Gary Lucas also posted this piece by Daniel Kachamba
"Another gem from Daniel Kachamba: a demonstration of the technique he called “Putugizi” featuring a right hand circular motion while the thumb and index strike the strings in a rumba rhythm. What Daniel called “high lumba” due to the speed of the music. The style may have originated in Mozambique. (“Putugizi” referring to “Portuguese”).
Recorded in 1972 at a film institute in Göttingen, Germany in collaboration with ethnomusicologist Gerhard Kubik / University of Vienna.”Gary Lucas
Rory Gallagher: “I use a Fender Stratocaster, mostly, and have a Telecaster for slide guitar. I kind of like Fenders. They’re good and crisp, and they travel well. Gibsons are nice, but they’re a little more low key. Fenders have a much more vicious sound. People have made guitars for me, but I never end up playing them, or I haven’t so far. I’m attached to the one I have.”
“For acoustic, I have a Martin D-35 or a National steel-bodied, “the one-resonator Acolian. I used to play the Martin a lot more, but now I just, more or less, work on the National because it’s a lot brassier. The material I do suits the National.”
“I don’t have any real Irish music in my thing, even though it creeps in here and there. But I don’t deliberately play any Irish gigs or anything. Oh, I like that when it happens, but I don’t see myself as an electric Celtic rocker.”
“When I started playing , the first guys I liked were Lonnie Donegan (of “British skiffle” fame), Buddy holly, Eddie Cochran, Elvis Presley, Chuck Berry, Fats Domino and Gene Vincent. And later on, Tommy Tucker, Willie Dixon, and Muddy Waters….the obvious blues people. I played on The London muddy Waters Sessions (Chess), and did a few Willie Dixon numbers that time. I have the album, yeah. Muddy was really good at it. I have the London Muddy Waters-Howling Wolf Sessions as well.”
Rory Gallagher with his 1960 Silvertone 1323. He used this guitar in the studio a lot in 1973 while recording the Blueprint and Tattoo albums.
“In America, if you looked in the old pawnshops in the old days… I found a fifteen dollar guitar, a Silvertone, which is a Danelectro, and I recorded “A Million Miles Away” and “Cradle Rock” on that guitar.
So I spotted these things earlier than others. Now it’s different, because everyone’s sharp: they see you coming! When you say; ‘Can I have a look at that Danelectro?’, they think: ‘Oh, this guy is from Europe, he can afford to pay a thousand dollars or something.”
Stevie Ray Vaughan believed that his 1930s National Duolian guitar was once owned by Blind Boy Fuller. The guitar was given to him by a roadie, Byron Barr, who bought it in 1981. SRV claimed the guitar was a 1928 dobro, but the supposed serial number (C704) indicates it’s actually a Duolian—a model that wasn't manufactured until 1930.
Regardless, the guitar was said to be a favorite of SRV and a prized possession. He was known to take the guitar with him on tour, regularly playing it backstage and in his free time.
He can be seen holding this guitar on the cover “In Step” album.
The only "known" recording of SRV using this guitar was on "Oreo Cookie Blues" on Lonnie Mack's "Strike Like Lightning" CD.
A Martin N-20 nylon-string acoustic with the serial number 242830, Trigger dates to early 1969, which means it was brand-new when Willie Nelson obtained it that same year. Why was Willie in need of a new guitar? Because he had laid his beloved Baldwin 800C acoustic on stage between sets and, as the story goes, a drunkard stepped on it.
With Nelson’s Baldwin broken, he took it to luthier Shot Jackson, who indeed deemed the guitar unsalvageable. Instead, he sold Willie a brand-new Martin N-20 for $750 – which current inflation puts at more than $5,600 – and installed the Baldwin’s PrismaTone and preamp into it. But rather than remove the Baldwin’s pickup and install it into the Martin’s bridge, Jackson removed the entire bridge from the brand-new Martin and replaced it with the Baldwin’s, which already had the mounting holes drilled into it.
Willie and Trigger, which wouldn’t get its nickname until many years later, formed a tight bond. The sound of an amplified nylon-stringed instrument played, unconventionally, with a pick was unusual. Since they were traditionally played fingerstyle, classical guitars such as the N-20 didn’t even come with pickguards.
The N-20 was first catalogued in 1969, though Martin began building them in 1968. The model wasn’t a bestseller by any means. Only 262 were made in 1969, making it quite rare.
Trigger wears the scars of more than 50 years of life on the road. The frets are all original but have worn down, meaning some notes thump or buzz. Rather than fixing the issue, as is standard procedure, the artefacts have become part of Trigger’s ageing sound through the years. Just as our voices age over time, the tone of Trigger can be tracked over decades of recordings and live performances.
“Trigger’s like me,” Willie once said with a laugh “Old and beat-up.”
Duane Allman occasionally used a 1961 Gibson SG (serial number 15263) finished in cherry red which he got from Dickey Betts – who himself played it in the early days of the Allman Brothers. Most notably, he played this guitar on Statesboro Blues.
