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Permalink Reply by David Tutterrow GutBucketGuitars on July 15, 2011 at 6:11pm

I went into the local shooting range this past weekend to see if they would give/sell me some bullet casings that I use on my builds. At first, they refused because they thought I was using them to "reload", whatever that means. I explained that I use them for my cigar box guitars and they agreed to let me take a few handfuls. They thought the guitars were like a ukelele or some sort of kids toy so I went and got one from the car (for just such an emergency) and brought it in.

 

When I walked in with it, the lady of the husband/wife team said, "Oh, how cute." The husband looked it up and down with curiosity and obviously thought it was more of a craft show item than an instrument. He plucked the strings a few times and perked up a little. I asked him if he wanted to hear it plugged up. "It's electric?" he said. I went to get my micro cube and when I came back in, he and his wife were both taking pictures of it with their iPhones as a customer looked on.

 

I plugged it up and played (badly) for about 30 seconds and he asked if it was for sale. I sold it to him right there. They also told me I could come in and get bullet shells any time I needed them.

 

I guess my experience is: I don't think a whole lot of people really understand these CBGs...until they hear them and realize these are bona fide instruments (in the hands of someone other than myself). They think they're toy guitars or something, at least in my experiences anyway. My best friend bought one from me after seeing pictures of it and said he thought it would be neat to hang it on his wall. I played it for him (again, badly) and he was amazed. Now he's told a friend of his about them who plays in a band and wants me to bring one to his show so he can check it out. I haven't run across any true snobbery yet, but I'm sure it's out there as so many of you have attested to and I hope i don't. So far, in my short time doing this, it's been a lack of understanding.

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Permalink Reply by Ryan Rose on July 16, 2011 at 2:29am

"Reloading" is exactly that. Clean the case, reprime it, add some powder and a new bullet, and it's ready to shoot again.

As far as discrimination, I haven't really seen much. There's a lady at work who wants one, for a wall decoration. She also wants it to be a four-string, because "you can't play anything on three strings." Huh? You just said you were going to hang it on the wall. I showed her a video of a three-string guitar, and was told that "he's not really playing a song; he's just making chords." Uh, yeah, and when you put them in a certain order, like he's doing, that's called a song. I had the same problem when I mentioned one-string instruments. It wasn't until I played her "Amazing Grace" on the canjo that it clicked in her head that you could actually play music on something with less than four strings. And yet she still wants one for decoration. So she's still waiting.

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Permalink Reply by Grease Stains on July 17, 2011 at 10:18am

in my experiance 90% of people are blown away by the fact that they work (i was! hah) and love them. that 10% tneds to be your guitar-snobes. to them nothing under $1500 is worth looking at. Hah, these are also the same people that love the sound of my strat, till they realise it's a Squire.

these people also tend to miss or lack the idea that there is a value in doing somthing your self. like one guy told a buddy of mine, "they perfected building guitars a long time ago." i lent my bud one of the can's. the guy liked it, was impressed by the sound i got, but admitted he still didn't understand why i'd want to do it. i guess it like Jesse James (the bike builder) said "If you have to ask, you just don't get it man."

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