normal rational
people mortgage their homes to afford a
particular vintage Les Paul or a
Stratocaster why would a middle-aged guy
in Royal New Hampshire Vault more than
2,000 of them in his barn and why do
players make those strange contorted
ecstatic orgasmic faces when playing
solos this is the story of the electric
guitar from the invention in the 1930s
to its golden years right through the
digital guitars of the future we’re
going to meet all kinds of people people
from rock stars and teenage virtuosos to
congressmen CEOs in an attempt to
understand their emotional connection to
their guitars the electric guitar is
Magic it goes beyond cultures it goes
beyond words it goes beyond language it
is a pulsing rhythmic connection to the
essential forces of the universe see
what they all have in common is their
passion for the instrument and a quest
to find their own personal tone you go
through this this long NeverEnding
journey and you also have the aid of the
whole commercial aspect of the guitar
business to help you along so that you
can work your ass off to spend all your
money trying to [ __ ] find the end of
this
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Quest
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United States guitar Market looking at
about $ 7.82 billion and $17 billion
worldwide every shape size color texture
design that you can find you know you’ll
find here at the halls of the N show it
really is a amazing
instrument
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the Guitar Center in Hollywood rocks day
and night you can buy just about any new
guitar but way back in the Vintage Room
a room that used to be the Groucho Marx
theater the burst Brothers reain Drew
Berlin and Dave Belzer are two of the
world’s top experts on vintage guitars
and the Vintage Room contains most of
them how did it all begin this is called
a Rick and Backer frying pan it’s
probably the first electric guitar type
instrument made in 1932 came out solid
solid body that’s for sure with a pickup
it’s a piece of metal metal body metal
one piece body neck type of thing um
it’s got the Rick and Backer pickup in
it which sounds
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pretty sounds pretty cool for the most
part the the guitar player was kind of
like next to the high hat you know his
job
was playing Rhythm Parts very little
lead because you couldn’t hear them as
soon as somebody put a pickup on the
guitar the guitar all of a sudden could
speak it went from being a background
instrument and became a solo instrument
and Charlie Christian was the first
person to do this Benny Goodman had a
black guy one of the first black guys
that was in a White Band
called Charlie Kristen and boy did I
like that this pickup is the first
pickup that was used on an electric
guitar apart from the Rick and Backa
frying pan Charlie Christian was playing
one of these in 1936 and this is the
pickup that made the sound
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possible Swedish music Side of Heaven to
me was that electric
guitar I wanted to be a preacher and
play guitar part of the popularity of
the guitar is I’m sure with three
chords um you can pretty much play 90%
of all the songs You Ever Had to
play you can make a whole career of that
three chords then you plug it into a
guitar amplifier where your voice is the
loudest voice in a room of either 150
500 5,000
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50,000 it’s an interesting Dynamic
begins to
happen once you can jack up the volume
and you can be heard
across in the next County it gives you a
lot of
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power
the technology of being able to you know
plug into plug into the lightning in the
sky you know and feel the fury of it I
mean there’s there’s still nothing
better than standing in front a [ __ ]
stack man and hitting a cord and having
it like move you you know you just you
can you can feel it hit you in the back
man there’s nothing like that it’s an
instrument that uh will always
win because you can always Crank It
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Up
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Rock and Roll Fantasy Camp is a chance
for anyone to be a rock star for a week
musicians of all ages and abilities sign
up for a one-week program where campers
ReDiscover their passion for music and
the guitar the audition bands are formed
Each of which has a rock star teacher
play then they have five days to learn
the material and perfect their
performance in the process they form a
team on the fifth and final day the
Bands travel to Hollywood’s House of
Blues where they compete in a battle of
bands in front of the public and their
families no pressure there but today is
day one when the campers arrive get to
know each other and audition for the
counselors who assigned them to BS I
think George Thor good said a best in
this room he said if anyone born after
1950 ever said that they didn’t want to
be a rock star they’re lying
J I wanted to be a rock star I went to
business instead but I had it in me and
that’s why I’m here this week I’m a
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rockar
all it’s fun as hell my name is Greg
Burns I’m from Atlanta Georgia and I’m a
professor of Neuroscience I kind of got
to the point in my career where you know
I had put the guitar away for many years
since high school and then the guitar
sitting there in the corner it called to
me and I picked it up again it brought
back a lot of great
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memories you take normal people that
play in their basement love the music
love the instruments and they come here
and they get to play with people that
have been through this like Jeff Baxter
you know I play dubie Brothers song I
play China Grove probably a couple times
a week Paul Stanley to get a chance to
see him growing up listening to kiss
Dicky bats without a
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question it’s rock and roll this week is
what it’s all about I mean I like the
noise and the power of rock and roll I
like the out of control but I like the
ugliness of it and I like the beauty of
it you know and I get that all from a
guitar you
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know to me you pick up a guitar and
whatever’s on your mind that you want to
get out there you can do it through
guitar the guitar sort of for me becomes
an extension of my voice it’ll say the
things for me that I don’t know how to
say sometimes I can be as aggressive I
can do whatever all the things I can’t
do verbally I can express on the guitar
whether they get it or not you
know while filming Les Paul in New York
there was word on the street about a
teenage girl from Long Island who was
incredibly gifted we caught up with her
at Pi studios in Glen Cove New York
Christen capalino has truly found her
voice through her guitar a Gibson Flying
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V when I was little I had a hard time
expressing myself like I I went through
some difficult times when I was young so
I felt like that was the best way to
express like my sadness mostly but at
the same time to express my happiness
through
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playing I love it like an electric
guitar you can really just feel it you
can really place your emotion
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into
when I play I Feel Like it Like releases
all my
pain through another world I can take
you
somewhere it’s like a
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Euphoria when people hear the name Les
Paul they typically think of a guitar
but Les is also a man he was one of the
greatest players of all
time but less may be more famous for his
contribution as an inventor some call
him the father of the solid body
electric guitar and multitrack recording
and it all started cuz he wanted to be
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heard I got a job on a Saturday night
one of my first jobs to play for the
cars that came in the big one’s barbecue
St
a fell drove up in a rumble seat and he
wrote a note to the car hop saying red
your guitar is not loud
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enough so I tried to take the pickup
from a photograph and Jab the needle in
the top of the guitar then I got
feedback so I decided I’m going to go
with a piece of railroad track and so I
placed a string on the piece of railroad
track I plucked the guitar and when I
heard this piece of railroad track sound
like something from another planet and I
saids oh my goodness how wonderful that
sounds and mother says wait a minute the
day you see a cowboy on a
horse playing with a railroad truck so I
said it’s got to be a piece of wood well
I started with a 4×4 and I thought
everybody fall over so I put sides on it
and I have another side here and this is
what the sides look like and these sides
just plug onto here and you screw them
on then you go on your job and you play
and so we call this the log and because
of the
log uh the solid body came
about
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I can’t imagine my life without a guitar
in
it and what it brings to me which is a
rock band and a life of Art and
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music
once you get into the guitar it becomes
part of your identity meet Shawn
Castello from Atlanta Shawn plays a Les
Paul a recreation of the 1956 Goldtop
model we filmed him at The Viper Room on
the Sunset Strip oh it’s changed my life
in every way I mean it’s become sort of
my identity in some ways like because I
started playing so young and became
successful I was a shy kid very very shy
not a good athlete not really great with
the ladies at first you know so it
really helped me in in every way just
establish confidence in myself I mean I
can’t imagine what my life would be like
without
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it
I don’t even know where the guitar
player ends and where I actually begin
you know I think it’s kind of I’m one
and the same at this point I’d say the
guitar saved my life it’s taken me a lot
of places that I never would have gone
they made me an honorary
Professor this would never have happened
if I didn’t play
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guitar
when I finally did get all six strings
and I learned like my first sort of
pentatonic lick I I felt like I had
arrived I mean I touched on something
that changed me
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forever in
1949 Along came a man called Leo Fender
who has changed the face of the electric
guitar forever
more Leo Fender despite not being a
player was an exceptional engineer and a
great listener Fender Telecaster was the
first successful solid body electric
guitar debuted in
1949 took a while to catch on but it
definitely
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did
there’s something very Americana about
an electric guitar I mean especially a
solid bodying guitar because it is
manufactured pretty much in the same way
as an automobile is Leo Fender had this
idea that you didn’t need to have a neck
that was actually glued onto the body
this was the great Innovation was called
the plank this guitar can be taken apart
and put back together in minutes you
unbolt these four bolts and that comes
off off you unscrew these two screws the
control cavity comes off 1949 everybody
thought it was a joke but Leo Fender had
the last off Leo had a we took one of
those first broadcasters one night went
into Los Angeles to a place called
Riverside Ranch Leo Fender and George uh
basically had this guitar that they
could not sell nobody was buying it
because they weren’t familiar with a
solid body guitar it’s never been done
before so they were kind of looking for
somebody to to play this thing there was
a young fellow came in a good-looking
young guy and came over where we were
standing and he saw our guitar sitting
there and he want know what kind of
guitar it was and said well it’s it’s
something new we’ve been working on and
he said could I see it and I said
certainly that’s why we brought it and
he said well can I play it never in my
life have I ever heard like these two
Fells are individually you put them
together and boy you got the very best
here we go with Jimmy Bryant Speedy West
and flying high
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he played at least two hours on that
guitar that night and everybody just
loved they never went back to dancing
the band didn’t go back to playing I
just listen to this young man play that
was a fabulous Jimmy Bryant the first
commercially successful solid body
guitars were definitely fenders and
we’re talking about something that
really really caught on quickly I mean
you can play a fender as loud as you
want I think that’s really one of the
reasons fenders were so popular in the
early 50s the Telecaster really got it
going you know and it just had this
Sonic
specialty that is unequaled some real
Hot Licks were played on this
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guitar
it’s a great
guitar I mean when you can really dig
into it and it still keeps the clarity
and
uh and you know you pick up new guitars
and they don’t they just don’t sound
like that to me when I was growing up I
loved Keith Richards and I loved country
music and things like that and uh they
always played telecasters and I always
wanted a Telecaster like Keith Richards
he had a a blonde Telecaster with a
beautiful
blacku I finally got a Telecaster like
when I was probably around 13 or
so I think the guitar really kind of
chose
me you know I just play all the time I
think that’s what keeps me kind of
sane you know I have terrible anxiety
and things like that so I just play just
keep my mind off
things and when I don’t you know I just
get real mean and stuff like
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that it’s made my life wonderful and I’m
making a living playing guitar which I
would do it for free anyways but you
know don’t tell my bosses
that
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but also it can ruin a lot of lives as
well just like you know alcohol or drugs
or anything like that because I play so
much when you pick your guitar over your
you know wife it’s not always the best
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thing
was that cool you can definitely be
addicted to the guitar because when I
went on my honeymoon not only did I take
my guitar but I took my guitar tech too
so at least he gave me a towel when I
needed
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one at first Gibson laughed at the
Telecaster after years of making finely
crafted archtop instruments this BL
concept looked like Amateur hour to them
till people started to play it and buy
it and suddenly Gibson needed to compete
in this new area so they called on our
old friend Les Paul the guitars they
created together are some of the finest
ever made the introduction of the Les
Paul began a 50-year sales war between
Fender and Gibson that continues
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today
as time went on and we made it more
lovable
beautiful until it was a bartender a
mistress a housewife it was everything
that you could think of and that was
something that you could love and it
would do what you tell them to do
sometimes Les Paul came up with this
absolute Masterpiece it’s called lespol
standard go toop this is the the very
very first Gibson solid body guitar this
guitar has a switch so the base pickup
just this pickup sounds like
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this in the middle both pickups sound
like
this the bridge lead
pickup
