I’ve received a number of questions about exactly what I’m playing on various tracks– what exactly are the instruments listed at the bottom of each page? What is a Flight Motorcycle Elvis ukulele or a Resonator Red homemade cigar box guitar?
Let me introduce the boys in the band.
First up, my homemade instruments.
Blue Lion 3-string Cigar box Guitar
My main instrument, I built this in the winter of 2017. It was about my fifth one, using a Liga Privada Flying Feral Pig cigar box because I liked the look and feel of the box, which also turned out to be the perfect size.
I left the wooden cigar compartments inside, which minimized the warpage that occurs when one tightens the strings (though there is some). It still remains one of the most structurally sound I’ve built.
It has a hard-tail bridge and a single humbucker pickup, which makes it an “electric” guitar rather than an “acoustic” one, though it sounds pretty good when unplugged, just not loud.
Compared to a “real” guitar, it has very high action and no frets so can really only be played with a slide. My favorite is a heavy brass one I call my Brass Finger.
I keep it tuned to open G.
Sometimes I use it on my lap to better mimic a real country sound, but most of the time I hold it normally. It has a great tone– it wasn’t my intention, but it sometimes sounds like George Harrison’s mid 70s stuff.
Resonator Red 4- string Acoustic Cigar Box Guitar
At some point I began flipping cigar boxes over to use the bottom as the soundboard (face) of the guitar. There were a few reasons for this.
First, often the bottom of the box is a sturdier material, leading to better resonance.
Second, it is easier to open the box and tinker inside (if the grounding or wires go awry) without having to remove the strings.
An added benefit is that the aesthetic of the final product is not dependent on the aesthetic of the box– often a cool logo or decoration is right where the bridge or knobs want to go. By freeing oneself of this concern, one can paint or stain with fewer constraints. I began working with sunburst patterns.
The resonator cone and a fourth string really give this baby the ‘high lonesome sound’ of Appalachia.
I grab this whenever I want to play nothing in particular, especially outside by a fire.
One-string electric cigar box guitar
Deceptively simple, this is a great head-clearing mechanism. It’s amazing how much range you can get out of a single-string, especially with a little sustain and distortion added.
One-string diddley bow
The first shall be last.
Without going into whole history of the diddley bow, this is the original method of getting music out of a single string. I whack it with a spoon and use a glass slide. My favorite is a bottleneck slide I made out of a 25 Jamesons’ bottle.
And yes the Altoids bridge is a vehicle for a piezo pickup.
One more: Hot Rod Hank
This one is not built from scratch. This one in fact is the very first uke I bought in 1990, Cambridge ,Massachusetts. It was not a quality instrument, and it finally gave up the ghost when I tried to tune it up a full step. The bridge sprung clean off.
I found a new bridge and a more secure way to fasten it, but before I did I thought I would have some fun and kind of hot rod it.
I added an onboard pre-amp and jack, as well as volume and tone knobs. And a cool sticker of Hank Williams that was laying around and fit perfectly around the sound hole. Because I needed to use electric guitar strings rather than nylon, the neck tension is considerably higher than it was so I have this tuned to “slack” (Hawaiian) key and play it with a slide.