Fear the Gear

The Gear is Near

THIS is why I'm poor and can't hear well...

Ike likes loud guitars... He's an old skool dinosaur, not a shredder

The Punk Project

The Project? To repaint and refurb this 96 Strat 50th Anniversary Edition

It's in rough shape... These were taken in the Fall of 2006...

Still working on it as of Jan 07... Some pictures to come... Will be a Wacky Packages Punk guitar...

An Old Pic before the Zakk

Ace - a Gibson Ace Frehley Signature Series Les Paul made on December 23rd of 1997 - S#93537569.

Zakk - an Epiphone Les Paul Custom Zakk Wylde Signature Camo - S#:I05091709

Tony - a Standard SG Gibson made on July 28th of 1998 - S#92098569

Jimi - a Cherry Red Fender Stratocaster from 1990 S#N986435
No... not strung for a lefty...

And this is Carla... - She's like Satchel Paige because I don't have the first idea how old she is. No serial number, no markings, nothing. She's a Carlo Robelli Archtop Jazz guitar, but the year she was born is a complete mystery. I bought her around 2001 at NJ Guitar and Bass on Amboy Ave in Edison NJ (They're good guys over there). I usually keep a Spanish tune on her and keep her within reach. Real nice.

Anyone with a clue as to the production age of the above axe please drop me a line...

Kiss, Gibson and the USA.

The Story of Ace

For this fever the only prescription is more cowbell

In the spring of 2006 I decided that I was finally going to get one of the the guitars I had always wanted. Being a KISS/Zep fan, a nice Gibson Les Paul with a cherry sunburst paint job was very high on the "gotta have one" list. I figured to see if there were any signature Ace Frehley's floating about. I saw one on Ebay and waited until the very last minute to place a bid. I lost. I had the winning bid with 21 seconds left, and I still lost. I hated it, but I had a good attitude. I figured one day an Ace guitar would find its way to my house.

It took an hour. That's when I got an email that saved the day. It was from Jeff Donahoe down in Virginia. He is a big time Ace Frehley collector and had a signature Ace Gibson he was looking to sell. He saw me lose the auction online and was now giving me a second chance to own the guitar of my dreams. What's more is that his Ace was better than the one auctioned off and he gave it to me for less than I bid. I got very lucky.

I'd asked him why he wanted to part with a Gibson Ace guitar. He said he wanted to "Thin the herd" a bit. Huh? I wondered what he was talking about. Then he sent me this picture.

Those guys are most of Jeff's Frehleys (He has more and he makes smokers too, how awesome). What's even better is that he has some 300s. What's a 300? When the Frehley models first came out there were 300 of them that were specially made at the Gibson Custom and Historic Shop. Serial numbers 1 thru 300 were made between March and June 1997 and, needless to say, they are pretty rare beasts. Jeff has five of them. That's right... five...

#'s 11, 127, 156, 205 and 289. Not too shabby, huh?

So, while not a "300", my Ace comes from a pretty prestigious guitar family. Thanks again Jeff!