About a month ago, I mentioned that novelist Jonathan Kellerman has recently published a book titled With Strings Attached: The Art and Beauty of Vintage Guitars, which is about his stellar guitar collection. I’ve since had a chance to read the book, and it is fantastic. The photos are gorgeous, and Mr. Kellerman includes detailed descriptions about many of the guitars. Not only is the book fantastic, but the guitar collection is fantastic, as well.

Mr. Kellerman was kind enough to answer a few questions about his guitar collection for us:

Guitar Lifestyle: What criteria do you look for when selecting guitars for your collection?
Jonathan Kellerman: Sound.  Sound, and sound.  LOL.  Seriously, although tone is always paramount, I’m attracted to instruments that require high degrees of craftsmanship – premium archtops, classicals, deluxe flattops such as prewar Martin 45’s.  But really, anything well-made that sounds great.  However, given limitations of space, time, and funds, one does need to be selective.  Though I have amassed around 120 guitars, they were acquired over a 35 year period.  So you can see that the rate of acquisition wasn’t that high (by guitar addict standards.)  I used to trade up, but once I started finding really great stuff, I stopped.  One of my great pleasures is finding an old instrument that was rarely, if ever played, and opening it up.

GL: Is there one particular guitar that stands out as the “pride” of your collection, or are they like kids…you can’t pick a favorite?
JK: I used to answer that question with the old it’s-like-choosing among my kids reply.  But now that I’ve owned – and have played Torres F.E.17, I have to say it’s the one I’d keep if I was stuck on a desert island.  The history, provenance and sound are profound and I feel privileged to be the custodian of such a fabulous, historically and eminently playable instrument.  Leading to your next question:

GL: I noticed in the book that you have an enviable collection of classical guitars, including two built by Antonio de Torres and one that once belonged to Francisco Tarrega. What is it like to own and play a guitar like that with so much history attached to it?
JK: The experience of playing a composition by Tarrega on Tarrega’s own guitar is as close to guitar nirvana as I could ever get.  It’s a smallish instrument with an amazingly large tone and despite fragile construction and multiple restorations – include some butchery – it sounds amazing, with a strong bass and those bell-like trebles for which Torres was acclaimed.  It is truly a piece of usable art.

GL: You mentioned in the book that you have passed on buying a 1959 Les Paul several times throughout the years. Given their skyrocketing value, do you ever plan to add one to your collection?
JK: Flametops remain too high for me, though I have noticed some serious drops in price due to the current financial situation.  That may be because the prices were driven up by investment-oriented hedge-fund types who are now divesting, but I can’t be sure of that.  Think about it: 58-60 LP’s are great guitars, but they were factory made out of solid wood, and well over 1000 were manufactured.  Yet, they still sell for more than double what that Torres cost.  I’ll be watching the market, though, to see if prices reach a point that I find comfortable.  In the end, it’s subjective.

GL: Do you have any advice for others who are looking to build a guitar collection?
JK: I’d say do your research and self-educate meticulously, play as many examples of your target guitars as you can find so you can make an intelligent choice, be aware of the market and avoid over-paying – for example, when buying at auction, set your max and don’t go past it.  Most important, buy what excites you – a guitar you’re really going to enjoy playing, rather than what you think will be a good investment.

A very special thanks to Jonathan Kellerman for taking the time to answer these questions. I highly recommend With Strings Attached: The Art and Beauty of Vintage Guitars as well as any of Kellerman’s novels.

Back Door Slam had a big year in 2008. I was able to catch them early last year as they traveled through Nashville supporting James McMurtry. Later in the year, they were given the opening slot for the Kid Rock/Lynyrd Skynyrd tour. And, to round out the year, they toured with Gov’t Mule. I’m glad to see them getting some recognition; they really put on a great show. It’s amazing that each member of the band is only 21. I predict big things for them in the coming years. If you get a chance to see them, I highly recommend it!

Here’s a video of Back Door Slam’s guitarist and vocalist Davy Knowles with Warren Haynes and Gov’t Mule playing “Almost Cut My Hair” by CSNY:

TheGearPage.net forums have a nice collection of photographs of the gear that the guitarists on the Experience Hendrix tour were using. For example, there are photos of Eric Johnson’s rig, Brad Whitford’s rig, Mato Nanji’s rig, Bernard Allison’s rig, Eric Gales’s rig, Kenny Wayne Shepherd’s rig, Jonny Lang’s rig, Buddy Guy’s rig, and there are also pictures of some of the artists’ pedalboards.

