A bit of Christmas in July???

I'm going to sound a bit like Bayou Bill, but...  After Santa visits him, his name changes from Jim to Jeff and he'll stop at my place in about a week or two.  
 
I got a call tonight from the guy who makes my custom guitars (we hadn't talked since late 2014!).  He felt bad that he's been so busy that he hadn't finished my final custom yet.  I had told him there's no rush since, until I get my act together, I really couldn't use it anyway.  Well, I'm now living in a house where the owner has a few nice guitars of his own plus a couple of more than sufficient 5W Blackstar amps.  So Jeff (my luthier) is going to send me my first custom back which will give me something to play until the new guitar (called the Red Rocker) is finished.
 
Here's a picture of her.  She's called the Raspberry Twist.  Raspberry because that's the color PRS used on one of their models that Jeff wanted to see if he could match (ironically, the owner of the house here has that exact color on his PRS!).  Twist because the guitar has Variax guts in addition to passive pickups (which are Bare Knuckle "Crawler" pickups, the signature pickups of Steve Stevens, Billy Idol's guitarist - a nice Classic Rock sound).
 

 
The Raspberry Twist covers all sorts of Classic Rock tones as well as acoustic and "other" sounds (thanks to the Variax guts).  The Red Rocker will be red (duh) with a light Korina body and modern sounding pickups (Bare Knuckle Trilogy's and a Nailbomb) plus it has a trem so there's a lot of territory covered between the two guitars.
 

 
Looks like things are turning around!  Now, to find some decent income... 

When's the first collab scheduled?

Congrats Craig, onwards and upwards!

WOW! BEAUTIFUL! Please let us hear it!!
 

That is a truly beautiful guitar
With the Variax innairds, do you think that you will even have the need/yen to play another?

 
Congrats!

Okay, gotcha.
 
What, pray tell, is a "real bass"? Do you mean an "acoustic" or "upright" bass?
 
 

And here I was, thinking that an "acoustic" bass WAS "the" normal bass and all other basses (electric, synth, washtub, etc.) needed a modifier to delineate them from a (normal) (acoustic) "bass".
 
Glad I asked.
 
Your blue guitar was beautiful as well. I that wish saxophones looked cool when you changed their color. Mostly, they just look cheap. Old, gnarly-looking saxes are best. The best ones are a mix of scratches, worn-off patches, and deep golden lacquer. They look authoritative and often (if they were taken care of) play better as well as there is less lacquer inhibiting the natural resonance of the metal. 
 
 

 
Enjoy your guit-fiddle!

craigb
Well, you know that they say there's a big difference in the saxes... 

One night, a man who just wanted to relax while watching a sitcom turned on his television. As he surfed the channels, he stopped on one and noticed that it featured a retrospective on the life of John Coltrane. Continuing on, he found the Chicago Symphony playing Beethoven's Symphony No. 6 (the "Pastoral Symphony") and the "Surprise Symphony" (No. 94) by Haydn. On another channel, the Kronos Quartet was playing  arrangements of some Jimi Hendrix tunes. Still another channel offered a video of Sonny Rollins in solo concert. The next offered the New York Philharmonic playing Debussy's "La Mer". The final channel offered a college saxophone quartet attempting to negotiate a harmonized transcription of Michael Brecker's unaccompanied solo on "Naima".
 
                           In disgust, the gentleman threw his remote against the wall, uttering those words which one hears so often now:
 
                                                      "Sax and violins! Sax and violins! That's all anyone sees on the television nowadays!"
 
 
                                                                                 
 
 
 
 

outland144k

craigb
Well, you know that they say there's a big difference in the saxes... 

One night, a man who just wanted to relax while watching a sitcom turned on his television. As he surfed the channels, he stopped on one and noticed that it featured a retrospective on the life of John Coltrane. Continuing on, he found the Chicago Symphony playing Beethoven's Symphony No. 6 (the "Pastoral Symphony") and the "Surprise Symphony" (No. 94) by Haydn. On another channel, the Kronos Quartet was playing  arrangements of some Jimi Hendrix tunes. Still another channel offered a video of Sonny Rollins in solo concert. The next offered the New York Philharmonic playing Debussy's "La Mer". The final channel offered a college saxophone quartet attempting to negotiate a harmonized transcription of Michael Brecker's unaccompanied solo on "Naima".
 
                           In disgust, the gentleman threw his remote against the wall, uttering those words which one hears so often now:
 
                                                      "Sax and violins! Sax and violins! That's all anyone sees on the television nowadays!"
 
 
                                                                                 
 
 
 
 

Good stuff Craig, a real beauty

BobF
 
I like the purple sax too ...

 
Blecch! (sic?)
 

 
 

craigb
Is that the stuff they used to use in San Francisco? 

 
The one and the same. But more like this now, I'm afraid:
 

 
 
So sad....  

Hippy repellent. 

Well, as they say, persistence pays off eventually while laziness pays off right now.