You will notice that title of my latest blog post is somewhat deceiving. I mean, you were probably all ready to read something about my latest networking magic or some job hunting moxie. Well, today’s post is going to be a tad more selfish (although, all the other posts have been about me so they could be considered selfish as well). Today I’ll be writing about a true love. Yes, the pointy headstock bass guitar.
Let me explain.
When I was a young pup growing up in a very musical household, I tried several musical instruments before I settled on playing the bass. There was the one week intensive playing drums, the occasional noodling on the acoustic guitar, the three hour piano lesson and finally the concentrated six month banjo dream (somehow, Deep Purple’s Smoke on the Water just didn’t sound as cool on a banjo as it did on the low E string of a guitar).
My oldest bother played drums; my other older brother played the guitar so they encouraged me to pick up the bass so we could be like the Partridge Family but on mushrooms. I was soon hooked (on the playing bass not mushrooms) and off to the bedroom to practice I went.
My first two basses we OK (an old 70s Kramer bass with an aluminum neck and then a pearl white Aria bass – hey I was totally digging on John Taylor from Duran Duran at the time!) and they were adequate for playing the occasional Judas Priest or AC/DC song; but something was missing.
I longed for a pointy headstock bass.
In the 1980s, you could not swing a bottle of Aqua Net without hitting a pointy headstock guitar. They were everywhere. It was March of 1986 when I first wandered into that Sam Ash music store in Paramus and low and behold my eyes were transfixed on a beautiful black pointy headstock bass hanging on the wall. I flipped my frosted glam metal hair out of my eyes while my cut off RATT concert shirt barely clung to my 98 lb body over my ridiculous cut up acid wash jeans and white untied wrestling sneakers (come on, we were all there at some point!) as she hung on the wall in all of her black high gloss glory – a double cut away body with a P/J pick up configuration, a rosewood fingerboard and then the wonderful black pointy headstock. I was hooked. After some careful negotiation about the value of my trade in (the Aria bass - sorry!) and the amount of cash I was to pony up, she came home with me and we bonded.
Wow.
Over the last 24 years, me and that pointy headstock bass played gigs in dorm rooms, apartments, dive bars, outdoor BBQ’s, New York City, gymnasiums, honky-tonks, Staten Island, Philadelphia, strip bars, Halloween parties, Friday nights, Saturday nights, two dollar beer night, New Years Eve parties, one US Army base, three dollar Kamikaze night, one art gallery opening, Sunday afternoons, freshman orientation night, the night before Thanksgiving night, narrowly missed opening for Quiet Riot night,… whew! The list goes on.
As the years went by, I gravitated to other basses but she was always there waiting to come out and play but she was in need of some major repairs. This year I finally got her spruced up and ready for action. I got her a new neck, cleaned her up and now she is competing with my other basses to get out. It’s like she never left. She is totally broken in, scratched up, beaten down and yet still sounds great. In all the years we played together, she never once let me down.
Welcome home pointy head stock bass. I can’t wait to talk about you when I finally land a new job.
Let me explain.
When I was a young pup growing up in a very musical household, I tried several musical instruments before I settled on playing the bass. There was the one week intensive playing drums, the occasional noodling on the acoustic guitar, the three hour piano lesson and finally the concentrated six month banjo dream (somehow, Deep Purple’s Smoke on the Water just didn’t sound as cool on a banjo as it did on the low E string of a guitar).
My oldest bother played drums; my other older brother played the guitar so they encouraged me to pick up the bass so we could be like the Partridge Family but on mushrooms. I was soon hooked (on the playing bass not mushrooms) and off to the bedroom to practice I went.
My first two basses we OK (an old 70s Kramer bass with an aluminum neck and then a pearl white Aria bass – hey I was totally digging on John Taylor from Duran Duran at the time!) and they were adequate for playing the occasional Judas Priest or AC/DC song; but something was missing.
I longed for a pointy headstock bass.
In the 1980s, you could not swing a bottle of Aqua Net without hitting a pointy headstock guitar. They were everywhere. It was March of 1986 when I first wandered into that Sam Ash music store in Paramus and low and behold my eyes were transfixed on a beautiful black pointy headstock bass hanging on the wall. I flipped my frosted glam metal hair out of my eyes while my cut off RATT concert shirt barely clung to my 98 lb body over my ridiculous cut up acid wash jeans and white untied wrestling sneakers (come on, we were all there at some point!) as she hung on the wall in all of her black high gloss glory – a double cut away body with a P/J pick up configuration, a rosewood fingerboard and then the wonderful black pointy headstock. I was hooked. After some careful negotiation about the value of my trade in (the Aria bass - sorry!) and the amount of cash I was to pony up, she came home with me and we bonded.
Wow.
Over the last 24 years, me and that pointy headstock bass played gigs in dorm rooms, apartments, dive bars, outdoor BBQ’s, New York City, gymnasiums, honky-tonks, Staten Island, Philadelphia, strip bars, Halloween parties, Friday nights, Saturday nights, two dollar beer night, New Years Eve parties, one US Army base, three dollar Kamikaze night, one art gallery opening, Sunday afternoons, freshman orientation night, the night before Thanksgiving night, narrowly missed opening for Quiet Riot night,… whew! The list goes on.
As the years went by, I gravitated to other basses but she was always there waiting to come out and play but she was in need of some major repairs. This year I finally got her spruced up and ready for action. I got her a new neck, cleaned her up and now she is competing with my other basses to get out. It’s like she never left. She is totally broken in, scratched up, beaten down and yet still sounds great. In all the years we played together, she never once let me down.Welcome home pointy head stock bass. I can’t wait to talk about you when I finally land a new job.
(BTW, that is me playing the pointy headstock bass somewhere, I think in 1989, I think. Maybe it was 1991... Just not sure...)
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