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you notice I have this guitar all the
way up volume wise and it’s not making a
lot of noise where this guitar if I turn
it
up and that’s the difference between the
single coil and the humbucker well I’m
sort of a less Paul girl I’ve always
liked that more of a grow dirty fat
Powerhouse kind of
sound
maybe it’s an overcompensation on my
part you know from being a a girl or
something when I play the guitar it
takes me to an amazing place where time
disappears you could be anywhere you
could be any age you could be almost
anyone it’s beyond your own self it’s
out of body
I love my
guitar nothing says rock and roll and
sex like a low strung lwh hung electric
guitar it’s hard to hug a
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Steinway it’s a sort of romantic thing
isn’t
it when you hold something close and you
get beautiful sounds to come out of it I
I think the electric guitar I mean
there’s no doubt that there’s a shape
that is a symbol of something sexy I I
got to say that but I’m not saying I
picked up a Guitar just cuz I was horny
here a perfect
illustration here we have a
vase put a neck on this thing what does
it remind you of it’s got great curves
the knobs are fun to twiddle with it’s
really soft on the line and it totally
ties into the art of the female body and
I just think it’s a romantic instrument
you know you touch it it’s just feel the
wood the strings that vibrates against
your body none of the other instruments
are are instruments that you hold to
your chest to your heart musicians
feel a tremendous relationship with
their instruments sometimes maybe to the
point of an
attraction this guitar is very
special I play it and it’s like making
love to it I’ve never told anybody
this I literally play this guitar and I
will start
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drooling I don’t know what it is but the
first time I touched it I felt something
through it it’s connected me to
it it’s very hard to explain but it’s
love you fall in love suddenly you don’t
know it just hits
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know now a serious competition from
Gibson’s Les Paul it was time for Fender
to respond and take it to the next level
the Stratocaster was so modern was so
radical looked out of place in the band
stands in the 1950s but rock and roll
changed all that and many legendary
musicians quickly adopted Str it’s no
coincidence that Defender Stratocaster
and rock were born at exactly the same
point in history the guitar that did it
for most people in England was uh Buddy
Holly stratas just seeing it on the
cover of that chirping crickets record
it just looked fantastic they had a
magic about them you know you see these
pictures of Americans playing these
great guitars you know this is a
Stratocaster
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it was a spaceship compared to anything
that had appeared at that time this is
the sexiest most curvaceous instrument
that’s ever come on this planet this is
sex with strings on it it just was a
guitar that seemed to be a huge leap
tonally the Stratocaster by adding the
third pickup really added to the tonal
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Spectrum this a front pickup a little
more mower middle pickup is a little
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brighter little raspier sound and then a
brighter sound in the back
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pickup this is very similar to a very
famous guitar called Blacky
that was sold by Eric Clapton a while
ago for nearly a million dollars now an
interesting thing about the Stratocaster
which is a big part of Eric Clapton’s
sound is he would do a little trick
which was actually putting the
switch right in between these two
pickups and you get a little out of
phase
sound
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which was the sound of you know Lay Down
Sally and you know slow hand the Slow
Hand album or starting even
with you know when he hooked up with
Delany and Bonnie and dererk and The
Dominoes is really where he went from
Gibs into a
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strat it was just my guitar always I
tried all kinds of guitars and I always
come back to Strat that’s the the only
guitar that inspires
me I had this Fascination since I was a
kid maybe because it was forbidden for
me to touch
it my dad was really influenced by
American blues music and American sound
and he had a lot of jam sessions back
home in Serbia and I grew up listening
to this kind of music since I was 2 or 3
years
old and I just wanted to play Blues I
just I just really wanted to go into
electric stuff I was really
trying hard to sound like Hing wolf when
I was 13 that was a bad
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idea a guitar is the way that our souls
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[Applause]
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speak
and I think maybe the best comment that
I ever got from my audience was when
they come to see me they all come home
thinking that playing guitar is the best
and that we should all become guitar
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players wow thing whenever I listen to
Gary play the guitar I always have a
glass of
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wine the house just kind of
shakes uh no one has complained uh that
I know of at least nobody tells them to
be quiet except if our kids are at home
my wife and daughters aren’t real
impressed with my uh guitar playing
skills and the girls would go Dad you
turn it down this is embarrassing you
know it’s not about them it’s about me
when we’re playing guitar to be CEO for
a company like Southwest Airlines is
terrific enjoy your flight but the
airline industry is tough and our assets
light 35,000 ft 500 M hour so it’s just
not for the faint
apart and it’s also a a 7 day a week
business uh which often translates into
near 24 hours a day so I have a lot of
outside interest and I’m just starved
for time so I like to play guitar
obviously it’s just a way to relax and a
way to take my mind off other things and
even you know if it’s just for few
minutes it’s still great just a great
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[Applause]
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joy I grew up with a condition called
scoliosis so I was in a bat cast for 14
months when I was a kid and a back brace
for 2 years which is when I started to
learn to play
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guitar
you don’t really get a lot of dates when
you get a full body cast on you try but
you really don’t get them so you know it
was really the guitar was around all the
time and ended up being like my best
friend I mean it’s the longest
relationship that I have on Earth is
with my guitar other than my mother and
father I’ve been in situations in my
life or I feel like I’ve been through a
lot
where you know the only thing I had was
the guitar the only thing that that I
could count on was the guitar it’s got
me out of a lot of trouble is what it’s
done I went from an anonymous dork to
like somebody who was kind of cool and
uh changed my whole life cuz I was kind
of a nerdy kid you know never uh the
most popular in school or anything like
that until I started playing the
guitar I used to go over to my buddy’s
house and his brother had a guitar and
you know just a crummy nylon string
guitar but I picked that up and somehow
I really felt something there I I knew I
could play that
thing when I first started playing
guitar I was playing flamco guitar you
know I never really thought about
playing electric guitar until I went to
see Chuck Barry play one
time he was like the devil with his
guitar and just the way he looked at you
it was like the devil with his Pitchfork
you know I just knew I had to get one of
those red
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guitar
I think my style is combination of being
in the doors and trying not to sound
like anybody
else I kind of had to play bass Rhythm
lead all those things at once you know
so it made me play a certain way and I
really hadn’t played electric guitar for
more than 3 or 4 months you know when I
got in the
doors at one point Jim was writing
everything and we didn’t really have
enough songs you know so Jim says hey
why don’t you guys try and write some
too you know so I went home and the next
day I wrote F my
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fire playing the guitar is it’s I guess
it’s like an escape for me just the way
those strings feel you know it just
makes me feel a certain way makes me
feel good let me put it that way and the
more you play the better you
feel
it’s like a drug it’s just like a drug
only it’s
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legal Gibson’s es series was the
brainchild of Ted mccardy Gibson’s
president in the 50s and 60s was first
produced in 1958 was a breakthrough
design because it has a solid Maple
block inside the es has the attributes
of a solid body like less feedback but
its resonance Chambers give it the chime
of a hollow body instrument
it’s a great all-around guitar that is
played and copied by just about
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everyone very fundamental two pickups
and you can get a nice rock and roll
sound out of it too without feeding
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back
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so it’s it’s it’s got the chimin of the
pickups it’s got the brightness of the
neck and it just looks
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spectacular BB historically played an ES
355 but more recently developed his own
version of Lucille B’s variation has no
Foles to further reduce feedback along
with other
modifications can’t take credit for it I
may have helped to improve it a
little I didn’t create it anyone that
bends a note on the guitar and holds it
and anyone that shakes a note like that
is getting it from BB King whether they
know it or not I Trill my hand like this
if you can see just like that that’s all
I do but I’ve learned to do it well
enough so it moves the string a
little to me the guitar is the most
expressive instrument because you can
bend those strings in you get in between
the
notes the guitar to me is the instrument
of
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infinity it’s the instrument of your
soul it goes through your heart through
your mind through your genitals to
what’s in your core in the
middle in an organ a piano you’ve got
notes you have to hit but on a guitar
you can play The Infinity between the
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notes playing slight on a guitar is like
what life is about I mean it’s not where
you are but it’s about how you get
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there without question the most
collectible guitar in the world is the
1959 lespa it’s considered the Holy
Grail of electrics the 59s are super
rare and super expensive at Pi Studios
Kristen calino had a life-changing
opportunity to play a 1959 Les Paul
Standard and to further Elevate The
Experience she played it through a
marshall amp that Jimmy Hendricks used
to record many of his
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Classics Gibson in the late 50s reached
a p of
craftsmanship and materials that just
came together where they made a guitar
that you know the best players in the
world desire the Strat of varas of
electric guitars the Les Paul flametop
this particular type of guitar has
always been the Pinnacle of collectible
guitars in my opinion this guitar has a
lot of book match flame which makes it
very
desirable these are played by all the
great art artists everybody from Joe
Walsh to Jimmy Page Jeff Beck everybody
even Clapton played one of these at one
time they’re fantastic
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guitars Les Paul sunber guitar it’s one
of the greatest rock and roll guitars
ever made and I’ve enjoyed uh playing
one for years and
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years and when the Butterfield band went
to Europe in ‘ 66 I noticed that Peter
Green was playing a uh red Paul like
this Clon was playing one and I wondered
to myself how did they know that this
guitar had all the inherent qualities of
sustained volume and tone that was just
better than any other possible uh rock
and roll guitar at that
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time there’s probably 20 25 important
things that affect the sound of a guitar
pickup there’s so many variables in the
shape how it produces the magnetic field
around the string area that’s what
generates the current that you hear that
goes into the amplifier I was very lucky
to have you know studied ham radio and
stuff like that to understand what it’s
all about you know I mean I can hear it
but what is it that I’m hearing you know
and I want to be able to produce it and
understand that if I use this many terms
or this kind of winding p how close each
wire is together there’s hundreds and
hundreds of wiring combinations and I’ve
done so many of them that I I can I can
I can really hear the
difference Seymour Duncan originally
started rewinding pickups for guitar
players when he was in London England
and this probably would have been the
mid-60s I’m going to guess and so I
think he just became obsessed with with
helping people achieve better guitar
tone having Seymour Duncan pickups in
your guitar you’re putting something in
your in your guitar that basically goes
back to the beginning of rock and roll
he you know worked with Hendrick he
worked you know with Jeff Beck of course
uh Jimmy Paige so all these great
players he helped them achieve the
sounds they were going
for
s has an uncanny ability to be able to
translate someone describing what they
want in sound in words like warm
sounding or bright or tight there’s a
lot of terms that are used to describe a
pickup to get get to the science you
have to have the magic or the the
mindset to understand where you’re
coming from so finding a pickup that has
a tone that’s to your liking that is so
important this just a very important
part of playing it’s very important to
what you hear and it’s a tone that you
produce that makes other people
appreciate what you’re doing
[Music]
too down through the history of
man items have been symbols connected to
people and events that either have
magical powers or have some significance
the electric guitar was a magic carpet
that propelled the Youth of America to
another place in another time the bolt
of lightning struck us when we saw the
Beatles on The Ed Sullivan Show Actually
All My Loving from the Beatles that’s
the first rock song pop song I ever
heard and I was sold and I immediately
decided I want an electric guitar the
reason why I started playing the guitar
was because of the Beatles I mean like
anybody my age you know that moment when
they on The Ed Sullivan Show in 1964
changed everybody life they hooked me I
actually started playing acoustic guitar
I started playing folk guitar and uh
graduated after a while to uh electric
[Music]
guitar lots of politicians play electric
guitar John KY Mike Huckaby Tony Blair
the late Tony snow and our friend
Congressman Paul hods of New
Hampshire I’m sort of a basic Rock and
roller you know if it’s got a couple of
chords and I can play a pentatonic scale
I’m a happy
[Music]
guy there’s a powerful
current that I feel flowing through me
when I play the guitar it comes from up
there and it goes through me and it is a
very powerful
thing how else can you make so much
louder noise have so much fun and have
it be Artful if you’re good at
[Music]
it at fantasy camp we discovered another
