# Unusual guitar/bass equipment from well known guitarists/bassists? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [May 1, 2020, 12:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unusual-guitar-bass-equipment-from-well-known-guitarists-bassists/852971 "2020-05-01T12:39:40Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Bijou\_Drains](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bijou_drains/32/2814_2.png) [@Bijou\_Drains](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bijou_Drains)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2020, 12:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unusual-guitar-bass-equipment-from-well-known-guitarists-bassists/852971/1 "2020-05-01T12:39:40Z")
I will start off with : Brian May of Queen uses a coin as a guitar pick. He thinks plastic picks are too flexible. ---
**Author:** ![wguy123](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wguy123/32/3161_2.png) [@wguy123](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wguy123)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2020, 2:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unusual-guitar-bass-equipment-from-well-known-guitarists-bassists/852971/2 "2020-05-01T14:19:24Z")
> [@Bijou\_Drains](#): > > I will start off with : Brian May of Queen uses a coin as a guitar pick. He thinks plastic picks are too flexible. What about his guitar? :eek: ---
**Author:** ![Guest-starring\_Id](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guest-starring_id/32/21736_2.png) [@Guest-starring\_Id](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guest-starring_Id)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2020, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unusual-guitar-bass-equipment-from-well-known-guitarists-bassists/852971/3 "2020-05-01T14:39:26Z")
While we’re quickly on the subject of picks - Sonny Sharrock liked to keep a bowl of them nearby while he was playing live. He would put some in his mouth, from which he’d grab a new one to replace the one he was currently using, or just spit some back out again. Neat seeing Tony Levin whipping out the ole [Chapman stick,](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chapman_Stick) like, back in '84. The great Allan Holdsworth on [snythaxe.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6GtbBmNEEWg) ---
**Author:** ![Bijou\_Drains](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bijou_drains/32/2814_2.png) [@Bijou\_Drains](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bijou_Drains)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2020, 2:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unusual-guitar-bass-equipment-from-well-known-guitarists-bassists/852971/4 "2020-05-01T14:47:34Z")
> [@wguy123](#): > > What about his guitar? :eek: May’s main guitar is a custom model he built himself with his father in the 60s: > **[Red Special](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Special)** > > The Red Special is the electric guitar designed and built by Queen's guitarist Brian May and his father, Harold, when Brian was a teenager in the early 1960s. The Red Special is sometimes referred to as the Fireplace or the Old Lady by May and by others. The name Red Special came from the reddish-brown colour the guitar attained after being stained and painted with numerous layers of Rustins Plastic Coating. The name Fireplace is a reference to the fact that the wood used to make the A guitar... ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2020, 3:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unusual-guitar-bass-equipment-from-well-known-guitarists-bassists/852971/5 "2020-05-01T15:38:51Z")
Billy Gibbons claims to play using a Mexican Peso from the 1950s. Although he probably has or does at times he also has had deals with companies to make custom picks. Steve Morse played his Frankenstein telecaster for years. Telecaster body and a strat neck. He redid all the wiring and added a weird collection of pickups. He played it until a signature model was made for him that did everything his old guitar did but better. > **[All-Star Gear: Steve Morse's Frankenstein Telecaster](https://www.musicradar.com/news/guitars/all-star-gear-steve-morses-frankenstein-telecaster-544071)** > > Progressive rock, country, bluegrass, jazz, classical, funk - there's hardly a style of music that Steve Morse hasn't mastered. Starting with his groundbreaking fusion band, the Dixie Dregs, right on ---
**Author:** ![Jonathan\_Chance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jonathan_chance/32/701_2.png) [@Jonathan\_Chance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jonathan_Chance)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2020, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unusual-guitar-bass-equipment-from-well-known-guitarists-bassists/852971/6 "2020-05-01T15:39:43Z")
Alex Lifeson of Rush invented specialize guitar stands that allow him to switch instruments during certain songs that required it. Especially between acoustic and electric. Apocryphally, he also used the same concept to build Neil a book stand so he could read while having breakfast. ---
**Author:** ![Bijou\_Drains](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bijou_drains/32/2814_2.png) [@Bijou\_Drains](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bijou_Drains)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2020, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unusual-guitar-bass-equipment-from-well-known-guitarists-bassists/852971/7 "2020-05-01T16:27:04Z")
Lindsey Buckingham also uses a custom made electric guitar for live shows. ---
**Author:** ![blondebear](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/blondebear/32/1022_2.png) [@blondebear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/blondebear)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2020, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unusual-guitar-bass-equipment-from-well-known-guitarists-bassists/852971/8 "2020-05-01T16:44:11Z")
> [@Loach](#): > > Steve Morse played his Frankenstein telecaster for years. Telecaster body and a strat neck. He redid all the wiring and added a weird collection of pickups. He played it until a signature model was made for him that did everything his old guitar did but better. Speaking of Frankenstein axes, John Entwistle, on the creation of his “Frankenstein Bass”: _I put this together in San Francisco on a day off part way through a Who tour. It’s the remains of five smashed basses hence the name ‘Frankenstein’…The neck, pickups and circuitry are from a ‘dead’ slab bass, the tailpiece from a Jazz bass, the pickguard from a black P bass and the machine heads from 2 white P basses…Two hours with a Phillips screwdriver and a soldering iron and I was ranting around my hotel room screaming “It’s alive, it’s alive!”_ The bass sold at auction in 2003 for £62,400 ($100,000). ---
**Author:** ![squeegee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/squeegee/32/14537_2.png) [@squeegee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/squeegee)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2020, 6:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unusual-guitar-bass-equipment-from-well-known-guitarists-bassists/852971/9 "2020-05-01T18:47:08Z")
> [@Loach](#): > > Billy Gibbons claims to play using a Mexican Peso from the 1950s. Although he probably has or does at times he also has had deals with companies to make custom picks. Gibbons gets weirder than that: he plays all his guitars strung with .007s; guitar strings as fine as hair. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2020, 8:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unusual-guitar-bass-equipment-from-well-known-guitarists-bassists/852971/10 "2020-05-01T20:32:41Z")