Dickey Betts: "What happened back then was I had this SG when we started the band, and then I got a Les Paul, my ’57, and when Duane wanted to play slide he would have to re-tune his one guitar every f**** time. And I got tired of it and said, “Here, take this guitar and tune it, and leave it tuned!” and gave him my SG. He loved that guitar."
The SG originally featured a Gibson sideways Vibrola tremolo, as can be seen from the screw holes left on the body, but it was removed and replaced with a stop bar by the time it got in Duane’s hands. It was equipped with two Gibson PAF humbucking pickups, and it featured the original small pickguard. Also, the truss rod cover seems to be either replaced, since it shows no “Les Paul” logo and does not have the white edge, or it was removed altogether.
The guitar was sold by Graham Nash at an auction. The opening bid was $125,000, but the guitar eventually fetched $591,000.
Speaking of GUITARS Now here is an odd bod from the Butterboy!
this ought to be right up my strasse and it is but 13 discs!? THIRTEEN!?
That’s gonna take me a while to listen and review so have at it guitar nuts, musos etc and let me know what you reckon! From Michael Chapman, B.J.Cole, to Jack Rose and John Fahey! and that’;s just a few I HAVE heard of!!! Enjoy!
Imaginational Anthem Vol. 01-13 is one of the most ambitious and reverent anthologies assembled around the American Primitive guitar tradition.
Released across two decades by Tompkins Square Records, the series began in 2005 as a quiet homage to fingerstyle innovators like John Fahey,
Robbie Basho, and Leo Kottke, but quickly evolved into a sprawling, multi-generational archive that bridges archival rediscovery with
contemporary experimentation.
Each volume carries its own curatorial logic, but taken as a whole, the 13-CD set offers a panoramic view of steel-string acoustic guitar as a storytelling medium.
The early volumes (01-04) lean heavily into rediscovered private press recordings, rare 1960s -1970s solo works, and unearthed demos from forgotten players.
These discs are rich with rarities, including tracks by Harry Taussig, Sandy Bull, and Max Ochs, often sourced from long-out-of-print LPs or unreleased acetates.
Tompkins Square’s commitment to provenance is evident throughout, liner notes are meticulous, and mastering is sympathetic to the original analog warmth.
Mid-series volumes (05-09) shift toward contemporary interpretations, featuring artists like Daniel Bachman, Chuck Johnson, and William Tyler,
who channel the Fahey ethos while expanding its harmonic vocabulary. These discs document a living tradition, where drone, raga, and ambient
textures meet Appalachian roots and modal folk. Volume 07, is notable for its geographic diversity, with contributors from the US, UK, Lisbon, Malta,
and South America. It leans into ambient, experimental, and post-folk textures, offering a modern lens on solo acoustic guitar.
The later volumes (10–13) return to archival excavation, with Volume 10 spotlighting early 20th-century 78rpm recordings, and Volume 13
offering a global perspective, including rare tracks from Japanese and European acoustic innovators. This final installment reframes
the genre as a worldwide phenomenon, not just an American artifact.
Throughout the series, Tompkins Square maintains a consistent aesthetic: understated packaging, poetic liner notes, and a deep respect for the artists’ intent.
The label’s founder, Josh Rosenthal, deserves credit for shaping the series into a kind of sonic museum, one that balances discovery with continuity.
For archival purposes, this set is a goldmine, it spans eras, styles, and geographies with minimal overlap, and its sequencing across volumes
reflects both historical lineage and curatorial vision. Whether used for genre mapping, provenance tracing, or sonic inspiration,
Imaginational Anthem stands as a definitive document of acoustic guitar’s expressive potential. (Butterboy)
In 1985 Guitar World ran a photo essay of Johnny Winter, Dickey Betts, and Brian Setzer displaying their tattoos. Johnny’s photo also graced the cover of Easy Riders: Tattoo Magazine of Skin Art in 1989. Getting tattooed exposed Johnny’s skin, and his music, to a new audience. “A lot of bikers like my music now that didn’t before I got tattooed,” he says. “More bikers bought my records because they identified with me.” A line drawing of Johnny’s Lazer guitar, a streamlined instrument that resembles a Steinberger bass, accompanied the 1989 interview “Rockin’ Tattoo Blues.” He bought it from luthier Mark Erlewine in the early 1980s, but didn’t start playing it until 1984, when he broke a string on his Firebird.
Erlewine, who made the Automatic guitar for Johnny’s friend Billy Gibbons in ZZ Top (as well as Don Felder of the Eagles and Mark Knopfler from Dire Straits), brought a Chiquita, a guitar about a foot shorter than a Stratocaster, to Johnny’s gig at the Austin Opry House. Johnny liked the Chiquita. The following year, Erlewine showed him a Lazer, a lightweight full-scale guitar, and Johnny bought a black model. “I remember trying it and liking it,” says Johnny. “It feels real good and it s pretty lightweight. The Lazer is a little bit easier to play than the Firebird. The action is as high, but the strings pull easier. It sounds close to a Fender. It’s a better sounding guitar than the Firebird; it’s more biting and has more of a treble sound. But I still use the Firebird on slide songs; the slide still sounds better on the Firebird.”
Source: Sullivan, Mary Lou. Raisin' Cain: The Wild and Raucous Story of Johnny Winter