teenage virtuosa named Jared stamy from
North Carolina Jared’s already a pro
musician at the age of 16 why is
powerfully obvious when he
[Music]
plays I was hooked on guitar on my 13th
birthday day which is the day I started
playing Dad pulled me into our computer
room and said listen to this and he
started playing the ocean by lead
Zeppelin and the second I heard that
song I I knew right then and there what
I had to
do
I got to have music in my future if I
don’t I won’t be
[Music]
happy the electric guitar has made some
pretty bold statements since its
Inception this is your gun but it is a
gun for peace this is the instrument of
the individual as soon as you held your
guitar you were sending a strong message
to the system I
believe that during the 60s and 70s when
rock and roll
began we musicians entertainers was a
able to bring more people together than
the politicians Indian why we hungarians
poles Czechs and Russians brought down
the Communist system is because of rock
and roll and blue jeans this is the way
you get the freedom right
here
now as a symbol I would say the guitar
is very
powerful when somebody holds up an AK-47
you know exactly what that
means when somebody holds up an electric
guitar there is no question in your mind
what that
[Music]
means this means
freedom This Means War
killing freedom to express exess freedom
to communicate your deepest and
innermost feelings from your soul to
your fellow human
beings in a world where people are
afraid of free
will this machine is unknown and
frightening in the right hands the
guitar can change the
world my love for guitars started in
Bangladesh it started with four of us
friends you know listening to Iron
Maiden when we were like uh 15 we
started this band rock music and being
in a Muslim country it’s not really
accepted so you have to hide and do
stuff we did an album in a
year it was being played
everywhere you see kids jamming to it
and stuff and you go oh my God that’s
us nobody knew what we look like we
didn’t put any pictures on the album
just to be
safe so we do a
concert curtain drops 35,000 people
cheering for
[Music]
us and then it got really
[Music]
weird it’s a Muslim country
and not certain people didn’t like
that we couldn’t play certain venues
anymore we can do certain things anymore
have to be very careful walking down the
streets and we have
[Music]
families but the biggest thing of all
music guitar is now I hope hold it and I
see it was hope because little kids will
look at you they’ll write to you they’ll
find you and they will tell you you did
it you went there and you know you know
I want to be there I can do it
too I can speak through that and tell
the whole
world that I exist and I have this
beautiful thing in me you know I can
express
[Music]
myself
this is what inspiration does you know
those all those kids are inspired by
[Music]
us Walter this is one that was just
brought in that came in while I was at
lunch with the instruments I can’t truly
tell you what things are going to be
worth that’s in spite of the fact that I
appraise guitars daily the guitar
described below is in our opinion of
Gibson Les Paul Goldtop model made early
in the year 1957 description serial
number 7 space
0232 the peg head has been cracked
lengthwise it matters very much on
condition whether it’s been monkeyed
with or not no this is one that uh if it
hadn’t been messed over here it be at
least least an $80,000 guitar current
market
value after repair of the peg head
$50,000 if you look at the 1959 guitar
one of the reasons it’s worth a lot of
money is because we sold all of 300 on a
global basis and let me tell you that
was not a big number for Gibson by 1960
Gibson decided to cease production of
the Les Paul and that’s when people like
Eric Clapton and Mike Bloomfield
discovered them more accurately Clapton
saw Freddy King playing a gold toop and
wanted a similar Vibe so almost
immediately demand exceeded the supply
and vintage Les Paul started getting
valuable they didn’t want the new
Gibsons they wanted those old ones and
the sound was as different as night and
[Music]
[Applause]
[Music]
day I got this guitar probably early uh
67 once I had enough money to start
buying guitars I think I paid
$400 to a friend named Rocky for this
guitar I don’t know where he got
[Music]
it there was a period in the 60s where
while the young kid was running up and
down the street to get a l ball Gibson
was was at the same time selling off all
their equipment and thinking that the
phase is over that it was going to go to
synthesiz
[Music]
it they were going to discard the
electric guitar after the demise of the
Les Paul in 1960 the Strat and the Telly
soldiered on and rode a wave of
enthusiasm during the early Beatles era
but in the mid 1960s newer guitars like
Defender Jazzmaster and jaguar began to
steal the older guitars Thunder
especially with the surf crowd in 1967
vendor was ready to cease production of
the Stratocaster then one man
single-handedly saved the Strat and
maybe the electric
[Music]
guitar
I first drank the Kool-Aid when I saw
Jimmy Hendricks at the Framingham
Carousel in
1968 that just blew my mind I knew at
that point in time all I wanted was
Fender Stratocaster the Stratocaster is
today an icon it’s the most Prof popular
guitar on the planet with almost 100
models to choose from not counting the
ripoffs it’s so ingrained in our culture
that it inspired a roller coaster Disney
World in
[Music]
Florida I’m definitely a guitar addict
you
know I’ve just been a guitar player for
the last 42 years
and I pretty much played the guitar
every single day you know I can count
the days I don’t play the guitar in a in
the course of a year I can count the
days on one
[Music]
[Music]
hand I’m so passionate about playing and
I I want to express that passion and my
own personal joy and exhilaration
through the
guitar because I think I find my Center
as a person when I’m
[Music]
playing cuz it’s really the only thing I
can do I can
barbecue but I can play guitar better
than I
barbecue a number of factors combined to
create the vintage guitar Market one was
a scarcity of the early models like the
Les Paul and the Flying V in the es
series even the early strats the other
was the fact that both Gibson and Fender
were bought by giant corporations Fender
by Massive CBS and Gibson by an
Ecuadorian cement company to begin
around 1966 or so the guitars began to
suffer from reduced quality and inferior
Sound by the early ‘ 7s most were junk
compared to what had come before the
musicians began to realize the new
guitars just didn’t feel or sound right
the corporate Bean counters had done
their jobs too well guitars back then
were made by the people for the people
you know then it got into I think a
monetary thing where they had to make
more of them and less time so they start
automating more and a lot of the steps
the final little sanding here or this
over here or um I think a lot of that
the Personal Touch got lost been playing
ales Paul for a pretty long time in the
first electric guitar that I ever got
was Les Paul but that one was such a
piece piece of [ __ ] that after about a
year I remember I stuck it neck first
through a wall things got so bad by the
mid 80s that Gibson was weeks away from
shutting its doors and then Henry
juskowitz and his Partners acquired
Gibson in a last minute attempt to save
the company they used technology and
perfectionism to revive the brand
gradually the new instruments improved
in quality but are they really as good
as the old ones I was
nonplused by the fact that our employees
didn’t think the guitars were any good
many of them were playing
fenders and I said man that’s just not
right I took a guitar and I smashed it
in the ground I said every guitar that
has Gibson on it that’s not right is
going to be
destroyed and you know what the guitar
started getting a lot better and the
employees started playing Gibson
prod
in hindsight it looks like all Gibson
had to do was look on the stages of of
rock and roll and they can see
everybody’s playing a l
ball if you look at the electric guitar
in principle the first ones are exactly
as they are today the Telecaster the
Stratocaster the Les Paul they just got
it right it’s completely
Timeless both Gibson and Fender are
copying very very closely what they made
in the 50s and early
60s since maybe 94 when Gibson dissected
a real burst from the ‘ 50s they made
the correct neck joint and the reissue
flame tops that they make are
particularly good instruments that you
can buy
new what we have been doing is exactly
what the cazo factory had done back in
the ‘ 50s of course they didn’t didn’t
have $100,000 numerical control machines
to add to the process but we have that
opportunity it’s beyond just being like
the old one it is a much better guitar
today the old ones don’t all sound the
same the pickup windings are different
from pickup to pickup when Seth lover
who invented the humbucking pickup was
asked how many turns of wire he put on
it so we just ran them until they were
full it is
mindboggling that these relatively
inexpensive components of the 50s
combined with inexpensive labor often
enough women who didn’t know how to play
a single chord on a guitar winding the
pickups were producing results that
today physicists study to try to figure
out and that’s part of the the Mystique
of the old ones but as far as recreating
the sound
uh you can come close enough I think
that in a blindfold test um you couldn’t
[Music]
tell this is a 1954 Les Paul with P90
pickups a wraparound
bridge and uh this is their their their
version nowadays of basically the same
[Music]
Guitar let’s listen to the
[Music]
[Applause]
[Music]
difference
it’s so creamy you know you can’t expect
a guitar from 2006 to sound like a
guitar from
1955 we have to look at the Quality and
integrity of things that were made in a
different time people made all these
things by hand and today guitars are
mass-produced they may have made 500 of
these a year back then for 3 years maybe
a little more now it’s 400 a day when
you get into vintage instruments
you’re dealing I think with just
time and who knows what Impressions time
makes on a thing the Vintage versus the
[Laughter]
new there was a time when the guitar was
at the Forefront of the generation gap
but today it can be a bridge between
Generations Johnny started playing with
us sitting in with us when he was 9
years old and actually uh two of our
albums that we got nominated for
instrumental Grammys Johnny was the
guitar player on one of which when he
was
nine it’s a great way to also spend time
together be able to share a common
passion for music and for guitar playing
keep it in the family and and play with
someone you love and respect too so
we’re always hanging out and we’re able
to you know hang out and do things that
we both care about so makes a lot more
fun
he’s a solo
[Laughter]
[Music]
hog it’s been my lifelong dream just to
play with
him he took me out when I was 12 years
old when I just started playing guitar
and I saw a gig I saw Toto play blew he
like just ripped it up the fans going
crazy I was like I want to be that guy I
want to be my dad so uh and I remember
the first time I asked I was like Dad I
want to play guitar he’s like oh yeah
I’m like yeah and he tuned down my low e
to a d and he put my fingered it sound
like a power like have fun left the room
and I just you know Prett much it
started
it’s been a kick for me just to see my
son you know like stand next to him and
play watch him
develop writing songs together and
working in the studios together doing
sessions and whatnot it’s been great fun
he’s my best friend it just happens to
be my
son give Daddy kiss
[Music]
now
you can only have one woman at a time
but you can have more than one of these
things of beauty and and I I fall in
love all the time gas gas gas gas well
we’re talking about gas you know and I
try not to pass it that much but I I do
have it oh I totally have gas I have gas
yes I do I’ve had guitar acquisition
syndrome since I was 16 years old you
just fall in love with something and
have to have it there times I just have
to like I don’t care I’m taking that
home how much okay I don’t care you know
what I mean cost a fortune but God it’s
fun I think I’ve got it fairly under
control I only bought two guitars this
week it’s true well this is my third
Strat that I’ve had I always get the
Sunburst we’ve got guitars in every room
of the house how many wives have said
why do you need so many get well they
all have their own little Vibe I just
love to hold them and play them and
collect them and look at them which is
why I got over 100 guitars I just did a
photo shoot so I have 108 guitars but
they’re not crap now I probably have
about 150 guitars between guitars banjos
mandolins it’s around 2,000 guitars I
don’t think a man ever has enough
guitars I wonder if I keep buying them
I’m going to be living under the freeway
but I’m going to have a really nice
guitar
collection I bought a Gibson Les Paul
sunburst from a guitar player in the Hol
I paid £250 for it and when I sold it
for £500 I thought hey I double my
money I had a 54 black uh Les Paul a guy
I knew said let me borrow it for the
summer I was young was the summer of
love I said sure take the guitar for the
summer man I’ll see you back here in
school he took the guitar and traded it
for a Harley I actually had the
opportunity to buy the most flamy 60
I’ve ever seen this is back in the 70s
the guy wanted $3,000 for it and I said
are you kidding that’s not worth no
$3,000 it’ll never be worth that much
now this one is
$350,000 there are people who paid over
$400,000 for these nowadays the one in
this condition uh you could expect to
pay about a half a million dollars for
possibly more sky the limit could have
had 12 Harley could have had all of the
Harley-Davidson company should have
about
it before I just poo poo the whole idea
we can say that there are people whove
paid over a million dollars for the
right postage stamp or coin and the
postage stamp is no good to put on an
envelope and mail something with it and
the coin is no good to put in a gum
[Music]
machine
hi this is Brian fiser from Firebird
Farm up in New Hampshire we primarily
grow organic blueberries but I’ve been
known to grow a few Firebirds Gibson
Firebirds that is my main reason of
collecting these instruments is that I’d
say half of the instruments that I own
need to be preserved for Generations
Beyond us and I just want to make sure
they get into an area where everyone can
appreciate them this is of course a 1950
8 Flying V here with the original tags
they were a total failure in the market
they produced approximately 70 some they
just were too modernistic so it’s hard
to venture a guess of what a Flying V in
this condition would bring would it be
200,000 or could it be 500 or 700,000
the old guitars do have a certain Mojo
and if you don’t know what it means I I
I can’t help you this guitar here is
what Mojo is all about this is an
original 1958 Flying V that I got from a
blues guy in Cincinnati named Big Ed
Thompson nine times out of 10 if you
pick up an old guitar and it’s been
played by somebody who could really play
you get that sense out of the guitar
there’s a lot of soul put in there from
somebody else who put the time to wear
to wear the paint off right here or have
some some pick pick scratches down here
you know there’s some stories in that
guitar I do like playing my old Tellies
you know it’s it’s just get this feeling
that this you know this guitar is from
the 50s and and uh you know it just has
a Vibe about it because it’s been around
for so long I really believe that
certain guitars have a spirit it’s been
to a thousand gigs it’s had hundreds and
hundreds of hours of playing on it think
of all the people who have who have been
