Thunder Road Guitars, USA
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Storytellers
Being a young fellow in this business I’ve always had the pleasure of hearing stories from folks that have played, bought, sold, and traded guitars for many, many years. Often the stories they share are flat out amazing and really make me love what I do, and love the fact that I can connect with a customer on a level where they feel comfortable enough to share life stories with me. This story I’m about to share came from a customer in the UK. I felt it was so cool I had to share. So without further adieu, here is Pete’s story.
“I’m fond of telling this story from my early days in London…..1966, and I was only sixteen and playing in bands while I was at college. I was a paperboy back then to make ends meet. One late afternoon I pushed one through a letter box of the Catholic Chaplaincy hall. A band were rehearsing inside, and an incredible sound came through the letterbox. I sat there on my bike for a half hour, holding the letterbox open, transfixed by the incredible guitar sounds coming through it. The door eventually opened, taking me by surprise and me and the bike and all the papers fell into the room. I sheepishly apologized to the guy and asked him who had been playing. It was a band called John Mayalls Bluesbreakers and he was rehearsing for their first gig with a new guitar player. A 19 year old called Eric Clapton! I had to race away as papers were getting late. I don’t know it you ever heard the album from this period. We call it the Beano album! Fabulous stuff. I saw Cream many times, both before and after they made it huge in the US. Eric was good, but he was never as dynamic as that rainy afternoon in Soho, a bit of a life changer for me. I knew then what I wanted to do with my life”
Pete just picked up a stunning Firebird V from Thunder Road and I’m sure he’ll be a friend of ours for life.
The ten days I didn’t sleep….Sounds pretty cool right? 90% of it was NOT cool. In all honesty most of this time was quite boring. I’m not sure if you’ve spent much time in a tour van, but generally the time between cities and shows just kind of blurs together in a mess of anywhere between 3 and 15 hours and before you know it you’re in a new town, city, state, or country. When you’re on the road 250 days a year summer turns to fall, which turns to winter and
The odd ones, the weird ones, the ones with 7 pickups. I’m talking about the next frontier of the vintage guitar market. Companies like Silvertone, Danelectro, Airline, Harmony, and many others that built guitars in the 50s and 60s have been lurking in the vintage guitar world for many years, every now and then poking their heads up a bit and gaining some attention. Every now and then a Jack White will pop up, or guitar players and collectors will get hip to the fact that Jimmy Page used
