Today I bought the sixth Rickenbacker guitar of my life... But also the third Rickenbacker of my life...
Folks I am pleased to introduce you to QH 3474.
- My old 1977 JG 320
I owned three RICS in my high school days. An April 1982 JG 620, a June 1980 FG 620 / 12 (that had belonged to Chris De Burgh) and then finally this one, which I bought in my last year of high school for $700. I had lusted after a John Lennon model RIC, for most of my teenage years, but by the time this one arrived I had gotten too used to the 620's full length neck... So while I loved the look and the sound of this guitar I did not play it publicly much at the time. As a result I can't seem to find any 1980's pictures of it, which is very odd given the huge number of images I have of my 620's.
Perhaps it was also that the year I bought it I became very interested in the Theatrical production, which is what I have done for most of my adult life.
In 1990 I was stranded in the UK. I had produced some plays for the 1990 Edinburgh Fringe Festival and had literally lost my shirt doing it. I was broke and massively in debt, and my guitars were at my mum's back in Canada.. I remember calling her and telling her "not to tell me" but to basically sell anything that she had to... When I finally got back to Canada all of the RIC's and a mighty fine National Studio 66 were long gone.
The last time I played this guitar (until tonight) was about a week before I left for the UK in 1989. My best friend played bass in a Hamilton band called THE CHESSMEN. They were a bunch of "Mods" who wrote Who or Kink like originals and they all played RICS... I came up on stage with this guitar and we did A HARD DAYS NIGHT...
When I got back to Canada, they were just gone, and I was poor and focused on finding work in the theatre. I ended up working on an old 1923 Vaudeville Theatre here in Hamilton in the winter and spring of 1991/1992 producing theatre and promoting the odd concert like BLUE RODEO or LOREENA MCKENNIT. The sound tech that we used to hire was Lou Furlenetto, who owned the Guitar Clinic, which was were my Mum had disposed of most of my gear. After one of the shows I asked him about my RIC's, because I was flush again and wanted at least one of them back - most particularly Chris De Burgh's former 620 12 string. He told me that he would check the records and would let me know.
It was about 6 months before I ran into him again, and I asked him again about them. He said that all three of the guitars had been bought by the same person and that they had been lost in a fire... I was pretty miffed because I thought that he was lying to me.. What's the odds of that I thought? He just can't be bothered to check...
It was only three years later around 1995, when I got talking to a cab driver.. We swapped stories about vintage guitars and I told him about my lost RICS. I had by then gotten back into music as a Celtic styled folk musician, although I had bought my JG 610 for a recording project. I told this cab driver the "lost in a fire" story and he said to me - "I know who that is!" and gave me the name!!
They lived way out in the country side about 30 miles away from my city Hamilton.. I arranged to drive out there to hear the story first hand - They had indeed bought all three of the Rickenbackers, and yes there was a horrible fire that consumed the entire house. Although thankfully everyone got out without injury. The fire started in the basement and the guitars were in a cabinet right next to the stairs... The only survivor was the 320... At the time the owner wanted to see about getting it playable again and did not want to part with it. I brought my photo album and a VHS tape of a 1983 Chris De Burgh concert where he played the 12 string... I left and that was it, as far as I was concerned the guitars were lost and gone...
But two weeks ago here on the Rickresource forum in a thread about a FG 1977 in Nova Scotia, I started to wonder... Hmm I wonder what happened to the 320? So I managed to track them down again and asked where did the 320 end up? The answer it was sitting in a closet for the past 14 years. They were kind enough to let me have it very cheaply - and so AMAZINGLY - I have one of my high school Rickenbackers back!!! It has the Klusons and the tiny head stock all of which I miss so much from the modern instruments.... I tuned it up and plugged it in and sounds fine... It is horribley burned and disfigured - it is like someone put their RIC into a pizza oven for 30 minutes... But considering the circumstances I am just grateful that it survived at all. The 620's which were right next to this in the cabinet were reduced to ashes.
The main disfigurement is scorching to the rosewood, and one of the dot inlays (which must have had plastic in it) has melted and is now a molten drop on the fretboard - it will have to filed down in order to play it again. But replace the TRC and Pickguard and at least it is a working guitar again.
Eventually I will get it restored back to its vintage 1977 condition - once I am back to work and the economy gets normal again... I am sure there are many experts here who will help me with that project! But in the meantime I celebrate the return of an old dear friend that I have not seen in many many years!! I never thought that this would ever happen.
Man I am so pumped tonight!Brian
from Hamilton, Ontario Canada.
Here's the first flood of what will be many many images to come in the next few days..
- When I opened the case
- Klusons!!!
- Scorched finger board
Its the East of Scotland folk bleed ya dry.