entertained by this thing and who have
put those Good Vibes back you know it
may sound silly I don’t know if it’s
true or if it’s not true but this guitar
here I have never played play another
Electric Guitar Bar None that sounds
better than this this is the one and it
also has that that
oozing unmistakable Mojo that the old
guitars
[Applause]
have when the guitar markets start
getting so crazy where Les Pauls are
$500,000 you know stratocasters were 10
15 20 25,000
all during the like 60s and 70s and8
people would change stuff out and put in
other hot rodded stuff that maybe would
have made it sounded different or but it
didn’t have the look of the old
instrument that was retaining so much in
value so I said you know I got to do
something about that and that’s when I
came up with the Antiquities and
Antiquity is the art of making something
or quality that is old so for me that
was important to do so that all of a
sudden became just a great hit and we do
a lot of custom things to them so
they’re all different you’re getting a
pickup like how it was manufactured 50
60 years ago I started with the
Antiquities and then Fender came out
with the relics and then Gibson came out
with the historics but we were we
started all that aging
thing since not everyone can afford a
vintage guitar and there only so many to
go around the manufacturers have created
new guitars that are aged or relied
versions of famous axes this is an exact
replica of Stevie Rayvon ‘s number one
guitar and at the time of his death this
is the way that guitar looked they
measured this guitar in every respect
and made 100 exact replicas of Stevie’s
guitar relics are also very collectible
since such a limited amount are produced
they’re great Investments so when it
comes to relicing say Stevie Ray vones
Lenny Stratocaster every Nick and ding
every discoloration and even the
cigarette R Burns and decals are
precisely replicated it allows the
consumer to actually partner with the
artist and own exactly what he’s had
that’s cool it’s a good thing you know
it’s a historical artifact that’s very
important to the world and now you’re in
this improbable position of documenting
it something that means so much to
people then you’re going inside of that
it’s a heavy
[Music]
experience
the beauty of this guitar I’ve actually
played it you know the technicians at
Fender that made these guitars said we
want people to play him we want people
to be able to
feel the same thing Stevie
[Music]
felt what is a digital guitar does it
play the same way as a traditional
analog guitar how does it feel and how
can it come so close to sounding like 26
other guitars at the turn of a
dial the veryx guitar first and foremost
is a musical instrument the ability now
to do modeling really is just to take
take us into the next chapter of the
discovery of
tone everything you hear from the varx
comes from the player’s
[Music]
fingers what goes on in varx is we take
those six strings convert them to
digital and effectively Place those
strings on a different
guitar so the
guitar
has regular pickups in it if you want to
hear him
buzz it will the analog part of it has
its own personality and then you have
the fact that all the varc guts inside
can change it to another 26 different
personalities so um you’ve got a manic
depressive on your hands that you’re
playing here’s kind of a less Paul sound
that’s the standard kind of a marshall
amplifier then another one if you want
the basic
Fender there’s kind of that in between
Fender
[Music]
position Rick and Backer 12
string
so it’s just a lot of variety with a
varx You’ got a whole catalog of guitars
so um you can see how this fits in with
my idea because I’m not one guitarist
you know I’m not one sound I’m not one
[Music]
style now I do see VAR accxes of very
definitive
way of being a the tour with just one
guitar but getting every sound I
want then
there’s I mean if you want big obviously
just D it up you know
[Music]
say
is it the future will it replace the
instruments that we all know and love
Les Paul thinks so there seems to be no
alternative at this
time that we’re going to go any other
direction but digital and it won’t be
analog George gruin doesn’t it’s phony
it doesn’t feel the same to the player
and it doesn’t Inspire the player to do
the same thing there’s really no
difference between the
feel
of a modeled instrument versus a real
one even if the audience can’t tell the
tonal difference if the musical ideas
the concepts wouldn’t have even occurred
to the musician if he wouldn’t have
composed that piece otherwise then the
instrument is critically important Leo
Fender got all kinds of criticism for
his plank this crazy piece of wood with
these new fangled pickups on it and
because it was it was just completely
new completely different a guitar is
something that’s a sacred instrument if
you will it’s very important and I would
personally find the idea of a digital
guitar about as interesting as a
photograph of dinner to eat much the
same as going out with a blowup doll of
that looks like a girl it just means
absolutely nothing by its very nature
the electric guitar is Forward Thinking
and Progressive however that exact same
thing that made it so groundbreaking at
the beginning is the same thing that
creates classicists and people that do
not want to change and want to
immediately um sort of hold things in
awe and not be able to sort of progress
this is the time this is the techn
technological age so why stop dreaming
now you know I’m still dreaming I’m
still dreaming that all of this will get
better and better this is all about
musical exploration and that that
Journey should never
end
I believe that each guitar just has
something locked in it that you just
want to get out you know it sort of
dictates how you want to
[Music]
play for some reason a melody or theme
comes to mind inspired by the
[Music]
instrument if I pick up somebody’s
guitar or pick something off the wall
it’s like a weird thing to me it’s like
something new in your hands and I almost
always come up with a new Riff on a new
[Music]
[Applause]
guitar I’ve been my whole life dreaming
of this sound that no one has
heard but I hear my head we’ve all heard
of the surfer’s Endless Quest for the
perfect wave the guitarist lifelong
Quest is to Define his own tone and it’s
just as Elusive and personal so where
does Tone come from is it the guitar or
the fingers the imagination or the soul
10 guitar players line them up they play
the same exact Blues like the same amp
the same guitar you’re going to get 10
different sounds so you’re going to
really find out it’s not a magic guitar
we toured with Van Halen I got to put
that to a test cuz Eddie would come up
and play through my stuff and jam with
us a sound check or I would plug into
his stuff you know he plugs into my app
he sounds like Eddie Van Halen I plug
into his amp I sound like me Eric
Clapton could play any instrument in the
world BB King could play any instrument
in the world and you would know it’s
Eric Clapton and BB King tone is the
reason that they’re rock stars and I’m a
congressman tone to me is a
sound that pleases
me
don’t ask me what it
is all the things that affect tone are
the wood the placement of the pickups
the bridge type of bridge the string
gauge the height of the pickup to the
string the three things that you know I
think tone is is the guitar the amp and
your
fingers if you have 10 fingers then
that’s you know 12 things how strong the
magnets are the type of coil that’s in a
pickup how many turns the pitch how many
layers per uh turn that are put on it
how many turns per
layer tone is the only part of music
that makes sense in the entire
[Music]
universe oh come on and then you have
the combination of potentiometers the
value of potentiometers the neck the
Frets the fingerboard tone for me is a a
pleasurable sound it’s
color has to be warm a brightness in
there as
well uh how strong the joints are
between the neck and the body uh the
placement of the tail piece either if
it’s a floating tremolo or if it’s a
solid Bridge tone is how you imagine you
will
[Music]
sound what you hear what you’re looking
for in in a
sound but you’re searching for it you’re
trying to please your own
ear actually in the end what you play
you know I mean what notes you choose to
play is all about tone as well the the
Finish is very important too cler finish
will make your would sound softer than a
polyester finish which will like
brighten it up and sometimes muffle the
sound of an actual guitar what it really
comes down to is is your body and how it
re reacts to the guitar you play it’s
really the flashh on the wood and
strings and some electricity running
through
it each instrument is going to give you
a different tone but the person playing
it is going to put a tone into that
instrument that’s going to come out to
the
amplifier toe is your signature of what
you feel what comes out of your of your
[Music]
[Applause]
belly I think tone is basically what you
feel in your soul It’s a combination of
what you hear in your head that comes
through your spirit and it’s transmitted
through your
[Music]
hands it’s their mood it’s their their
their profile it’s their uh upbringing
it’s their their whole Karma their whole
aura about how they live their life the
thing about it is is the thing that you
seek and you hope that hope that you can
one day have is your own voice an
identifiable voice when somebody turns
on your record and goes oh that’s
him the best form of expression that I’m
that I’m capable
of that person that goes out and does
the the hour and a half gig for that
hour and a half that’s who I am more
than any at any other
[Music]
[Applause]
[Music]
time are you ready to
rock tonight we got 13 real special
bands for you they work damn hard all
week long to perform
tonight
[Music]
get the fire
help set my soul fire get the Fire
H
wo get the
[Music]
fire
[Music]
[Applause]
[Music]
[Applause]
I just told these guys let’s have fun
and kick ass it it feels incredible what
a rush I can totally understand why
people get addicted
so how’s it going to feel going back to
real life
tomorrow it’s going to suck I I
definitely feel more like a rockstar I
mean it’s about being on stage that’s
what the the culmination of this whole
week is about that’s what everything is
about nothing feels better than this
nothing I I think when you strap on the
guitar You Can Do
[Music]
Magic
[Music]
I’m going to do this till I die
[Music]
folks why do people love the guitar
they’re beautiful they let you express
your deepest emotions they make you look
cool they could be a ticket to somewhere
you want to go and they’ve changed the
world but for me I just love to
play got to find some tone on my
[Music]
own
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he
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yeah
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he
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he
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he
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all
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oh
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the electric guitar is like an artist’s
brush or a sculptor’s clay it’s an
expression of human beings desire to
reach out with their senses it expands
our sense of hearing sight touch even
taste that is if you play with your
teeth hey I’m Kevin bacon like a lot of
you I love guitars if you’re a player
you already know what I’m talking about
the way they look the way the strings
feel under your fingers it’s almost as
if they’re
alive you learn how to play the
instrument then the instrument plays
you when you’re really in the zone it’s
like God is playing you know you’re just
the
conduit so where does this passion come
from and the power why normal rational
people mortgage their homes to afford a
particular vintage Les Paul or a
Stratocaster why would a middle-aged guy
in Royal New Hampshire Vault more than
2,000 of them in his barn and why do
players make those strange contorted
ecstatic orgasmic faces when playing
solos this is the story of the electric
guitar from the invention in the 1930s
to its golden years right through the
digital guitars of the future we’re
going to meet all kinds of people people
from rock stars and teenage virtuosos to
congressmen CEOs in an attempt to
understand their emotional connection to
their guitars the electric guitar is
Magic it goes beyond cultures it goes
beyond words it goes beyond language it
is a pulsing rhythmic connection to the
essential forces of the universe see
what they all have in common is their
passion for the instrument and a quest
to find their own personal tone you go
through this this long NeverEnding
journey and you also have the aid of the
whole commercial aspect of the guitar
business to help you along so that you
can work your ass off to spend all your
money trying to [ __ ] find the end of
this
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Quest
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United States guitar Market looking at
about $ 7.82 billion and $17 billion
worldwide every shape size color texture
design that you can find you know you’ll
find here at the halls of the N show it
really is a amazing
instrument
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the Guitar Center in Hollywood rocks day
and night you can buy just about any new
guitar but way back in the Vintage Room
a room that used to be the Groucho Marx
theater the burst Brothers reain Drew
Berlin and Dave Belzer are two of the
world’s top experts on vintage guitars
and the Vintage Room contains most of
them how did it all begin this is called
a Rick and Backer frying pan it’s
probably the first electric guitar type
instrument made in 1932 came out solid
solid body that’s for sure with a pickup
it’s a piece of metal metal body metal
one piece body neck type of thing um
it’s got the Rick and Backer pickup in
it which sounds
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pretty sounds pretty cool for the most
part the the guitar player was kind of
like next to the high hat you know his
job
was playing Rhythm Parts very little
lead because you couldn’t hear them as
soon as somebody put a pickup on the
guitar the guitar all of a sudden could
speak it went from being a background
instrument and became a solo instrument
and Charlie Christian was the first
person to do this Benny Goodman had a
black guy one of the first black guys
that was in a White Band
called Charlie Kristen and boy did I
like that this pickup is the first
pickup that was used on an electric
guitar apart from the Rick and Backa
frying pan Charlie Christian was playing
one of these in 1936 and this is the
pickup that made the sound
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possible Swedish music Side of Heaven to
me was that electric
guitar I wanted to be a preacher and
play guitar part of the popularity of
the guitar is I’m sure with three
chords um you can pretty much play 90%
of all the songs You Ever Had to
play you can make a whole career of that
three chords then you plug it into a
guitar amplifier where your voice is the
loudest voice in a room of either 150
500 5,000
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50,000 it’s an interesting Dynamic
begins to
happen once you can jack up the volume
and you can be heard
across in the next County it gives you a
lot of
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power
the technology of being able to you know
plug into plug into the lightning in the
sky you know and feel the fury of it I
mean there’s there’s still nothing
better than standing in front a [ __ ]
stack man and hitting a cord and having
it like move you you know you just you
can you can feel it hit you in the back
