At 8:24 this evening...

DING-dong

bark bark bark, woof woof woof

shad-duP!

who the hell is that?
better not be a J/W this time of nite!
ya' hungry Moose?

hello? What's this large package on my back porch?
is that a FedEx van pullin' away? hmm. my Rob Allen
doubleneck was sent via FedEx...?

HOLY CRAP!

sho`nuff. it's the double!!!
brrr! It's dang cold out hyar.
let's get you inside sweetheart.

aww geez...freakin' peanuts!

alrighty. let's un-box this thang.

sweeet custom Burgundy gig bag by "Under Cover".

okay hands! stop shakin'! just open the purty gig bag and...

<marquee>beep-beep-beep &nbsp; beep-beep-beep</marquee>

golly gee-whiz, I'd almost forgot - I'm on call this week. Yey!

Anyhoo...it's a beauty! And so freakin' LIGHT.
I visited the FedEx tracking page (about every 5 minutes)
and noticed somethin' neat: "Total Weight: 11.0 lbs" (tee-hee)
And those UN-lined ebony and cocobolo boards! I don't
think my hands have ever been happier. I'm gonna let her
sit for bit and "adjust", then put some fresh Roto 88's on
the bottom neck and T/I Acousticores on the upper.
I dunno why Rob shipped it with Roto tapes on the upper and
LaBella tapes on the lower -- what's the p'ernt?

I'm sure if I stop to think about waitin' nine months for this,
PLUS the fifteen years it's been since I had to sell my ol'
Ric 4080/12, not to mention the various scars, punctures,
and mangled mitts courtesy the ex-PBFH...

#272's name (for now) will be: Vindicator. Maybe later -
Charles & Mambo

But fer now...

(for pics go hyah)

 

Thanx fellers .

I know I should be`sheddin gruffer. But I don't wanna'
bring her up to pitch (just yet). She's been through a lot...
bonked around some plane's cargo hold and the back of
some van with X-boxes, betsy-wetsy's, and all that other
Xmas stuff. And this dang Texas weather .

I did do a little noodlin'...I couldn't keep my hands off that
coco-buddah board . One thing about R/A's is when ya'
hold`em close, you can feel the body vibratin'. I guess coz
that swamp ash bod is so much bigger than my single, it really
set my sternum to singin'.

Now. What to do with all the others (`cept the Franken-Yammer).
What to do?...what to do?

 

#1. I hate frets (j/k )

The whole thing came about as a result of experimentin'
with different strings on my single #115. I tried all the tapewounds -
Fender, GHS, LaBella, and Rotosound. Settled on Roto 88 LD -- a
sweet, woody, "airy" thump.

Next, I got a bug to try some phosphor-bronzezzz. The first (and
last) set I tried were Thomastik-Infeld AB344 Acousticores.
Roundwound p/b over a nylon core. Rubbery? Yup! But
what a tone!!! For those not into subtlety, y'all can stop here .
Runnin' through my D-180 with that cascading channel bidness
gave some wacky, over the top compression.

OK. Call me greedy. I wanted to have both tones available on a
moment's notice without havin' to swap out strings, re-tweak coz of
the different tension, etc. I figgered the Rotos on the coco-b would
be a good all-purpose tone. The `Coustis on ebony (coz they're
roundwounds, albeit bronze) would be a great "solo" sound.

Or...it's some Freudian, sub-conscious thingie of tryin' to replace
my long lost Ric 4080/12.
Specious reasoning or psycho-babble . I don't really give
a sh*t. It's my money