I'm pretty sure I had a plastic toy guitar in the Sixties when I was kid. I've been racking my brains as to its likely shape but its not collating!
I think it was like a plastic acoustic guitar. There were lots of them around connected to bands like the Beatles and to TV stars like Mickey Mouse. There's some amazing galleries online like this one https://www.polarityrecords.com/vintage-toy-guitars.html
In the Seventies I progressed onto a proper acoustic and eventually a Telecaster copy bought from Kay's catalogue by my understanding parents. This gave way to a cheapo Strat copy from another catalogue my folks had in the mid-Seventies and last but least a decent Hondo Iceman copy, which my Dad paid for in a proper guitar shop.
Writing this I realised that the only guitar I actually paid for myself was a big EKO 12-String, which I adored. This was circa 1979 and cost me £60 and somewhere I have lots of tapes of me jamming with this beautiful thing. Frustratingly I left it behind when I moved abroad in late 1980 and years passed and you know what happens.
I did by some amps and some fuzz boxes for a band I was in. One old Burns amp melted my friend's metal strings and burnt his fingers!
I still have my basic Strat copy and copy Hondo Iceman. The Telecaster copy went to a young guy in Preston. The only thing I remember about him was that he lost a leg in a motorbike accident.
I always wanted a Gibson SG as a teenager or a Rickenbacker. I would sit staring at them in NME or shop windows, but alas these axes of masters were beyond my pocket, as I didn't have much dosh after I left home in 1978. Insurance Clerks earned around £70 a week,
My guitar playing fizzled out in the late 1980's but I keep them around for old time's sake. Some of my best days were playing these guitars in bands in the late Seventies going into the Eighties, although I was never very good. My thing was writing songs and tunes. Happy hippy Days.
But it all started with a plastic toy guitar my folks got me one Christmas.
Did you have one readers?
I did have a red plastic guitar when I was little, but that got tossed out by my Mother or Grandmother decades ago. Never had a real guitar.
ReplyDelete'tossed out' is such a great phrase. Just think of all the stuff that was chucked Zigg! We could fill a department store with it!
DeleteI had a wooden ukelele, which because it was small an guitar shaped, I always assumed was a child sized guitar. I only realised when I grew up that it was a ukelele! Needless to say I couldnt play it.
ReplyDeleteand to think, Formby is just up the road! You should have stood on a few corners!
DeleteDidn't Woolworths stock Kay guitars at some point?
ReplyDeleteThat does ring a bell MJ.
DeleteI had a wooden toy guitar many,many decades ago. Closest I can find webwise is:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.cathyscollectables.co.uk/pages/Vintage_Toy_Musical_Instrument_Unrecognised_Childs_Wooden_Guitar_Box_Circa_1960_70s_Poland_217137-z=671951&p=82579.cfm
Same shape box but darker brown. It didnt make me musically inclined, though I did try my hand at the flute for a couple of years.
That's a lovely looking guitar Timmy. It has a Flamenco look to it!
DeleteHi Paul, I used to play in a couple of rock bands from 1978 until about 1985, During that time I managed to collect a couple of guitars. My first guitar, a Sunburst Fender Stratocaster with a Maple Neck, I bought in 1978 along with a Watkins Dominator Mk2 Valve Amp Combo [Like the Jam and Jethro Tull used to use] I got them both in Cardiff. Me and a mate had to lug them onto the train and Bus to get them home. I also got a couple of effects peddles a week or so later and around 1982, I also got a Hondo 2 guitar, which is a beautiful instrument.
ReplyDeletein 1982, I had my Strat customised with a Brass Nut and Bridge and the lower pickup replaced with a Demazio Humbucker. After 1985, I used them together with a keyboard on Radio Station session work. It just came in handy to create the exact musical etc effects that I wanted, than spending stupid amounts of time trawling through commercial production records. I even got to play on a set of jingles for Red Dragon Radio.
Today, I still hanker to play in a band, and make original music. But I've (1.) Yet to find a bunch who are interested enough, and (2.) Need to be a better musician, or at least have the other members put up with my incompetence!
I sold most of the effects peddles on in the mid 1980's, although I still have my Vox Distortion Sustainer and Evans Echopet. A couple of years ago I bought a Zoom 505, and I've found it excellent.
Like you Paul, I hanker after a Rickenbacker 360/12 as there is only one 12 string electric guitar I want, and that is a Rickenbacker. But as they cost a couple of thousand pounds, I'd want to be able to play it really, really well. And I don't think I'm a good enough musician or practice enough to warrant buying one of those.
I still have a couple of recordings of me and the various people I've played in bands with. Most of it is passible I guess. I can usually get a tune out of most instruments, although I can't play the drums for Toffee! Back in the late 1990's I did some sessions with a some guys and Young Female Drummer, she was very good, and very talented. There I was lucky enough to play a Fender Jazz Bass. Oddly though, I couldn't play it with a Plectrum, I had to use my fingers direct. That was a really nice instrument, pity it wasn't mine.
Yet having twanged a good few different guitars, my Number One GoTo guitar is still that [now vintage] 1978 customised Strat, that I bought with money I saved from my early wage packets.
I love that sound f that Strat and I enjoyed your reply a lot Bill. Very evocative and reminded me a lot of my own musical 'journey'. I always enjoyed the bands I was in - all completely different and only one played any gigs - if I don't include busking on Blackpool prom with mates! I miss those days a great deal in my late teens and early twenties, the camaraderie, the community of rockers and the huge buzz of making music and above all listening to the songs I scribbled on scraps of paper played properly by some really talented young people [and I don't include myself in that!]. Like you I have jams and live gigs on old cassettes and one day when I retire I'd love to compile them in some way onto a CD with a real cover and historic sleeve notes like a proper album for my old band mates all now in there late 50's and 60's! Vinyl would be even better and I think I'd die of happiness if I held such a thing in my hand!
DeleteI had an Emenee plastic folk guitar in 1964, along with my Beatles wig, when I was trying to channel Paul McCartney!
ReplyDeleteha ha, it sounds wonderful Zigg! The British Invasion eh! Me and my brother were named either after catholic saints or as I like to think , the Beatles, namely Paul and John!
Deletei have again my bass guitar,a cheap Eagle EB30 l and a Yamaha Pacifica,both lefthanded!!i d like to reprise to play,, maybe a day :))
ReplyDeletehere's to EW playing again! Yay!
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