Rick Neilson of Cheap Trick has a bevy of guitars; in concert, he plays a different one for each song. Most unusual is his [five-necked guitar](https://societyofrock.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/2015-10-16-1445029822-3615972-ricknielsen3.jpg). [There are other](https://societyofrock.com/rick-nielsens-top-5-over-the-top-guitars-these-are-ridiculous/)s that stand out. ZZ Top had their [rotating guitars](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wjef-h9MbxA). Neilson was working on the same concept when they started using them, so he made the five-necked one instead. ---
**Author:** ![Bijou\_Drains](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bijou_drains/32/2814_2.png) [@Bijou\_Drains](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bijou_Drains)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2020, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unusual-guitar-bass-equipment-from-well-known-guitarists-bassists/852971/11 "2020-05-01T20:44:47Z")
Willie Nelson has an acoustic guitar that is so old he put another hole in it above the sound hole. Bo Diddley had a rectangular guitar. ---
**Author:** ![blondebear](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/blondebear/32/1022_2.png) [@blondebear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/blondebear)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2020, 9:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unusual-guitar-bass-equipment-from-well-known-guitarists-bassists/852971/12 "2020-05-01T21:03:56Z")
Ace Frehley outfitted a couple of his Les Pauls with smoke bombs and fireworks to fire off during his solos. ---
**Author:** ![DrCube](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a3d4f5/32.png) [@DrCube](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrCube)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2020, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unusual-guitar-bass-equipment-from-well-known-guitarists-bassists/852971/13 "2020-05-01T21:27:27Z")
I can’t even explain what Roy “[Future Man](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Future_Man)” Wooten plays with Bela Fleck and the Flecktones, but I’ll try. He calls it a SynthAxe Drumitar. The [SynthAxe](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SynthAxe) is apparently a guitar shaped MIDI synthesizer (of which only 100 were ever made), which he modified into some sort of [drum machine](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zendrum) and uses it mainly as a percussion instrument. ---
**Author:** ![Guest-starring\_Id](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guest-starring_id/32/21736_2.png) [@Guest-starring\_Id](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guest-starring_Id)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2020, 9:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unusual-guitar-bass-equipment-from-well-known-guitarists-bassists/852971/14 "2020-05-01T21:53:36Z")
Aside from the Manson double-neck acoustic (with a mandolin neck thrown in, on top, for chuckles) John Paul Jones also has a triple-neck mandolin with an acoustic bass on the bottom of the instrument. Wouldn’t mind seeing that second gizmo. ---
**Author:** ![Shoeless](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/shoeless/32/7099_2.png) [@Shoeless](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shoeless)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2020, 10:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unusual-guitar-bass-equipment-from-well-known-guitarists-bassists/852971/15 "2020-05-01T22:53:58Z")
Never heard of a SynthAxe before. So, kind of the polar opposite of a Keytar? ---
**Author:** ![wguy123](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wguy123/32/3161_2.png) [@wguy123](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wguy123)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2020, 1:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unusual-guitar-bass-equipment-from-well-known-guitarists-bassists/852971/16 "2020-05-02T01:00:31Z")
> [@Bijou\_Drains](#): > > May’s main guitar is a custom model he built himself with his father in the 60s: > > [Red Special - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Special) That’s why I brought it up. I thought that way more interesting than his using a coin as a pick. Who else built their own electric guitar that they then used for an entire rock-n-roll career? Eddie Van Halen is famous for his frankenguitar, but that was made by someone else and then modified by him. Brian and his dad made the entire guitar, including the body, the neck and the tremolo system. About the only thing they didn’t make was the pickups, but they did modify them. ---
**Author:** ![blondebear](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/blondebear/32/1022_2.png) [@blondebear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/blondebear)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2020, 3:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unusual-guitar-bass-equipment-from-well-known-guitarists-bassists/852971/17 "2020-05-02T03:17:37Z")
Nigel Tufnel would play his guitar solos using a violin–not a violin _bow_, but a violin–and would stop in mid-solo to tune the violin. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![pool](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pool/32/4152_2.png) [@pool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pool)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2020, 3:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unusual-guitar-bass-equipment-from-well-known-guitarists-bassists/852971/18 "2020-05-02T03:38:16Z")
Jaco Pastorius played the Bass of Doom a Fender Jazz Bass that he turned into a fretless bass by pulling out the frets and filling them in with resin, he had a truly beautiful tone. ---
**Author:** ![don\_t\_ask](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e68b1a/32.png) [@don\_t\_ask](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/don_t_ask)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2020, 6:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unusual-guitar-bass-equipment-from-well-known-guitarists-bassists/852971/19 "2020-05-02T06:10:19Z")
There is Pat Metheny’s [42 string “guitar.”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wp1wHZfZz9s) I’ve been keeping my out for one, but no guitar shop seems to stock them. ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2020, 9:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unusual-guitar-bass-equipment-from-well-known-guitarists-bassists/852971/20 "2020-05-02T09:01:02Z")
> [@squeegee](#): > > Gibbons gets weirder than that: he plays all his guitars strung with .007s; guitar strings as fine as hair. Tony Iommi of Black Sabbath originally used banjo strings on his guitar, as he’d lost two fingertips on his right hand in a work accident as a teenager and the lighter strings were less painful to play. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unusual-guitar-bass-equipment-from-well-known-guitarists-bassists/852971.md?page=2)