Interestingly, the guitar techs were asked to tape over the Fender logos on the Fender amps because Gibson was sponsoring the show. Seems like a silly move to me. I’m sure that most people in the audience knew what kind of amps they were.

Check out the gear photos here.

I was browsing YouTube the other day and noticed this early performance of Eric Johnson playing Song for George. You may be familiar with the version that appears on Johnson’s album Ah Via Musicom. However, in early performances, he played the song on a Dobro, as shown in the following video. I like the Dobro version even better than the recorded version!

Last week, I met some friends at a local movie theater for a showing of David Gilmour’s Live at Gdansk DVD. I’ve been on a bit of a David Gilmour kick over the past few weeks, and I’ve recently watched Gilmour’s Remember That Night - Live at Royal Albert Hall and Pink Floyd’s Pulse. So, I was pretty pumped to see this new DVD.

Much like the Live at Royal Albert Hall DVD, the Live at Gdansk DVD includes many great Pink Floyd hits, as well as performances of songs from Gilmour’s latest album On an Island. In addition to Gilmour’s touring band, the DVD features the Baltic Philharmonic Symphony Orchestra, which adds an interesting touch to the music.

Overall, I thought this was a very good concert recording. Gilmour, as always, is great, and the band is also very good. However, having recently seen Remember That Night - Live at Royal Albert Hall, I can’t help but compare the two DVDs, and the Royal Albert Hall concert was better, in my opinion.

My first impression of the Live at Gdansk concert was that it took Gilmour a song or two to really get going. And, his playing, while tasteful as always, lacked a little bit of the spark that was in the Royal Albert Hall concert. By any standards, his playing was still great, but just not quite as crisp and sharp as in the Royal Albert Hall show.

That being said, I still really enjoyed the Live at Gdansk show and would recommend it to any fan of Pink Floyd and David Gilmour. However, if you haven’t seen Remember that Night - Live at Royal Albert Hall, I would recommend getting that DVD first.

Fender has launched a mini-site for the release of the NOS and Relic David Gilmour Signature Series Stratocasters. The mini-site has a lot of great features, including a timeline of the guitar, details about the guitars, the story behind the guitars, and media from Gilmour’s recent Live at Gdansk DVD.

I first heard about the Fender Kenny Wayne Shepherd Artist Series Stratocaster several months ago, but didn’t hear much about it from Fender. However, I noticed today that Fender has information about the guitar on their Web site.

The guitar is based on Kenny’s own ‘61 Fender Strat and features custom-voiced Kenny Wayne Shepherd pickups, an alder body, maple neck w/ rosewood fretboard, and 21 jumbo frets.

This guitar looks pretty nice and has a street price in the $700-$750 range. Guitar Center is reporting that models will be available in October.

As an interesting (to me) aside, Kenny Wayne Shepherd played a small role in my wife and I getting together. At the time, my wife and I had mutual friends and one night I mentioned that I was going to the KWS concert that was coming up. At the time, KWS was not all that well known, but my wife surprised me by knowing who he was and being interested in going to the show. Not only that, she was a fan of SRV, as well. She’s had my heart ever since!

Fender has recently introduced the Jim Adkins JA-90 Thinline Telecaster. Adkins is the guitarist and frontman for Jimmy Eat World. I’m not all that familiar with Jimmy Eat World, but this looks like a nice guitar! The guitar features P-90s, a semi-hollow Ash body, medium jumbo frets and comes in red or black.

(via Electric Guitar Review)

I mentioned a few weeks ago that Jimmy Page, John Paul Jones, and Jason Bonham were in the studio jamming together and writing new material. It seems like politics may prevent a full reunion with Robert Plant from occurring, but MusicRadar is reporting that Plant may be interested in a potential reunion, there’s just a lot of paperwork to fill out:

Just for the O2 show, Plant says, “The endless paperwork was like nothing I’ve experienced before. I’ve kept every one of the emails that were exchanged before the concert and I’m thinking of compiling them for a book, which I feel sure would be hailed as a sort of literary version of Spinal Tap.”