man there’s nothing like that it’s an
instrument that uh will always
win because you can always Crank It
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Up
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Rock and Roll Fantasy Camp is a chance
for anyone to be a rock star for a week
musicians of all ages and abilities sign
up for a one-week program where campers
ReDiscover their passion for music and
the guitar the audition bands are formed
Each of which has a rock star teacher
play then they have five days to learn
the material and perfect their
performance in the process they form a
team on the fifth and final day the
Bands travel to Hollywood’s House of
Blues where they compete in a battle of
bands in front of the public and their
families no pressure there but today is
day one when the campers arrive get to
know each other and audition for the
counselors who assigned them to BS I
think George Thor good said a best in
this room he said if anyone born after
1950 ever said that they didn’t want to
be a rock star they’re lying
J I wanted to be a rock star I went to
business instead but I had it in me and
that’s why I’m here this week I’m a
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rockar
all it’s fun as hell my name is Greg
Burns I’m from Atlanta Georgia and I’m a
professor of Neuroscience I kind of got
to the point in my career where you know
I had put the guitar away for many years
since high school and then the guitar
sitting there in the corner it called to
me and I picked it up again it brought
back a lot of great
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memories you take normal people that
play in their basement love the music
love the instruments and they come here
and they get to play with people that
have been through this like Jeff Baxter
you know I play dubie Brothers song I
play China Grove probably a couple times
a week Paul Stanley to get a chance to
see him growing up listening to kiss
Dicky bats without a
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question it’s rock and roll this week is
what it’s all about I mean I like the
noise and the power of rock and roll I
like the out of control but I like the
ugliness of it and I like the beauty of
it you know and I get that all from a
guitar you
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know to me you pick up a guitar and
whatever’s on your mind that you want to
get out there you can do it through
guitar the guitar sort of for me becomes
an extension of my voice it’ll say the
things for me that I don’t know how to
say sometimes I can be as aggressive I
can do whatever all the things I can’t
do verbally I can express on the guitar
whether they get it or not you
know while filming Les Paul in New York
there was word on the street about a
teenage girl from Long Island who was
incredibly gifted we caught up with her
at Pi studios in Glen Cove New York
Christen capalino has truly found her
voice through her guitar a Gibson Flying
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V when I was little I had a hard time
expressing myself like I I went through
some difficult times when I was young so
I felt like that was the best way to
express like my sadness mostly but at
the same time to express my happiness
through
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playing I love it like an electric
guitar you can really just feel it you
can really place your emotion
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into
when I play I Feel Like it Like releases
all my
pain through another world I can take
you
somewhere it’s like a
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Euphoria when people hear the name Les
Paul they typically think of a guitar
but Les is also a man he was one of the
greatest players of all
time but less may be more famous for his
contribution as an inventor some call
him the father of the solid body
electric guitar and multitrack recording
and it all started cuz he wanted to be
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heard I got a job on a Saturday night
one of my first jobs to play for the
cars that came in the big one’s barbecue
St
a fell drove up in a rumble seat and he
wrote a note to the car hop saying red
your guitar is not loud
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enough so I tried to take the pickup
from a photograph and Jab the needle in
the top of the guitar then I got
feedback so I decided I’m going to go
with a piece of railroad track and so I
placed a string on the piece of railroad
track I plucked the guitar and when I
heard this piece of railroad track sound
like something from another planet and I
saids oh my goodness how wonderful that
sounds and mother says wait a minute the
day you see a cowboy on a
horse playing with a railroad truck so I
said it’s got to be a piece of wood well
I started with a 4×4 and I thought
everybody fall over so I put sides on it
and I have another side here and this is
what the sides look like and these sides
just plug onto here and you screw them
on then you go on your job and you play
and so we call this the log and because
of the
log uh the solid body came
about
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I can’t imagine my life without a guitar
in
it and what it brings to me which is a
rock band and a life of Art and
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music
once you get into the guitar it becomes
part of your identity meet Shawn
Castello from Atlanta Shawn plays a Les
Paul a recreation of the 1956 Goldtop
model we filmed him at The Viper Room on
the Sunset Strip oh it’s changed my life
in every way I mean it’s become sort of
my identity in some ways like because I
started playing so young and became
successful I was a shy kid very very shy
not a good athlete not really great with
the ladies at first you know so it
really helped me in in every way just
establish confidence in myself I mean I
can’t imagine what my life would be like
without
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it
I don’t even know where the guitar
player ends and where I actually begin
you know I think it’s kind of I’m one
and the same at this point I’d say the
guitar saved my life it’s taken me a lot
of places that I never would have gone
they made me an honorary
Professor this would never have happened
if I didn’t play
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guitar
when I finally did get all six strings
and I learned like my first sort of
pentatonic lick I I felt like I had
arrived I mean I touched on something
that changed me
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forever in
1949 Along came a man called Leo Fender
who has changed the face of the electric
guitar forever
more Leo Fender despite not being a
player was an exceptional engineer and a
great listener Fender Telecaster was the
first successful solid body electric
guitar debuted in
1949 took a while to catch on but it
definitely
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did
there’s something very Americana about
an electric guitar I mean especially a
solid bodying guitar because it is
manufactured pretty much in the same way
as an automobile is Leo Fender had this
idea that you didn’t need to have a neck
that was actually glued onto the body
this was the great Innovation was called
the plank this guitar can be taken apart
and put back together in minutes you
unbolt these four bolts and that comes
off off you unscrew these two screws the
control cavity comes off 1949 everybody
thought it was a joke but Leo Fender had
the last off Leo had a we took one of
those first broadcasters one night went
into Los Angeles to a place called
Riverside Ranch Leo Fender and George uh
basically had this guitar that they
could not sell nobody was buying it
because they weren’t familiar with a
solid body guitar it’s never been done
before so they were kind of looking for
somebody to to play this thing there was
a young fellow came in a good-looking
young guy and came over where we were
standing and he saw our guitar sitting
there and he want know what kind of
guitar it was and said well it’s it’s
something new we’ve been working on and
he said could I see it and I said
certainly that’s why we brought it and
he said well can I play it never in my
life have I ever heard like these two
Fells are individually you put them
together and boy you got the very best
here we go with Jimmy Bryant Speedy West
and flying high
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he played at least two hours on that
guitar that night and everybody just
loved they never went back to dancing
the band didn’t go back to playing I
just listen to this young man play that
was a fabulous Jimmy Bryant the first
commercially successful solid body
guitars were definitely fenders and
we’re talking about something that
really really caught on quickly I mean
you can play a fender as loud as you
want I think that’s really one of the
reasons fenders were so popular in the
early 50s the Telecaster really got it
going you know and it just had this
Sonic
specialty that is unequaled some real
Hot Licks were played on this
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guitar
it’s a great
guitar I mean when you can really dig
into it and it still keeps the clarity
and
uh and you know you pick up new guitars
and they don’t they just don’t sound
like that to me when I was growing up I
loved Keith Richards and I loved country
music and things like that and uh they
always played telecasters and I always
wanted a Telecaster like Keith Richards
he had a a blonde Telecaster with a
beautiful
blacku I finally got a Telecaster like
when I was probably around 13 or
so I think the guitar really kind of
chose
me you know I just play all the time I
think that’s what keeps me kind of
sane you know I have terrible anxiety
and things like that so I just play just
keep my mind off
things and when I don’t you know I just
get real mean and stuff like
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that it’s made my life wonderful and I’m
making a living playing guitar which I
would do it for free anyways but you
know don’t tell my bosses
that
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but also it can ruin a lot of lives as
well just like you know alcohol or drugs
or anything like that because I play so
much when you pick your guitar over your
you know wife it’s not always the best
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thing
was that cool you can definitely be
addicted to the guitar because when I
went on my honeymoon not only did I take
my guitar but I took my guitar tech too
so at least he gave me a towel when I
needed
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one at first Gibson laughed at the
Telecaster after years of making finely
crafted archtop instruments this BL
concept looked like Amateur hour to them
till people started to play it and buy
it and suddenly Gibson needed to compete
in this new area so they called on our
old friend Les Paul the guitars they
created together are some of the finest
ever made the introduction of the Les
Paul began a 50-year sales war between
Fender and Gibson that continues
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today
as time went on and we made it more
lovable
beautiful until it was a bartender a
mistress a housewife it was everything
that you could think of and that was
something that you could love and it
would do what you tell them to do
sometimes Les Paul came up with this
absolute Masterpiece it’s called lespol
standard go toop this is the the very
very first Gibson solid body guitar this
guitar has a switch so the base pickup
just this pickup sounds like
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this in the middle both pickups sound
like
this the bridge lead
pickup
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you notice I have this guitar all the
way up volume wise and it’s not making a
lot of noise where this guitar if I turn
it
up and that’s the difference between the
single coil and the humbucker well I’m
sort of a less Paul girl I’ve always
liked that more of a grow dirty fat
Powerhouse kind of
sound
maybe it’s an overcompensation on my
part you know from being a a girl or
something when I play the guitar it
takes me to an amazing place where time
disappears you could be anywhere you
could be any age you could be almost
anyone it’s beyond your own self it’s
out of body
I love my
guitar nothing says rock and roll and
sex like a low strung lwh hung electric
guitar it’s hard to hug a
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Steinway it’s a sort of romantic thing
isn’t
it when you hold something close and you
get beautiful sounds to come out of it I
I think the electric guitar I mean
there’s no doubt that there’s a shape
that is a symbol of something sexy I I
got to say that but I’m not saying I
picked up a Guitar just cuz I was horny
here a perfect
illustration here we have a
vase put a neck on this thing what does
it remind you of it’s got great curves
the knobs are fun to twiddle with it’s
really soft on the line and it totally
ties into the art of the female body and
I just think it’s a romantic instrument
you know you touch it it’s just feel the
wood the strings that vibrates against
your body none of the other instruments
are are instruments that you hold to
your chest to your heart musicians
feel a tremendous relationship with
their instruments sometimes maybe to the
point of an
attraction this guitar is very
special I play it and it’s like making
love to it I’ve never told anybody
this I literally play this guitar and I
will start
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drooling I don’t know what it is but the
first time I touched it I felt something
through it it’s connected me to
it it’s very hard to explain but it’s
love you fall in love suddenly you don’t
know it just hits
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know now a serious competition from
Gibson’s Les Paul it was time for Fender
to respond and take it to the next level
the Stratocaster was so modern was so
radical looked out of place in the band
stands in the 1950s but rock and roll
changed all that and many legendary
musicians quickly adopted Str it’s no
coincidence that Defender Stratocaster
and rock were born at exactly the same
point in history the guitar that did it
for most people in England was uh Buddy
Holly stratas just seeing it on the
cover of that chirping crickets record
it just looked fantastic they had a
magic about them you know you see these
pictures of Americans playing these
great guitars you know this is a
Stratocaster
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it was a spaceship compared to anything
that had appeared at that time this is
the sexiest most curvaceous instrument
that’s ever come on this planet this is
sex with strings on it it just was a
guitar that seemed to be a huge leap
tonally the Stratocaster by adding the
third pickup really added to the tonal
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Spectrum this a front pickup a little
more mower middle pickup is a little
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brighter little raspier sound and then a
brighter sound in the back
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pickup this is very similar to a very
famous guitar called Blacky
that was sold by Eric Clapton a while
ago for nearly a million dollars now an
interesting thing about the Stratocaster
which is a big part of Eric Clapton’s
sound is he would do a little trick
which was actually putting the
switch right in between these two
pickups and you get a little out of
phase
sound
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which was the sound of you know Lay Down
Sally and you know slow hand the Slow
Hand album or starting even
