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Everybody Wants Some!


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Way back in 1985ish, watching John Cusack in Better Off Dead, my highschool buddy and I instantly recognized Van Halen's* and Everybody Wants Some from the first drum beat in the famous Pig-in-the-Poke animation scene.  We were rocking along with it, but even then, sitting in the theater, I noticed that the iconic red and white Van Halen guitar wasn't quit right.  "Nice try guys," said my 17 year old self, "But Eddie's guitar is more of a Strat-bodied thing.  Kramer, you know?  How could you get that wrong?"

Image result for better off dead hamburger gif

The burger's guitar is NOT: 

Image result for van halen frankenstein

Duh.  I was a smug, smart-ass, OCD geek from southern New Hampshire.  Land of DEC PDP8s and VAXes.  Everyone's dad worked at Digital.

Until this evening.  Somewhere in the depths of Ebay I came across a listing for a replica of Eddie's Ibanez Destroyer, and it clicked:

EPIPHONE-EXPLORER-DESTOYER-VAN-HALEN-WOMEN-amp-CHILDRENFIRST-SHARK-GUITAR-EVH

What did those animation guys know?  They knew their Van Halen, That's for sure.  The burger's guitar was actually a tribute to the Ibanez Destroyer "Shark"

Image result for van halen ibanez shark

And to further rub it in my face, the scene was on the Frankenstein theme.  So, yeah.  Smart-ass geek from NH eats some crow 33 years late, outdone by Van Halen fans in Hollywood. 

In my defense, the cover of Women and Children First, which was all we had to go on back then, sans internet**,  was in black and white, so I never conceptualized red & white on the Shark.  Hell, we didn't even have a color TV until the early 80s.  

Image result for van halen women and children first

But still.  Hubris.

 

*Who's doing better these days...

**Though a buddy, whose dad worked at Digital, did have a 300 baud phone-cradle modem.  I once played Adventure all night on that thing.  I knew how to boot a PDP8 and somehow knew enough to get to games and fire it up.

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Before it jumped the shark, literally ... Ed has said in interviews that the mod, specifically the loss of all that wood around the bridge. messed up the tone and resonance and he regretted doing it on the back end. 

b40a61620fe56fdbcc82121c42295da4.jpg

white_destroyer.jpg

 

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48 minutes ago, Jeff R said:

Before it jumped the shark, literally ... Ed has said in interviews that the mod, specifically the loss of all that wood around the bridge. messed up the tone and resonance and he regretted doing it on the back end. 

b40a61620fe56fdbcc82121c42295da4.jpg

white_destroyer.jpg

Is that Mary-Kate or Ashley behind him?

Asking for a friend.

 

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His "regret" over chopping up an Ibanez always caught me square in the funny bone.

Most people who bought them at the time regretted not being able to afford the Gibson.

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When one of the kids begins driving, I start my instructions with "go that way.  Real fast.  If something gets in your way, turn!"

I watched it with some of the elder Toadrollers a few years ago, and throughout the movie they were saying, "oh, so that's where that comes from."  It is an absolute classic.  Love that Camaro.

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3 hours ago, Ed Rechts said:

did nothing to stop EVH fanboi geeks who still seek out 70s Destroyers to mod in the same way, as tribute to that dysfunctional guitar.

You need to go peruse this Facebook fan page, https://www.facebook.com/groups/evhreplicas/, and watch these fuckers go all batshit OCD over colors, tape widths, tape placements .... they actually have like blueprints in the site's archives. A lot more detail attention than just finding the proper year quarter.

Then again, it was one of those guys who painted the body below and set the high water mark for attention to detail ... and then I got to be one of those guys making this assembly come together for a client ...

29133445_1803312786637564_82494566607159

29177012_1803312153304294_85297801004801

This one differs from Ed's Frankie in that I set it up to actually play itself. I'd be lying if I denied wanting it for myself haha.

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12 minutes ago, Ed Rechts said:

I'll ask ya this, would you dedicate your reputation and assign your name to rendering an EVH Shark, knowing full well that it was tonally fucked? 

I haven't played a ton of them, but the few vintage Ibanez Destroyers I've ever played, made of Japanese sen or ash or whatever it is, left a lot to be desired for my ears and ribcage ... and they hadn't had the ass chainsawed out of them.

On the other hand, I've played alder and ash b/o Charvel Stars that were absolute ass kickers and if I was going to do a EVH Shark tribute, that would be my platform of choice. If you just want a 100 percent accurate replica, a big hi-res poster is much cheaper LOL

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THIS is a "Shark" replica that meets my thumbs up - this one was actually made by Wayne Charvel ... Wayne Guitars custom order to be precise.

wstar1.jpg

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7 minutes ago, Ed Rechts said:

I thought the vintage Destroyers I played were mahogany, but maybe I was being fibbed to (re: "muh lawsuit Ibanez!")

They weren't mahogany.  

Some of them, however, have been described as "dead mint."

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1 hour ago, Jeff R said:

You need to go peruse this Facebook fan page, https://www.facebook.com/groups/evhreplicas/, and watch these fuckers go all batshit OCD over colors, tape widths, tape placements .... they actually have like blueprints in the site's archives. A lot more detail attention than just finding the proper year quarter.

