Jason01

You could order them with an optional tone knob. With all the optional stuff that one has its probably original.

I have a picture of me when I was about 5 years old playing with a toy guitar and I had it left handed, I knew even then what felt right. I was around right handed guitars growing up and never picked them up, it was just unnatural for me. Fast forward years down the road and when I figured out that no one in my family was playing the right handed guitar and I could just string it backwards I picked it up. I guess I get a little pissed when people tell me I should have just learned right handed, I'm a damn lefty and I've never tried to tell a right handed person that they should play left handed. If it didn't matter then they wouldn't have ever bothered to make a left handed guitar in the first place. Steve Morse and Joe Perry are great guitar players but so are Jimi and Tony. It does suck trying to find decent leftys but I would have probably had 100 guitars and been living on ramen noodles for the last ten years if I'd been right handed. The scarcity of leftys keeps the GAS in check. If you start looking at full sized guitars for her check out Carvin, they don't charge an upcharge for leftys and mines been a real nice guitar so far (plus I don't want any more competition for my lefty hamers! hah, j/k).

That guitar is a set neck because if you were to strip off the paint and have a look at the neck joint the neck and body are two pieces glued together and blended smooth. A true neck thru would not have a joint, its one piece of wood from the tip of the neck to the end of the body(usually with "wings" making up the sides of the body). Thats a really nice cali and one thats highly coveted around here.

I dug it, I heard melody and musicality in the guitar, maybe not great tone but that wasn't the point of it. Guess its just a matter of what you listen for. Never really listened to either one of them before but that was pretty damn cool.

Any more straplocks or hotsauce left?

later cali necks aren't skinny, at least mine isn't. They're fantastic guitars. As they said though, you're better off picking up a used usa diablo than a new import cali. You're not likely to lose any or at least as much money on the diablo if you decide you don't like it later.

Gonna need a volume pot as well, originals got issues.

Hey Chris, I tried replying to that e-mail address you sent me and got errors and returned message. There another one you've got?

Ok, I recently acquired a project phantom GT and I need to start hunting down parts for it to try and resurrect this poor guitar. I need a pickguard, a kahler whammy bar (black), and one of those black brushed aluminum backplates (looks like a long oval shape. The original pickguard is just a piece of it left so I have nothing to use as a template. Anyone got any of this stuff laying around in their parts piles? Also, where can I get those little black screws hamer used to attach the pickguards and parts? Wish me luck, this ones going to take some serious work.

Ahh, I just noticed the bottom of the guitar stand and thought "geez, you'd have to be laying on the ground to get that shot". Ever since I've tried and failed to take a decent pic of my guitars I've been trying to analyze the guitar pics posted on the board and on ebay. Some people do it really well, like Greg, and then theres guys like me who can't get wood grain to show up in a pic without resorting to sanding the finish off the guitar (no, I haven't really done that).

Did you have to dig a hole in the ground for that second shot Greg or what?

I was simply trying to convey my frustration at going into guitar shop after guitar shop and during that period where fender was making those jimi strats the only lefty guitar I would see up on the wall was actually made for the right handed people as well. This is a free country and you're certainly entitled to buy as many lefty guitars as you want, you might want to check out southpaw guitars in Houston and you can grab as many as you want. If its not about the Jimi thing then how come I never see right handed people playing anything upside down other than a strat? I can't recall any other company marketing a left handed guitar upside down for right handed people, feel free to correct me if I'm wrong.

I'm with Mike, it bugs the hell out of me to see righties playing lefty guitars cause they want to be Jimi or whatever and taking them out of circulation for those of us that are actually looking for them. I wanted to go to the Fender plant and go on a shooting spree when they came out with that Jimi Hendrix model with the lefty body strung up right handed and the backward logo and all that. We're usually stuck with cheap black low end models when a manufacturer decides to throw us a bone and make a left handed version of a guitar and I'd go in to a store and see this nice white lefty strat on the wall and it would be strung up right handed and I'd get pissed off. Whats the lefty in the pawn shop you guys are looking at anyway?