with you know when he hooked up with
Delany and Bonnie and dererk and The
Dominoes is really where he went from
Gibs into a
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strat it was just my guitar always I
tried all kinds of guitars and I always
come back to Strat that’s the the only
guitar that inspires
me I had this Fascination since I was a
kid maybe because it was forbidden for
me to touch
it my dad was really influenced by
American blues music and American sound
and he had a lot of jam sessions back
home in Serbia and I grew up listening
to this kind of music since I was 2 or 3
years
old and I just wanted to play Blues I
just I just really wanted to go into
electric stuff I was really
trying hard to sound like Hing wolf when
I was 13 that was a bad
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idea a guitar is the way that our souls
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[Applause]
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speak
and I think maybe the best comment that
I ever got from my audience was when
they come to see me they all come home
thinking that playing guitar is the best
and that we should all become guitar
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players wow thing whenever I listen to
Gary play the guitar I always have a
glass of
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wine the house just kind of
shakes uh no one has complained uh that
I know of at least nobody tells them to
be quiet except if our kids are at home
my wife and daughters aren’t real
impressed with my uh guitar playing
skills and the girls would go Dad you
turn it down this is embarrassing you
know it’s not about them it’s about me
when we’re playing guitar to be CEO for
a company like Southwest Airlines is
terrific enjoy your flight but the
airline industry is tough and our assets
light 35,000 ft 500 M hour so it’s just
not for the faint
apart and it’s also a a 7 day a week
business uh which often translates into
near 24 hours a day so I have a lot of
outside interest and I’m just starved
for time so I like to play guitar
obviously it’s just a way to relax and a
way to take my mind off other things and
even you know if it’s just for few
minutes it’s still great just a great
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[Applause]
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joy I grew up with a condition called
scoliosis so I was in a bat cast for 14
months when I was a kid and a back brace
for 2 years which is when I started to
learn to play
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guitar
you don’t really get a lot of dates when
you get a full body cast on you try but
you really don’t get them so you know it
was really the guitar was around all the
time and ended up being like my best
friend I mean it’s the longest
relationship that I have on Earth is
with my guitar other than my mother and
father I’ve been in situations in my
life or I feel like I’ve been through a
lot
where you know the only thing I had was
the guitar the only thing that that I
could count on was the guitar it’s got
me out of a lot of trouble is what it’s
done I went from an anonymous dork to
like somebody who was kind of cool and
uh changed my whole life cuz I was kind
of a nerdy kid you know never uh the
most popular in school or anything like
that until I started playing the
guitar I used to go over to my buddy’s
house and his brother had a guitar and
you know just a crummy nylon string
guitar but I picked that up and somehow
I really felt something there I I knew I
could play that
thing when I first started playing
guitar I was playing flamco guitar you
know I never really thought about
playing electric guitar until I went to
see Chuck Barry play one
time he was like the devil with his
guitar and just the way he looked at you
it was like the devil with his Pitchfork
you know I just knew I had to get one of
those red
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guitar
I think my style is combination of being
in the doors and trying not to sound
like anybody
else I kind of had to play bass Rhythm
lead all those things at once you know
so it made me play a certain way and I
really hadn’t played electric guitar for
more than 3 or 4 months you know when I
got in the
doors at one point Jim was writing
everything and we didn’t really have
enough songs you know so Jim says hey
why don’t you guys try and write some
too you know so I went home and the next
day I wrote F my
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fire playing the guitar is it’s I guess
it’s like an escape for me just the way
those strings feel you know it just
makes me feel a certain way makes me
feel good let me put it that way and the
more you play the better you
feel
it’s like a drug it’s just like a drug
only it’s
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legal Gibson’s es series was the
brainchild of Ted mccardy Gibson’s
president in the 50s and 60s was first
produced in 1958 was a breakthrough
design because it has a solid Maple
block inside the es has the attributes
of a solid body like less feedback but
its resonance Chambers give it the chime
of a hollow body instrument
it’s a great all-around guitar that is
played and copied by just about
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everyone very fundamental two pickups
and you can get a nice rock and roll
sound out of it too without feeding
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back
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so it’s it’s it’s got the chimin of the
pickups it’s got the brightness of the
neck and it just looks
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spectacular BB historically played an ES
355 but more recently developed his own
version of Lucille B’s variation has no
Foles to further reduce feedback along
with other
modifications can’t take credit for it I
may have helped to improve it a
little I didn’t create it anyone that
bends a note on the guitar and holds it
and anyone that shakes a note like that
is getting it from BB King whether they
know it or not I Trill my hand like this
if you can see just like that that’s all
I do but I’ve learned to do it well
enough so it moves the string a
little to me the guitar is the most
expressive instrument because you can
bend those strings in you get in between
the
notes the guitar to me is the instrument
of
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infinity it’s the instrument of your
soul it goes through your heart through
your mind through your genitals to
what’s in your core in the
middle in an organ a piano you’ve got
notes you have to hit but on a guitar
you can play The Infinity between the
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notes playing slight on a guitar is like
what life is about I mean it’s not where
you are but it’s about how you get
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there without question the most
collectible guitar in the world is the
1959 lespa it’s considered the Holy
Grail of electrics the 59s are super
rare and super expensive at Pi Studios
Kristen calino had a life-changing
opportunity to play a 1959 Les Paul
Standard and to further Elevate The
Experience she played it through a
marshall amp that Jimmy Hendricks used
to record many of his
[Music]
Classics Gibson in the late 50s reached
a p of
craftsmanship and materials that just
came together where they made a guitar
that you know the best players in the
world desire the Strat of varas of
electric guitars the Les Paul flametop
this particular type of guitar has
always been the Pinnacle of collectible
guitars in my opinion this guitar has a
lot of book match flame which makes it
very
desirable these are played by all the
great art artists everybody from Joe
Walsh to Jimmy Page Jeff Beck everybody
even Clapton played one of these at one
time they’re fantastic
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guitars Les Paul sunber guitar it’s one
of the greatest rock and roll guitars
ever made and I’ve enjoyed uh playing
one for years and
[Music]
years and when the Butterfield band went
to Europe in ‘ 66 I noticed that Peter
Green was playing a uh red Paul like
this Clon was playing one and I wondered
to myself how did they know that this
guitar had all the inherent qualities of
sustained volume and tone that was just
better than any other possible uh rock
and roll guitar at that
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time there’s probably 20 25 important
things that affect the sound of a guitar
pickup there’s so many variables in the
shape how it produces the magnetic field
around the string area that’s what
generates the current that you hear that
goes into the amplifier I was very lucky
to have you know studied ham radio and
stuff like that to understand what it’s
all about you know I mean I can hear it
but what is it that I’m hearing you know
and I want to be able to produce it and
understand that if I use this many terms
or this kind of winding p how close each
wire is together there’s hundreds and
hundreds of wiring combinations and I’ve
done so many of them that I I can I can
I can really hear the
difference Seymour Duncan originally
started rewinding pickups for guitar
players when he was in London England
and this probably would have been the
mid-60s I’m going to guess and so I
think he just became obsessed with with
helping people achieve better guitar
tone having Seymour Duncan pickups in
your guitar you’re putting something in
your in your guitar that basically goes
back to the beginning of rock and roll
he you know worked with Hendrick he
worked you know with Jeff Beck of course
uh Jimmy Paige so all these great
players he helped them achieve the
sounds they were going
for
s has an uncanny ability to be able to
translate someone describing what they
want in sound in words like warm
sounding or bright or tight there’s a
lot of terms that are used to describe a
pickup to get get to the science you
have to have the magic or the the
mindset to understand where you’re
coming from so finding a pickup that has
a tone that’s to your liking that is so
important this just a very important
part of playing it’s very important to
what you hear and it’s a tone that you
produce that makes other people
appreciate what you’re doing
[Music]
too down through the history of
man items have been symbols connected to
people and events that either have
magical powers or have some significance
the electric guitar was a magic carpet
that propelled the Youth of America to
another place in another time the bolt
of lightning struck us when we saw the
Beatles on The Ed Sullivan Show Actually
All My Loving from the Beatles that’s
the first rock song pop song I ever
heard and I was sold and I immediately
decided I want an electric guitar the
reason why I started playing the guitar
was because of the Beatles I mean like
anybody my age you know that moment when
they on The Ed Sullivan Show in 1964
changed everybody life they hooked me I
actually started playing acoustic guitar
I started playing folk guitar and uh
graduated after a while to uh electric
[Music]
guitar lots of politicians play electric
guitar John KY Mike Huckaby Tony Blair
the late Tony snow and our friend
Congressman Paul hods of New
Hampshire I’m sort of a basic Rock and
roller you know if it’s got a couple of
chords and I can play a pentatonic scale
I’m a happy
[Music]
guy there’s a powerful
current that I feel flowing through me
when I play the guitar it comes from up
there and it goes through me and it is a
very powerful
thing how else can you make so much
louder noise have so much fun and have
it be Artful if you’re good at
[Music]
it at fantasy camp we discovered another
teenage virtuosa named Jared stamy from
North Carolina Jared’s already a pro
musician at the age of 16 why is
powerfully obvious when he
[Music]
plays I was hooked on guitar on my 13th
birthday day which is the day I started
playing Dad pulled me into our computer
room and said listen to this and he
started playing the ocean by lead
Zeppelin and the second I heard that
song I I knew right then and there what
I had to
do
I got to have music in my future if I
don’t I won’t be
[Music]
happy the electric guitar has made some
pretty bold statements since its
Inception this is your gun but it is a
gun for peace this is the instrument of
the individual as soon as you held your
guitar you were sending a strong message
to the system I
believe that during the 60s and 70s when
rock and roll
began we musicians entertainers was a
able to bring more people together than
the politicians Indian why we hungarians
poles Czechs and Russians brought down
the Communist system is because of rock
and roll and blue jeans this is the way
you get the freedom right
here
now as a symbol I would say the guitar
is very
powerful when somebody holds up an AK-47
you know exactly what that
means when somebody holds up an electric
guitar there is no question in your mind
what that
[Music]
means this means
freedom This Means War
killing freedom to express exess freedom
to communicate your deepest and
innermost feelings from your soul to
your fellow human
beings in a world where people are
afraid of free
will this machine is unknown and
frightening in the right hands the
guitar can change the
world my love for guitars started in
Bangladesh it started with four of us
friends you know listening to Iron
Maiden when we were like uh 15 we
started this band rock music and being
in a Muslim country it’s not really
accepted so you have to hide and do
stuff we did an album in a
year it was being played
everywhere you see kids jamming to it
and stuff and you go oh my God that’s
us nobody knew what we look like we
didn’t put any pictures on the album
just to be
safe so we do a
concert curtain drops 35,000 people
cheering for
[Music]
us and then it got really
[Music]
weird it’s a Muslim country
and not certain people didn’t like
that we couldn’t play certain venues
anymore we can do certain things anymore
have to be very careful walking down the
streets and we have
[Music]
families but the biggest thing of all
music guitar is now I hope hold it and I
see it was hope because little kids will
look at you they’ll write to you they’ll
find you and they will tell you you did
it you went there and you know you know
I want to be there I can do it
too I can speak through that and tell
the whole
world that I exist and I have this
beautiful thing in me you know I can
express
[Music]
myself
this is what inspiration does you know
those all those kids are inspired by
[Music]
us Walter this is one that was just
brought in that came in while I was at
lunch with the instruments I can’t truly
tell you what things are going to be
worth that’s in spite of the fact that I
appraise guitars daily the guitar
described below is in our opinion of
Gibson Les Paul Goldtop model made early
in the year 1957 description serial
number 7 space
0232 the peg head has been cracked
lengthwise it matters very much on
condition whether it’s been monkeyed
with or not no this is one that uh if it
hadn’t been messed over here it be at
least least an $80,000 guitar current
market
value after repair of the peg head
$50,000 if you look at the 1959 guitar
one of the reasons it’s worth a lot of
money is because we sold all of 300 on a
global basis and let me tell you that
was not a big number for Gibson by 1960
Gibson decided to cease production of
the Les Paul and that’s when people like
Eric Clapton and Mike Bloomfield
discovered them more accurately Clapton
saw Freddy King playing a gold toop and
wanted a similar Vibe so almost
immediately demand exceeded the supply
and vintage Les Paul started getting
valuable they didn’t want the new
Gibsons they wanted those old ones and
the sound was as different as night and
