Summer Road Trip

I'm headed out to BC this summer for some touring and will be making a road trip movie. I will be doing some remote recording, ocean side jamming and expect to be stopping in many truck stop diners. Ultimately I'll end with some video, audio and put it all together in a documentary style production. A 'behind-the-scenes' experience of being on the road with me.

I'm looking for your help in the form of suggestions of what you'd like to know about being on the road. What are the things you've always wondered about? Do you want to know which are my favorite truck stops? Do you want to see the various road side attractions along the way?

What about songs? Which of my songs would you like to hear 'campfire' recordings of? This is your opportunity to shape this production your way.

Re-imagining my life

Today is a cold day here in Winnipeg. Coldest day so far this winter and it's Valentine's day to boot! I like the irony in that. Great day for snuggling together if you got a snuggling partner.

I've spent alot of time in the past few weeks re-imagining my life. I've spent the past 20 years knowing that I would be a professional musician and am in the rare posititon of having completed most of the dreams I had in this career. Certainly all the important dreams have been achieved. Which leaves me questioning what to do next. I started playing guitar at eighteen knowing that I would play for a living. In all those years I did many other jobs but always with the focus of playing guitar as my main priority. So now what?

What do you do when all your dreams have been achieved? I've been thinking about moving into promotions or graphic design. I'm a pretty good graphic artist and think there is lots of creative work there. I also think about the retail world and my work at Sled Dog Music. Should I try to own a store and keep working in that world? Or should I just go full steam ahead and create a new CD and tour like mad again? Anyway dear readers when I know I'll happily share it with you. For now I am bundled up against the cold enjoying a rare morning off - trying to re-imagine my life.

The crowd at Solid Ground

Here is the view from the stage at the Solid Ground Cafe in Lorette. Lindsay Jane and Vanessa took good care of me and the show was a real hoot.

Telecaster Upgrades

Alright. I promised you I'd upload some pics as the work went and here they are. This is my "retro" baby here on the left. To refresh your memory (and for the benefit of new readers) I recently acquired a Squire Telecaster (made in China) with the plan to upgrade it with a better bridge and better electronics.

1. First thing I did was change the stock white pickguard to the lovely tortoise shell model you see here. I also upgraded the 3-way switch that came with the guitar. The original was 'spongy' and soft feeling.

2. Next I ordered a Wilkinson 3 saddle bridge (right) to replace the stock one. The stock one was fine but with the lovely "retro" colours of this guitar I wanted something more traditional. I also outfitted the guitar with two new DiMarzio pickups. For the 'neck' position I chose the famous Twang King pickup. It has the sound of an old vintage pickup and even came with vintage wire attached. The bridge position I installed is the Virtual T pickup. It is a stacked 'humbucking' pickup that keeps the traditional brige sound but does so with no hum.

3. First job was to fit the new bridge. Here you see my friend (and guitar guru) John Sharples drilling a pilot hole for the screw holes that will hold the new bridge down. The Wilkinson is a little smaller than the stock bridge so new holes had to be drilled and I'll be filling in the old holes soon. After temporarily mounting the new bridge and checking the string allignment, we marked and then drilled out the new screw holes. After the holes were drilled we test mounted the bridge and were satisfied that it was mounted correctly.

4. The next step was to feed all the wires through to the control cavity. Once that was complete all I needed to do was complete 5 solder connections and the bridge replacement and pickup install would be complete.

Here is a picture of the bridge mounted and the wires all hanging out of the cavity. You can still see the holes from the original bridge behind the new bridge.

If you've been reading my blog you know that I've wired my kit tele before I attempted this one and I've worked on a few others as well. Needless to say I am alot more comfortable with the soldering job than I was on that first guitar and I pleased to announce that I didn't grab the hot end once during this operation. The new pickups were wired in and the ground straps all placed. Then the control cavity was closed up and the the set up work begun.


5. So here is the finished Bridge and Pickup install all ready for setup. Once I had it set up I couldn't resist and I plugged her in and gave her a run around the block. The new pickups are glorious and the whole thing sounds amazing.

Now how bout the budget?
Squire Guitar - $230.00
Fender Pickguard - $55.00
Wilkinson Bridge - $40.00
Twang King PU - $85.00
Virtual T PU - $129.00
Total Cost - $539.00

Unbelievable Tone & Vintage Vibe - Priceless!