Dream Theaters -pull me under. had me totally hooked from the first time I heard it. I ended up at the music store trying to describe it/sing it to the guy behind the counter (only time I've ever done that) since I had no idea who the band was or the name of the song but I knew I had to have it (He ended up trying to sell me a toad the wet sprocket or a smashing pumpkins CD so one of us was waaay off, probably me, I'm not much of a singer). SRVs -little wing. cover had me from the first time I heard it. I'm not sure I was a Stevie Ray fan before that but that song changed it all for me. SRVs -texas flood. live from the el mocambo. This version absolutely kills! (gotta watch it on the video to truely appreciate it). Dio's -we rock. I was curious who this Dio guy was with the freaky album covers (hadn't made the black sabbath connection yet) so I bought the last in line. First song, opening notes and I was hooked. Gary Hoeys -hocus pocus blew me away from the first time I heard it. Almost pulled the car over on that one. I've probably got more but those are the ones that really jump out at me.

Wow, that stars and stripes flame job is friggin cool!

From the serial numbers E is eighties and the first 3 is the year. Its not precise, some of them could go in the surrounding years but thats the general idea. A friend of mine has one almost exactly like that, it was a decent strat but had a very pronounced V neck that I thought was pretty strange. I don't know why people knock the 3 bolt strats, I've got one and I think the micro tilt system is wonderful. I've never had any stability problems with the neck on my '77.

I guess it would have to start with Ace Frehley and Randy Rhoads. My first two albums were kiss and blizzard of oz and I listened to them over and over and over (as kids do). Fast forward years down the road and Kurt Cobain enters the scene and pretty much single handedly wipes the music I like off the planet (yea I know, alot of it was crap at that point anyway). Me and a friend picked up the guitar around that time. For me it was to be able to go back to my musical beginning (the kiss and randy rhoads stuff) and the music through the 80's that I really liked. Queensryche was a huge influence, I've probably listened to Operation Mindcrime more than any other single CD I've ever owned although Zakk Wyldes book of shadows CD is getting up there. Once I picked up the guitar I started learning to read tab through the guitar magazines (I didn't have any guitar teacher so this is about all I had to go on). One name kept popping up all over the place in them, Joe Satriani. I got hold of his "The Extremist" CD and that one completely changed my musical direction. It had incredible technique, incredible tone, incredible melodies and NOT ONE lyric. It was my first instrumental rock CD and its still the benchmark I compare all the rest to. I know he gets lumped into the shredder category and he can sure hold his own there but his playing is alot more blues based and has more flow to it for lack of a better word. As far as the people I've actually sat down and watched live that blew me away I went to a Neil Zaza clinic around '92 and was just floored. That guy could play faster than I could even comprehend, I still can't. I knew I'd never be a shredder after watching him play, I don't have the discipline or the time to sit for hours and hours with a metronome that it must take to develop that. I still love that stuff and its inspiring because I know its beyond my abilities even though I will probably never get there.

As far as Savatage goes Jon Oliva didn't get his pic on the handful of rain album but he did write tunes, tour with the band playing keyboards, rhythm guitar, and singing packground vocals, play keyboards on the album and co-produce it so I'd still include him on that one. He also sang and played keyboards on dead winter dead even though his pic was not in the booklet again. I could venture a guess or two why he wasn't on the band listings but it would just be speculation. There was always an Oliva in that band whether they got credit for it or not.

I am trying to figure out how to burn this onto a DVD. Anyone know what i need to do to get this done? My first attempt i made a something that will play on my computer but not in the dvd player so I'm thinking I must need to put it into a format that my dvd player will read. I've never burned to DVD before so this is pretty much a pain in the ass. My computer came with a dvd burner in it and roxio drag to disc stuff on it.

I also saw em on letterman last night. I liked the song and the vibe but as stike said, that solo was awful.

Theres a guitar?

Hoobastank, if they'd just back the gain off a little it would be a nice tone but it just sounds like the speakers gonna explode where he's got the gain/volume on the last album. I think thats what drives me nuts about it is I can hear in my head what it should sound like and he's just got too much cowbell! err...gain.

Steves comments have brought up a question. It was my understanding that when the original V's were designed they were designed with sitting down playing in mind, hence the unusual shape. You were supposed to sit and play it like you would a classical guitar, with the notch?(I don't know what the hell you call that part) resting on your....uuuhh, right leg for you damn right handed people out there. Is that not the case? I've never been able to sit down with a V yet so I don't know if it really works like that or the designers were just on drugs or the rumor I heard was completely false or what?

I like the angled bookmatching job on the standard, gives the top a neat look.