[Music]
[Applause]
[Music]
day I got this guitar probably early uh
67 once I had enough money to start
buying guitars I think I paid
$400 to a friend named Rocky for this
guitar I don’t know where he got
[Music]
it there was a period in the 60s where
while the young kid was running up and
down the street to get a l ball Gibson
was was at the same time selling off all
their equipment and thinking that the
phase is over that it was going to go to
synthesiz
[Music]
it they were going to discard the
electric guitar after the demise of the
Les Paul in 1960 the Strat and the Telly
soldiered on and rode a wave of
enthusiasm during the early Beatles era
but in the mid 1960s newer guitars like
Defender Jazzmaster and jaguar began to
steal the older guitars Thunder
especially with the surf crowd in 1967
vendor was ready to cease production of
the Stratocaster then one man
single-handedly saved the Strat and
maybe the electric
[Music]
guitar
I first drank the Kool-Aid when I saw
Jimmy Hendricks at the Framingham
Carousel in
1968 that just blew my mind I knew at
that point in time all I wanted was
Fender Stratocaster the Stratocaster is
today an icon it’s the most Prof popular
guitar on the planet with almost 100
models to choose from not counting the
ripoffs it’s so ingrained in our culture
that it inspired a roller coaster Disney
World in
[Music]
Florida I’m definitely a guitar addict
you
know I’ve just been a guitar player for
the last 42 years
and I pretty much played the guitar
every single day you know I can count
the days I don’t play the guitar in a in
the course of a year I can count the
days on one
[Music]
[Music]
hand I’m so passionate about playing and
I I want to express that passion and my
own personal joy and exhilaration
through the
guitar because I think I find my Center
as a person when I’m
[Music]
playing cuz it’s really the only thing I
can do I can
barbecue but I can play guitar better
than I
barbecue a number of factors combined to
create the vintage guitar Market one was
a scarcity of the early models like the
Les Paul and the Flying V in the es
series even the early strats the other
was the fact that both Gibson and Fender
were bought by giant corporations Fender
by Massive CBS and Gibson by an
Ecuadorian cement company to begin
around 1966 or so the guitars began to
suffer from reduced quality and inferior
Sound by the early ‘ 7s most were junk
compared to what had come before the
musicians began to realize the new
guitars just didn’t feel or sound right
the corporate Bean counters had done
their jobs too well guitars back then
were made by the people for the people
you know then it got into I think a
monetary thing where they had to make
more of them and less time so they start
automating more and a lot of the steps
the final little sanding here or this
over here or um I think a lot of that
the Personal Touch got lost been playing
ales Paul for a pretty long time in the
first electric guitar that I ever got
was Les Paul but that one was such a
piece piece of [ __ ] that after about a
year I remember I stuck it neck first
through a wall things got so bad by the
mid 80s that Gibson was weeks away from
shutting its doors and then Henry
juskowitz and his Partners acquired
Gibson in a last minute attempt to save
the company they used technology and
perfectionism to revive the brand
gradually the new instruments improved
in quality but are they really as good
as the old ones I was
nonplused by the fact that our employees
didn’t think the guitars were any good
many of them were playing
fenders and I said man that’s just not
right I took a guitar and I smashed it
in the ground I said every guitar that
has Gibson on it that’s not right is
going to be
destroyed and you know what the guitar
started getting a lot better and the
employees started playing Gibson
prod
in hindsight it looks like all Gibson
had to do was look on the stages of of
rock and roll and they can see
everybody’s playing a l
ball if you look at the electric guitar
in principle the first ones are exactly
as they are today the Telecaster the
Stratocaster the Les Paul they just got
it right it’s completely
Timeless both Gibson and Fender are
copying very very closely what they made
in the 50s and early
60s since maybe 94 when Gibson dissected
a real burst from the ‘ 50s they made
the correct neck joint and the reissue
flame tops that they make are
particularly good instruments that you
can buy
new what we have been doing is exactly
what the cazo factory had done back in
the ‘ 50s of course they didn’t didn’t
have $100,000 numerical control machines
to add to the process but we have that
opportunity it’s beyond just being like
the old one it is a much better guitar
today the old ones don’t all sound the
same the pickup windings are different
from pickup to pickup when Seth lover
who invented the humbucking pickup was
asked how many turns of wire he put on
it so we just ran them until they were
full it is
mindboggling that these relatively
inexpensive components of the 50s
combined with inexpensive labor often
enough women who didn’t know how to play
a single chord on a guitar winding the
pickups were producing results that
today physicists study to try to figure
out and that’s part of the the Mystique
of the old ones but as far as recreating
the sound
uh you can come close enough I think
that in a blindfold test um you couldn’t
[Music]
tell this is a 1954 Les Paul with P90
pickups a wraparound
bridge and uh this is their their their
version nowadays of basically the same
[Music]
Guitar let’s listen to the
[Music]
[Applause]
[Music]
difference
it’s so creamy you know you can’t expect
a guitar from 2006 to sound like a
guitar from
1955 we have to look at the Quality and
integrity of things that were made in a
different time people made all these
things by hand and today guitars are
mass-produced they may have made 500 of
these a year back then for 3 years maybe
a little more now it’s 400 a day when
you get into vintage instruments
you’re dealing I think with just
time and who knows what Impressions time
makes on a thing the Vintage versus the
[Laughter]
new there was a time when the guitar was
at the Forefront of the generation gap
but today it can be a bridge between
Generations Johnny started playing with
us sitting in with us when he was 9
years old and actually uh two of our
albums that we got nominated for
instrumental Grammys Johnny was the
guitar player on one of which when he
was
nine it’s a great way to also spend time
together be able to share a common
passion for music and for guitar playing
keep it in the family and and play with
someone you love and respect too so
we’re always hanging out and we’re able
to you know hang out and do things that
we both care about so makes a lot more
fun
he’s a solo
[Laughter]
[Music]
hog it’s been my lifelong dream just to
play with
him he took me out when I was 12 years
old when I just started playing guitar
and I saw a gig I saw Toto play blew he
like just ripped it up the fans going
crazy I was like I want to be that guy I
want to be my dad so uh and I remember
the first time I asked I was like Dad I
want to play guitar he’s like oh yeah
I’m like yeah and he tuned down my low e
to a d and he put my fingered it sound
like a power like have fun left the room
and I just you know Prett much it
started
it’s been a kick for me just to see my
son you know like stand next to him and
play watch him
develop writing songs together and
working in the studios together doing
sessions and whatnot it’s been great fun
he’s my best friend it just happens to
be my
son give Daddy kiss
[Music]
now
you can only have one woman at a time
but you can have more than one of these
things of beauty and and I I fall in
love all the time gas gas gas gas well
we’re talking about gas you know and I
try not to pass it that much but I I do
have it oh I totally have gas I have gas
yes I do I’ve had guitar acquisition
syndrome since I was 16 years old you
just fall in love with something and
have to have it there times I just have
to like I don’t care I’m taking that
home how much okay I don’t care you know
what I mean cost a fortune but God it’s
fun I think I’ve got it fairly under
control I only bought two guitars this
week it’s true well this is my third
Strat that I’ve had I always get the
Sunburst we’ve got guitars in every room
of the house how many wives have said
why do you need so many get well they
all have their own little Vibe I just
love to hold them and play them and
collect them and look at them which is
why I got over 100 guitars I just did a
photo shoot so I have 108 guitars but
they’re not crap now I probably have
about 150 guitars between guitars banjos
mandolins it’s around 2,000 guitars I
don’t think a man ever has enough
guitars I wonder if I keep buying them
I’m going to be living under the freeway
but I’m going to have a really nice
guitar
collection I bought a Gibson Les Paul
sunburst from a guitar player in the Hol
I paid £250 for it and when I sold it
for £500 I thought hey I double my
money I had a 54 black uh Les Paul a guy
I knew said let me borrow it for the
summer I was young was the summer of
love I said sure take the guitar for the
summer man I’ll see you back here in
school he took the guitar and traded it
for a Harley I actually had the
opportunity to buy the most flamy 60
I’ve ever seen this is back in the 70s
the guy wanted $3,000 for it and I said
are you kidding that’s not worth no
$3,000 it’ll never be worth that much
now this one is
$350,000 there are people who paid over
$400,000 for these nowadays the one in
this condition uh you could expect to
pay about a half a million dollars for
possibly more sky the limit could have
had 12 Harley could have had all of the
Harley-Davidson company should have
about
it before I just poo poo the whole idea
we can say that there are people whove
paid over a million dollars for the
right postage stamp or coin and the
postage stamp is no good to put on an
envelope and mail something with it and
the coin is no good to put in a gum
[Music]
machine
hi this is Brian fiser from Firebird
Farm up in New Hampshire we primarily
grow organic blueberries but I’ve been
known to grow a few Firebirds Gibson
Firebirds that is my main reason of
collecting these instruments is that I’d
say half of the instruments that I own
need to be preserved for Generations
Beyond us and I just want to make sure
they get into an area where everyone can
appreciate them this is of course a 1950
8 Flying V here with the original tags
they were a total failure in the market
they produced approximately 70 some they
just were too modernistic so it’s hard
to venture a guess of what a Flying V in
this condition would bring would it be
200,000 or could it be 500 or 700,000
the old guitars do have a certain Mojo
and if you don’t know what it means I I
I can’t help you this guitar here is
what Mojo is all about this is an
original 1958 Flying V that I got from a
blues guy in Cincinnati named Big Ed
Thompson nine times out of 10 if you
pick up an old guitar and it’s been
played by somebody who could really play
you get that sense out of the guitar
there’s a lot of soul put in there from
somebody else who put the time to wear
to wear the paint off right here or have
some some pick pick scratches down here
you know there’s some stories in that
guitar I do like playing my old Tellies
you know it’s it’s just get this feeling
that this you know this guitar is from
the 50s and and uh you know it just has
a Vibe about it because it’s been around
for so long I really believe that
certain guitars have a spirit it’s been
to a thousand gigs it’s had hundreds and
hundreds of hours of playing on it think
of all the people who have who have been
entertained by this thing and who have
put those Good Vibes back you know it
may sound silly I don’t know if it’s
true or if it’s not true but this guitar
here I have never played play another
Electric Guitar Bar None that sounds
better than this this is the one and it
also has that that
oozing unmistakable Mojo that the old
guitars
[Applause]
have when the guitar markets start
getting so crazy where Les Pauls are
$500,000 you know stratocasters were 10
15 20 25,000
all during the like 60s and 70s and8
people would change stuff out and put in
other hot rodded stuff that maybe would
have made it sounded different or but it
didn’t have the look of the old
instrument that was retaining so much in
value so I said you know I got to do
something about that and that’s when I
came up with the Antiquities and
Antiquity is the art of making something
or quality that is old so for me that
was important to do so that all of a
sudden became just a great hit and we do
a lot of custom things to them so
they’re all different you’re getting a
pickup like how it was manufactured 50
60 years ago I started with the
Antiquities and then Fender came out
with the relics and then Gibson came out
with the historics but we were we
started all that aging
thing since not everyone can afford a
vintage guitar and there only so many to
go around the manufacturers have created
new guitars that are aged or relied
versions of famous axes this is an exact
replica of Stevie Rayvon ‘s number one
guitar and at the time of his death this
is the way that guitar looked they
measured this guitar in every respect
and made 100 exact replicas of Stevie’s
guitar relics are also very collectible
since such a limited amount are produced
they’re great Investments so when it
comes to relicing say Stevie Ray vones
Lenny Stratocaster every Nick and ding
every discoloration and even the
cigarette R Burns and decals are
precisely replicated it allows the
consumer to actually partner with the
artist and own exactly what he’s had
that’s cool it’s a good thing you know
it’s a historical artifact that’s very
important to the world and now you’re in
this improbable position of documenting
it something that means so much to
people then you’re going inside of that
it’s a heavy
[Music]
experience
the beauty of this guitar I’ve actually
played it you know the technicians at
Fender that made these guitars said we
want people to play him we want people
to be able to
feel the same thing Stevie
[Music]
felt what is a digital guitar does it
play the same way as a traditional
analog guitar how does it feel and how
can it come so close to sounding like 26
other guitars at the turn of a
dial the veryx guitar first and foremost
is a musical instrument the ability now
to do modeling really is just to take
take us into the next chapter of the
discovery of
tone everything you hear from the varx
comes from the player’s
[Music]
fingers what goes on in varx is we take
those six strings convert them to
digital and effectively Place those
strings on a different
guitar so the
guitar
has regular pickups in it if you want to
hear him
buzz it will the analog part of it has
its own personality and then you have
the fact that all the varc guts inside
can change it to another 26 different
personalities so um you’ve got a manic
depressive on your hands that you’re
playing here’s kind of a less Paul sound
that’s the standard kind of a marshall
amplifier then another one if you want
the basic
Fender there’s kind of that in between
Fender
[Music]
position Rick and Backer 12
string
so it’s just a lot of variety with a
varx You’ got a whole catalog of guitars
so um you can see how this fits in with
my idea because I’m not one guitarist
you know I’m not one sound I’m not one
[Music]
style now I do see VAR accxes of very
definitive
way of being a the tour with just one
guitar but getting every sound I
want then
there’s I mean if you want big obviously
just D it up you know
[Music]
say
is it the future will it replace the
instruments that we all know and love
Les Paul thinks so there seems to be no
alternative at this
