Yup, I played some guitar this morning. Bellana went home and we are sad to see her leave so I played guitar to feel better. It didn’t really help, but it was still good to play. Hell, it’s always good to play.
Bonus pics:
Photo a Day 8/365
Tag: gibson sg standard
SG Standard on Film
Nope
I tried to goad myself into playing the guitar at lunch today. I even took a picture for the photo a day thing.
Nope. I had a bad reaction to a piece of chicken instead. I guess it was just too big of a bite. It took me three hours to get through 4.4 oz of chicken, but one hour of that was just dealing with stomach pain and nausea and another hour was spent in a meeting at work. You know how it is.
Speaking of problems eating that stem from my gastric bypass surgery, the organization that determines the rules for qualifying for weight loss surgery has just rewritten those rules. They lowered the BMI requirement from 35 to 30. According to that I still qualify. My BMI is 34.4 even after losing 169 pounds. Can they bypass more of my stomach? WOOHOO!
Guitar Specs
This is going to be a guitar nerd post. You’ve been warned.
Here are the specs for my new guitar. Most of this is obvious just by looking at it. I’m mostly concerned with saving the pick ups, the frets, the nut, the wood in the body and the fretboard, and the tuners.
Body
Body Shape – Les Paul
Body Material – Mahogany
Top – Maple
Weight Relief – None
Finish – Gloss Nitrocellulose Lacquer
Neck
Material – Mahogany
Profile – Vintage 50s
Scale Length – 24.75″ / 628.65mm
Fingerboard Material – Rosewood
Fingerboard Radius – 12″
Number Of Frets – 22
Frets – Medium Jumbo
Nut Material – Graph Tech
Nut Width – 1.69″ / 43.05mm
End of Board Width – 2.26″ / 57.4mm
Inlays – Acrylic Trapezoids
Hardware
Finish – Nickel
Bridge – ABR-1 Tune-O-Matic
Tailpiece – Aluminum Stop Bar
Tuning Machines – Vintage Deluxe w/ Keystone Buttons
Pickguard – Cream
Control Knobs – Gold Top Hats w/ Pointers
Switch Tip – Amber
Switchwasher – Cream
Jack Plate Cover – Cream
Electronics
Neck Pickup – Burstbucker 1
Bridge Pickup – Burstbucker 2
Controls – 2 Volumes, 2 Tones & Toggle Switch (Hand-wired with Orange Drop Capacitors)
While I’m at it, let’s save off the specs from my SG too. They are still available on the Gibson website under legacy models.
Body
Wood Species – Mahogany
Finish – Gloss Nitrocellulose Lacquer
Neck
Material – Mahogany
Neck Profile – Slim Taper
Scale Length – 24.75″
Fingerboard Material – Rosewood
Fingerboard Radius – 12″
Number of Frets – 22
Hardware
Finish – Chrome
Bridge – Aluminum Tune-O-Matic
Tailpiece – Aluminum Stop Bar
Tuning Machines – Locking Kidneys
Pick Guard – Black 4-ply
Control Knobs – Black Top Hats
Switch Tip – Black
Switch Washer – Black (not mounted)
Electronics
Neck Pickup – 61R
Bridge Pickup – 61T
Controls – 2 volumes, 2 tones, 1 toggle switch
Therapy
Said it before, but playing the guitar like a doofus is what passes for Covid-19 mental health therapy for me.
Added leads to a November song. Added rhythm to a November song. Added rhythm to a re-recording song. That puppy was a work out.
My SG is finally making an appearance in the Great 2015 Re-Recording Project. Will I got back to the ES-335 for volume 4, or will that be the Les Paul? Do you care? No? Do I care that you don’t care? No? Does any of this mean anything other than me getting my frustrations out in the middle of the corona-quarantine? Nope.
Ouch
I put vocals on five songs this morning. Two new ones and three re-recordings. This afternoon I put lead guitars on four of them. I decided a few days ago that I was going to stop using my ES-335 and use my SG instead. The 335 (and the Les Paul) is over 40 years old and best I can tell it’s never had a fret replacement. The SG is two years old. It’s all original. What’s that mean?
The frets on the 335 are old and worn. I’m going to have to have them replaced… soon… as well as all of the wiring and all of the pots. I’ve written about that a few times before. The frets on the SG aren’t worn at all, not even a little bit. What’s that mean?
Ouch, is what it means. Worn frets are lower and closer to the fretboard then non-worn frets. That means they are a lot easier on the fingers when you’re sliding around like a madman. Today, on the non-worn SG’s frets, I was sliding around like a madman for an hour and a half. What I thought were pretty decent sized calluses on my left hand turned out to not be that thick after all. A couple more rounds of me ripping my finger tips to shreds like I did today will fix that.
Ouch.
One More Serial Number Fun Post
My Gibson ES-335 Pro was the 127th guitar stamped in Kalamazoo on Wednesday December 5, 1979.
My Gibson SG Standard doesn’t follow the same serial number method as my two 70’s Gibsons. There is much less to play with now as the first two digits are the model year (not necessarily the year the guitar was built, kinda like cars) and the remaining seven digits are just a counter for that model year. My guitar is the 22,586th 2018 model guitar.
I never noticed it before, but there is a Made in USA stamp on my Les Paul. My ES-335 does not have a Made in USA stamp, but it does have SECOND in it’s place. It was a factory second, kinda like clothes were a slight defect will keep the item from passing Quality Control, but it isn’t bad enough to stop it from selling at a slight discount. I believe my 335 is seconded because of a hole in the finish on the back of the guitar. It’s never bothered me in the slightest.
My SG includes both a Made in USA stamp and a 2018 Model stamp. Just in case the serial number didn’t give it away. I bought the SG new and I have all of the case candy. That includes a filled out QC checklist card that is dated 10/12/17… so my 2018 guitar was actually made in 2017. It has a model number too, SGS18HC… something or other… CM1, or CH1, or something like that. The hand writing is a little tough to make out. They also sent a picture of my guitar sitting on the QC work bench where it was apparently plugged into a Boss tuner pedal…. I don’t like Boss pedals. That actually makes me sad.
As for the model number, SGS is SG Standard, 18 is the model year, HC is probably hard shell case. The rest? I don’t know, and Google doesn’t tell me anything.
Well, that’s it for serial numbers for my electric guitars. I suppose I could go look at my Takamine acoustic 12-string but… I don’t wanna.
Happy Friday!
Inside the Red Head's Head 