Then again, it was one of those guys who painted the body below and set the high water mark for attention to detail ... and then I got to be one of those guys making this assembly come together for a client ...

29133445_1803312786637564_82494566607159

29177012_1803312153304294_85297801004801

This one differs from Ed's Frankie in that I set it up to actually play itself. I'd be lying if I denied wanting it for myself haha.

No thanks, I’d probably just post a video of that old SNL sketch where Shatner is playing himself at a Star Trek convention and asks Jon Lovitz if he’s ever kissed a woman. 

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4 hours ago, kizanski said:

They weren't mahogany.  

Some of them, however, have been described as "dead mint."

I thought it was "minty clean",  but I don't have the photoshop that I made handy to prove it......

😀

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38 minutes ago, mathman said:

I thought it was "minty clean",  but I don't have the photoshop that I made handy to prove it......

😀

Here you go!

minty-clean.jpg

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Am I the only one bothered by the Strat style headstock on the Frankenstein guitar? I know Eddie had many variations of everything and I think the guitar started out with a Strat neck (or at least a mity-mite Strat replacement neck) but for me the iconic Frankenstein guitar has a matching banana headstock!

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I still use the line "I want my two dollars!".

 

BTW: Since the cover of Women And Children First is black and white I always assumed that the Destroyer was where the black with yellow stripes first came from. You learn something new every day.

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On 5/12/2018 at 10:50 AM, veatch said:

What bothered me was the backwards wammy bar...

Still like that movie, BTW. So many quotable lines. 

That always bugged me too,  but because there was no whammy on that guitar, but that they didn't realize that it was the route for the toggle switch.

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On 5/12/2018 at 1:31 PM, Ed Rechts said:

I am familiar with that site, and the quarter thing has made me chuckle.

But c'mon, Jeff, you rendered a functional guitar there. That is an excellent display of your talents, and I applaud you for the work. You should showcase that one.

I'll ask ya this, would you dedicate your reputation and assign your name to rendering an EVH Shark, knowing full well that it was tonally fucked? Without a disclaimer, like those plastic surgeons that add a superfluous nipple or a forehead penis to some monied nutbag with a fetish? Methinks, (I hope) NOT.

Most of these guitars have to be conversation pieces, unless you're in a tribute band. If you're winging that Frankenstrat, and boor the fuck outta anyone about it's level to perfected detail, you better to be able to play every fucking nuanced riff from the first 5 albums AT LEAST if you are gonna call yourself anything more than a collector.

These fanboi indulges fall under the "shut up and play" category for me, if you'll excuse the surliness. 

I'd personally love to have one and play, I don't know...all Beatles, the Jam, or The Knack covers...and then post videos of that on a die-hard page and sit back and wait for the reactions.

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9 hours ago, HAMERMAN said:

Am I the only one bothered by the Strat style headstock on the Frankenstein guitar? I know Eddie had many variations of everything and I think the guitar started out with a Strat neck (or at least a mity-mite Strat replacement neck) but for me the iconic Frankenstein guitar has a matching banana headstock!

IIRC, the original Frankenstein guitar never got fitted with a banana headstock neck. He had a Kramer beak neck on it during the 1984 era and then it seems he retired it in favor of the 5150 build and similar single humbucker copies. I am pretty sure he had it "restored" to a Strat head in the '90s. I do know that his 5150 build had a banana headstock when Ed assembled it. 

There was this ad, but I always thought this was a Franky copy, not the original. If I am incorrect, Jeffro will surely chime in and set the record straight img_0?1180226607

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ETA: This early '90s era photo would suggest I am wrong, but I honestly never realized Ed even played Franky in the studio during his EBMM tenure. c6da1f4f3aebae53847d806229edf5a9.jpg

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That ad above is a Frankie copy. Ed had several Frankie copies, different tunings, backups for gigs, chasing different things via different woods, different pickups, different trems. They were Charvel bodies, Kramer bodies, whatever was handy and whatever he was endorsing at that time. Some are here ... http://www.vintagekramer.com/5150f.htm

The real Frankie wore a strat head in most of its incarnations, or a Kramer logo'ed neck in that endorsement era. The link above shows a few versions.

Ed would swap necks for a variety of reasons. Fret wear, flavor of the month, no rhyme or reason. Here it is wearing the black painted neck from the black/yellow Charvel on the cover of VHII. Ed didn't like the B/Y guitar, thought it was too bright tonally, so he bounced the neck over to Frankie around the time Frankie went from BW to RBW. Kept the black head paint, scraped the paint off the neck trunk because he didn't like the feel. I'm pretty sure the original neck was put back on the B/Y prior to him bringing it to Dime's funeral.

Paint_guitar.jpg

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Here's where it wore a Danelectro neck for a VERY brief stint in 1983 for the Brian May Star Fleet project ...

FrankywDanonck.jpg

 

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On 5/12/2018 at 11:26 AM, Rockola said:

Truly, a great shame has fallen on the once formidable legend.

 

 

Better_off_dead_announcer.png

The once great champion - now a study in moppishness.

I own less than 25 movies - this is one of them.

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