Rickresource Rickenbacker Forum

Kenny. I downloaded the clip of you smashing that guitar from your website. You were giving that thing a workout and it wouldn't fall apart. What kind of guitar was that?

Heehee!

It was a Teisco. We were promised money for the gig, so I went to Midtown Music in Atlanta and asked for a smasher. The Teisco was offered up for sacrifice, and for only $30. Or $50. I can't remember. All I know is that it was a terrible guitar. I figured it would make it through "My Generation"...

The thing is, the @#$%er wouldn't break! As you can see in the video, I finally broke it over my knee. (A chunk of wood flew into the drywall, and stuck. The owner of the establishment framed it with a plaque.)

I also sustained pretty serious trauma to my hands - picture yourself hitting a concrete floor as hard as you can with a wooden baseball bat, which won't break. My hands were bleeding, and sore for a week. I don't know how Townshend has done it so many times...

Here's the clip, for those of you just tuining in:
http://www.kennyhowes.com/video.html

Pete Townshend once said he prefered Gibsons over Fender because they broke apart easier. I just bought an Epiphone "Junior" kinda an LP looking thing for 89 bucks, new, to bring to work and practice with (yep, gotta a lotta time to do so). That thing would break if I looked at it wrong, I betcha.

In my distant and shady past ( Summer of '67 or so ) I was playing the bass in a band
that was playing a bar gig when the guitar player started channelling Pete T and smashed
a _beautiful_ 360FG into tiny little pieces against the cinderblock wall behind the stage.

Afterwards he said:
"No big deal. I was tired of it and Mom'll buy me something else"


Tis great to be young :^)

I'd love to have that 360 today

Claude

"No big deal. I was tired of it and Mom'll buy me something else"

Ugh.... I sure hope that kid's mom did not buy him another Ric! If my kid ever smashed a Ric I don't know what I would do, but it would not be pretty. I would certainly make him buy his own replacement.

By the way, Kenny, that clip was kind of funny.... I could almost feel the bewilderment as you kept smashing at that thing and it absoloutely refused to break! I bet you were relieved when it finally cooperated! Go figure, Townshend had Ric smashing down to an art form and they seemed to break easily for him, and a cheap piece of junk holds together and refuses to be broken! I'm glad you had the good sense not to smash one of your Rics!

Melissa >> Ugh.... I sure hope that kid's mom did not buy him another Ric!

Unfortunately this was a situation where "no" wasn't in the family vocabulary.
At the time I was merely jealous of the family wealth. Now I realize how poorly
trained to cope with life this fellow was due to excessive mothering.

Claude

Funnily enough, I don't think PT owned/broke that many Rics; I know in the clips I've seen it's been mostly other guitars. (Kids Are Alright out on DVD soon! Yay!)

PT also only used Rics for, what, the first Who record? And the first few singles? To be so well known for that instrument for a relatively short period, it's funny. (It'd be like me being known for playing a Teisco for one song and then smashing it!) Kind of like the Beatles/AC30 thing...but that's another post entirely.

I think my...er, smashing "technique" could have been better. The Teisco had a bolt-on neck, I could have cracked it over my knee early on...but since the smashing was prolongd, it worked out fine, the dramatic result was good.

Kenny
I'm using an old Teisco tube head here in Lima into an old double 15" cab for practise with a band, the drummer owns it, it's from about 1967, it's 100 watts with about 50% distortion, haha, but it sounds great. I can get a great Jack Bruce sound out of it, if I really crank it. It actually has a watt meter on the front of the amp (doesn't work). It has vol. and tone like a radio! also an expander knob, which I think is two pots in one, it simultaneously turns down the bass while boosting the treble and vice versa, which I really like, it's very simple, and sounds great with my 4001, it sounds huge. I think they made those things to last. I'm cranking the hell out of it for at least 8 hours every day and the thing never complains, it's got all kinds of bottom, especially with that old cab. It's a strange looking thing though.

17-year zombie thread revived.... for this?

Link works for me, don’t know what I’m doing wrong...

kennyhowes wrote:

Really I keep saying these ancient threads should be deleted. .

Here's a link to the video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fOiXNAH-TrA

drumbob wrote:
Really I keep saying these ancient threads should be deleted. .

Dunno, I kind of like it.

Having a really long shelf-life is what online forums are all about. The ability to search, is what differentiates this place from the Facebook pages.