time that we’re going to go any other
direction but digital and it won’t be
analog George gruin doesn’t it’s phony
it doesn’t feel the same to the player
and it doesn’t Inspire the player to do
the same thing there’s really no
difference between the
feel
of a modeled instrument versus a real
one even if the audience can’t tell the
tonal difference if the musical ideas
the concepts wouldn’t have even occurred
to the musician if he wouldn’t have
composed that piece otherwise then the
instrument is critically important Leo
Fender got all kinds of criticism for
his plank this crazy piece of wood with
these new fangled pickups on it and
because it was it was just completely
new completely different a guitar is
something that’s a sacred instrument if
you will it’s very important and I would
personally find the idea of a digital
guitar about as interesting as a
photograph of dinner to eat much the
same as going out with a blowup doll of
that looks like a girl it just means
absolutely nothing by its very nature
the electric guitar is Forward Thinking
and Progressive however that exact same
thing that made it so groundbreaking at
the beginning is the same thing that
creates classicists and people that do
not want to change and want to
immediately um sort of hold things in
awe and not be able to sort of progress
this is the time this is the techn
technological age so why stop dreaming
now you know I’m still dreaming I’m
still dreaming that all of this will get
better and better this is all about
musical exploration and that that
Journey should never
end
I believe that each guitar just has
something locked in it that you just
want to get out you know it sort of
dictates how you want to
[Music]
play for some reason a melody or theme
comes to mind inspired by the
[Music]
instrument if I pick up somebody’s
guitar or pick something off the wall
it’s like a weird thing to me it’s like
something new in your hands and I almost
always come up with a new Riff on a new
[Music]
[Applause]
guitar I’ve been my whole life dreaming
of this sound that no one has
heard but I hear my head we’ve all heard
of the surfer’s Endless Quest for the
perfect wave the guitarist lifelong
Quest is to Define his own tone and it’s
just as Elusive and personal so where
does Tone come from is it the guitar or
the fingers the imagination or the soul
10 guitar players line them up they play
the same exact Blues like the same amp
the same guitar you’re going to get 10
different sounds so you’re going to
really find out it’s not a magic guitar
we toured with Van Halen I got to put
that to a test cuz Eddie would come up
and play through my stuff and jam with
us a sound check or I would plug into
his stuff you know he plugs into my app
he sounds like Eddie Van Halen I plug
into his amp I sound like me Eric
Clapton could play any instrument in the
world BB King could play any instrument
in the world and you would know it’s
Eric Clapton and BB King tone is the
reason that they’re rock stars and I’m a
congressman tone to me is a
sound that pleases
me
don’t ask me what it
is all the things that affect tone are
the wood the placement of the pickups
the bridge type of bridge the string
gauge the height of the pickup to the
string the three things that you know I
think tone is is the guitar the amp and
your
fingers if you have 10 fingers then
that’s you know 12 things how strong the
magnets are the type of coil that’s in a
pickup how many turns the pitch how many
layers per uh turn that are put on it
how many turns per
layer tone is the only part of music
that makes sense in the entire
[Music]
universe oh come on and then you have
the combination of potentiometers the
value of potentiometers the neck the
Frets the fingerboard tone for me is a a
pleasurable sound it’s
color has to be warm a brightness in
there as
well uh how strong the joints are
between the neck and the body uh the
placement of the tail piece either if
it’s a floating tremolo or if it’s a
solid Bridge tone is how you imagine you
will
[Music]
sound what you hear what you’re looking
for in in a
sound but you’re searching for it you’re
trying to please your own
ear actually in the end what you play
you know I mean what notes you choose to
play is all about tone as well the the
Finish is very important too cler finish
will make your would sound softer than a
polyester finish which will like
brighten it up and sometimes muffle the
sound of an actual guitar what it really
comes down to is is your body and how it
re reacts to the guitar you play it’s
really the flashh on the wood and
strings and some electricity running
through
it each instrument is going to give you
a different tone but the person playing
it is going to put a tone into that
instrument that’s going to come out to
the
amplifier toe is your signature of what
you feel what comes out of your of your
[Music]
[Applause]
belly I think tone is basically what you
feel in your soul It’s a combination of
what you hear in your head that comes
through your spirit and it’s transmitted
through your
[Music]
hands it’s their mood it’s their their
their profile it’s their uh upbringing
it’s their their whole Karma their whole
aura about how they live their life the
thing about it is is the thing that you
seek and you hope that hope that you can
one day have is your own voice an
identifiable voice when somebody turns
on your record and goes oh that’s
him the best form of expression that I’m
that I’m capable
of that person that goes out and does
the the hour and a half gig for that
hour and a half that’s who I am more
than any at any other
[Music]
[Applause]
[Music]
time are you ready to
rock tonight we got 13 real special
bands for you they work damn hard all
week long to perform
tonight
[Music]
get the fire
help set my soul fire get the Fire
H
wo get the
[Music]
fire
[Music]
[Applause]
[Music]
[Applause]
I just told these guys let’s have fun
and kick ass it it feels incredible what
a rush I can totally understand why
people get addicted
so how’s it going to feel going back to
real life
tomorrow it’s going to suck I I
definitely feel more like a rockstar I
mean it’s about being on stage that’s
what the the culmination of this whole
week is about that’s what everything is
about nothing feels better than this
nothing I I think when you strap on the
guitar You Can Do
[Music]
Magic
[Music]
I’m going to do this till I die
[Music]
folks why do people love the guitar
they’re beautiful they let you express
your deepest emotions they make you look
cool they could be a ticket to somewhere
you want to go and they’ve changed the
world but for me I just love to
play got to find some tone on my
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own
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he
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yeah
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he
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he
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he
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Video Tags: musician,Music,Singers,Singing,Songs,Movies,Films,Official,documentary,free documentary,music documentary,musician documentary,electric guitar documentary,guitar documentary,B.B. King,Slash,Jerry Cantrell,alice in chains,Paul Stanley,kiss,kiss band,gene simmons,ace frehley,peter criss,guns and roses,axl rose,band documentary,rock and roll,rock and roll documentary,les paul,John 5,Nancy Wilson,Skunk Baxter,music history,rock and roll history
Video Duration: 01:27:07
@Norther56
Nice to see someone actually considered interviewing Steve Howe for one of these docs. Glad he agreed. 🙂
@tommoyer4697
Paul stanley???? He should never be allowed to buy a ticket to this show
@johnyblandofoz952
GR8 DOCO… WELL DONE TEAM… PLEASE KEEPEM COMMIN… WE ARE ALL WITH YOU…
@DatMetalBoi75
RIP to all the legends in this doc who aren't with us anymore
@bryandraughn9830
7 years standing in my room facing the ceiling with my eyes closed and some older dudes hire me to play lead guitar.
50 years later I see a roadie tipping over my combo amp to spill a few gallons of rainwater out of the back and i gotta ask myself. "What just happened?"
Im just saying, you gotta draw the line somewhere.
@Keepmelevel
Truth✌️🏽😎 the only thing in my life that never gave me any shit and was always by my side.❤
@SLURPSLURP
24:48–25:33
@randypariseau2373
I was always turned off by the look of a telecaster, which I found odd considering I grew up watching Nashville Now and listening to country from a young age. I always gravitated towards Les Paul's and stratocasters or super strats. Then I played a Godin Telecaster and was blown away. I now crave a butterscotch black guard tele
@beachcomber4141
Very cool documentary. Of course so many other guitarists should have been in this, but the thing would have been 23 hours long. But as a guitar player/lover/geek since 13 years old, this resonated in a ton of ways for me. There is something very magical about an electric guitar.
@user-vb7gd9sj2c
😂give me rhe in your post ooffice
@reptalien_music
Who let Kevin Bonehead on the set?
@arlen1630
If i kept all my guitars i could retire
@BrianOboylemusic
My wife and I got together when I was 15 I played in a little local hard-core van. I guess she figured that out grow up the weird thing is she still likes hard-core music and still goes to show every now and then but how the fuck do you not know to walk into a store close your eyes literally anything and walk out with the perfect gift. It’s mind blowing.!!! Dorothy if you stumble across this somehow someway through Divine Providence this year, I would still like an SG or Les Paul for Christmas. Thank you very much. I will leave milk and cookies.
@briand563
I'm not even close to a good guitar player. Actually, i suck lol but i get the whole gas thing, lol guitars are awesome. I have 5 eletric and 1 acustic, and there are at least 3 more. i have my eye on. Of course, all of mine are cheap guitars. All of them combined probably only cost a fraction of the tax on some of these guitars 😂.
@johneapleseed6876
Who ever edited this hates Gibson. I think all the jokes go over everyones head.
@gushutchinson8758
A guitar is a friend for life.. Not just for Christmas
@gushutchinson8758
When the super rich pay 10's of thousands for guitars they keep locked away they do active guitarists harm.. They remove from circulation some of the best instruments, I personally think guitars like to be played, they grow with the musicians.. I've noticed it, especially with acoustics, they get louder, bolder, sweeter and more defined with daily use.. then of course the less you play that goes into reverse.. So a rich fool pays a million, so what?! that guitar will tend to grow colder and probably depressed.
So some of the greatest guitars are doomed to wither in cases, in rows., life without the possibility of parole.
I don't know enough about what full-time guitarists are shelling out,, on average.. Between 850 and 6000? Leaving the rest of us unable or unwilling to pay more than 400 players who get a lot out of playing just for themselves.. beginners, part timers,ife long learners, loners, enthusiastic amateurs, guitars are bought for children, even if I knew I had only 6 months to live.. I'd want to be playing the best guitar.. Well guitars.. I could get.. I have 9 and a banjo, that's about the limit I can look after, keep clean, stringed, repaired, upgraded and most important LOVED-that means played.. If I had more money, or when my music pays.. I might be able to maintain a few more!! 15? 20?!.. It's so true that well loved guitars at the very least have their own character then some get a personality…. As so many players describe these deep bonds with specific guitars it gets Undeniable.. But who wants to be subjected to some kind of in depth scientific study looking at to what extent can a guitar be "alive" to it's human, or to multiple players? Very difficult to measure,.. Brain waves, scans, temperature, mood, quality of performance, study the guitars sound waves over time, look at biochemical data..
It seems likely the study itself would influence the results.. Maybe not.. How much of a guitars change is measurable, observable, or follows a pattern, cycle etc.. I'm convinced our Interactions do affect,.. Both ways!!! If 1000 guitarists were paid to select 3 new Wednesday guitars, same model, then choose 1 to favour 1 to insult, not physically abuse!! and 1 to be neutral
.. It's not gonna work is it.?!!
I think many players would take up a simpler challenge to measurably improve the sound quality, playability, warmth etc.. of any ONE particular guitar of their choice … over a period of time.. Like 3, or 6 months.. If it's judged improved.. You can keep it! If there's no change … you have to pay all the costs of the study!!
If you're made it worse you have to just buy a new one…. This should keep both the scientific method.. and the scientists on track, no bias… I'd go for it.. I'd choose something second hand, like Rory Gallaghers strat!!.. There's got be a few restrictions!!.. Price..?! Condition.. I don't think I'm cut out for setting the parameters.. I can definitely improve a guitar and guitar can improve me and I'd leap at the chance to gamble on it if the prize is keeping a dream guitar!! Let's hope the Smithsonian institute see this comment!!! Ha ha ha..!!
"
@GS-uy4xo
It’s a good start – they should make one a year for a decade or two.
@TAM-gz5tc
have any of you heard hank marvin????????
@cameronfowler7361
Loved seeing Phil X rocking an old Yamaha SBG at the namm show. I have owned hundreds of guitars over the last 40 years or so . The SBG2100 I picked up in the 80s is still the best overall guitar I have owned
@davedecker1725
The electric guitar is one of greatest gifts of the 20th century. Even the most geeky snot nosed kid picks up a strat or les Paul and it's like the hammer of Thor or Conan's sword.
Stewart Copeland once called heavy metal " The Silverback Gorilla strength that is denied 16 year old boys"
Pretty tough to have a metal band without guitars
@gordonbezanson4710
Kevin didnt even play with the G string🤣
@superflysoulbrother
8:18 wow that tone!
@dustinbrummett3774
Really cool seeing Lukather and his son together
@rogerwilliams2629
Well done. Really
@GB-jf6lo
If anyone believes that this man is telling the truth or is really trying to help humankind it is time for you to WAKE UP!!!!!!
@djsaeg
my top has always been Jimi Page, David Gilmour, Dimebag Darrell and Tom Morello but i´ve been just realizing how incredible is Mike McReady what an absolutely fantastic player he is
@joeblack007forever
💕💕💕
@timothycormier3494
For me it was those big bends in the beginning of train kept’a rollin by Aerosmith. That train whistle sound burned into my soul and I’ve been hooked ever since. It still inspires me every time I hear it.
@stepitupandgo67
crickets chirping during hendrix playing at 53:13 or so….shameful
@jacksonmarshallkramer5087
THE ORIGINAL CHARVEL GANG is an hour and a half documentary just like this one but it's about the development of humbucking Strat body guitars with Floyds that Charvel/Jackson built. They started out selling bodies and necks and then a player named Eddie Van Halen walked in and got a rejected body, a second, and a neck. He put it together, painted it black with yellow stripes, and he changed the way guitars were played and equipped. Another player, Randy Rhoads came in and wanted a neck thru, oddball looking offset V shaped guitar. Grover Jackson was afraid that building a neck thru that wasn't Strat shaped might hurt his business that was just taking off. Randy told him to put his name on the pointy headstock. Jackson guitars was born. Everybody is in that vid. It's put together just like this.
@chicochicoshukor7184
Just subcribe❤❤❤ Amazing