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What attracted me to the guitar? I think it was the sound first of all. Then the look of the thing, wood and metal, shiny red, cool somehow! Bits of metal stuck here and there. What were they for? Oh, and its electric! Electric? What do you mean? It plugs into a socket on the wall? No, not possible. You need an amplifier. What’s an amplifier? Don’t know, I’ve never seen one. And so it went, the need to find out about this phenomenon called the “electric guitar”.
I suppose my curiosity was aroused by a friend of my family who left a ukulele banjo at our family home in Fawdon, Newcastle. On opening the case we encountered what would become the start of my obsession with all things stringed. A mini banjo, 4 strings (nylon) referred as “cat gut” by my father, which set me off wondering how this cat gut was removed from the cats. Try as I might I couldn’t imagine any method which didn’t involve animal cruelty.
Sniffing the strings didn’t suggest anything either, so nothing for it either play the thing and ignore the cat cruelty or put it back in the case and ring the RSPCA. Further investigation elicited the information from the same source (my father) that the stuff stretched across the round drum-like bit of the instrument was known as “pigskin”. A panic was starting to set in, Pigskin, catgut! Who made these things? The Devil? How my father knew these things wasn’t clear. He didn’t play an instrument and as far as I knew had no more than a passing interest in it. That would have been that, had we not opened the little pocket in the case which I now know should contain spare strings, a tuner, etc. Inside was a tutor for the ukulele. For reasons of authenticity we must remember at this point, circa 1959, that the word “tutor” was not in common use around the council estate where we lived. You went to school, left school got a job as a miner or in engineering, got a girlfriend, got married and settled down, easy. It was the “settle down” bit that worried me. To me, a Tutor was a person who worked at a University, not a flimsy booklet with some chord shapes in it.
I did wonder at the time if adding water to the ancient pamphlet would miraculously produce the afore-mentioned “tutor” who would then instruct us in the magical art of playing the ukulele banjo. It was not to be. My father then stunned us all by announcing that he knew how it was tuned. Of course, he’d read the “tutor” when we weren’t looking. “It’s My Dog Has Fleas” he intoned. I thought we were going back to the animal cruelty theme but no – he insisted – he could tune it using this information which we thought must have been passed to him during our weekly trip to “Confession”.
Somehow he got it roughly in tune and a “strum” across the strings with his thumb produced a “plunk” not unlike my aunt’s door chimes, which were always stifled by the topcoats hanging over them.
We were ready to rock! If a uke can rock. Further tutor investigation and my father’s amused tolerance helped me to learn three chord shapes – G, G7 and D, I think they were. My brother and sister were by now running round the house singing: “My dog has fleas” over and over, much to the annoyance of my mother who was enjoying one of her self-inflicted “migraines”.
We know that George Formby played a “uke”, so a George Formby vigil was set up in front of our black and white telly. Eventually, after what seemed like decade to me, a cry went up: “He’s on, he’s on!” We all tumbled into the living room (I don’t know what happened in the other rooms) and drank in George’s highly educational performance of “When I’m Cleaning Windows”.
With the clarity of youthful observation, I ascertained that George had a really “cool” rhythm going on and when he went in to the double time thing he did for solos, I was stunned.
Serious practise ensued, although my progress was hindered by the discovery of a “Felt” pleck in the case. I must have lost a week trying to master the use of this – the most ridiculous of implements. It was green, about two inches long by one inch wide, and shaped roughly like a leaf from a large shrub. From that day to this, I have never seen anyone using a felt plectrum.
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The first song I learned was, “Hang Down Your Head, Tom Dooley” – popularised at the time in the UK by Lonnie Donegan, a banjo player who had found fame with his versions of American folk songs which he had started playing as a feature during gigs with Chris Barber’s Jazz Band. I would later see Chris Barber’s band in the flesh at the “New Orleans Jazz Club” in Newcastle. Inspirational to a 16-year-old kid from Fawdon.
Lonnie had left by then and a chap called John Slaughter played guitar and banjo with great skill. I managed to exchange a few nervous words with John and found him to be very approachable and helpful. You must remember that information on guitars and stuff was hard to find and that word of mouth and going to gigs was the only way to find out what was going on elsewhere.
Anyway, Tom Dooley would catapult me from the living room on to the world stage. Well, into the back garden, at least.
Once I had mastered the chords I learned the song. My father’s initial support had now turned into irritation and he would undermine my efforts with quips like: “You’ve go no rhythm”, or “You can’t sing in tune”. I think I already knew this was the case, but didn’t really want to hear it from the man whose approval I sought every living minute I was awake. It wasn’t considered manly in those days to play an instrument, this was still a middle-class pastime: “not for the likes of us”, a phrase I would grow to hate. I remember my father’s support as crucial to my learning on the uke and later the guitar, so will forgive his thoughtless comments which have stayed with me.
A huge part of my youth was spent at my grand-mother’s house just around the corner from our own house. As the oldest of three and soon to be four, I found the relative calm of my Nana’s a huge draw. It was, and still is, a fifties council house. Solid, basic and without any real purpose other than to give shelter and provide a base for the working occupants. It did have a garden, however, always popular with the miners. You would be hard pushed to find an untidy garden at that time.
It was at this house that the next important musical discoveries would be made. One of my uncles was a “Trad” fan and had records by Kid Ory, Chris Barber and the like. They were 78’s and very breakable. On a Saturday afternoon, after a day in the pubs and record shops of Newcastle, my uncles would return with a selection of new records. It was here that I first heard Elvis sing: “Hound Dog”, with the fantastic guitar solo played at full volume. I think in retrospect, that my uncles were a bit wild and maybe if they had lived today they would have been given ASBO’s for disturbing the peace every Saturday and Sunday.
To me it was heaven, loud music, pocket money on a sliding scale depending on how many pints they had consumed. After dinner they would be unable to eat the puddings after drinking so much beer, so they usually came my way, too.
There were disagreements with each other and occasionally the neighbours, but mostly it was genial, if a little too physical at times. My uncle John was a floor layer and had a reputation on the High Street as a good fighter, unfortunately his idea of rough and tumble often ended up on bloodshed and my Granny intervening with whichever implement she could lay her hands on. She was only five foot nothing, but what a force.
My grand-parents were Scottish and Irish by descent and I can remember the unspoken discontent that hung in the air at the house. My grand-father was unable to work due to his experiences in the First World War, but it seemed to me as a young boy that he was treated very badly by the rest of the family. I think not working was a huge stigma in those days.
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It was after one of these raucous afternoons, when the uncles had gone to bed in preparation for the night-time session in the pub, that my nana had the radio on tuned to Luxembourg. 
Various pop songs of the day were coming and going on the ever changing signal from the station when, as it if had been transported from another galaxy, came the strains of Rambling Jack Elliott singing what I now know to be “Talking Blues”. Wow! How’s he doing that, I though to myself. I don’t know if it was the flat picked guitar or the manic hillbilly voice, I just became a fan instantly. Jack would eventually inspire the young Bob Dylan and become a legendary figure of American folk music. I was building a set of musical references, although such a term was unknown to me at that time. Elvis, George Formby, Rambling Jack Elliott, Scotty Moore, Kid Ory. All lumped together in my nana’s window-box (interior), waiting for Saturday to come round.
Early Guitars
The next instrument I acquired after the uke was a plastic 4-string uke, shaped like a guitar, with a picture of Elvis on the front. It had nylon strings, was impossible to tune and sounded awful. I think they were advertised on the back page of some magazine of the day. Being plastic, it didn’t last long in our house and was confined to the bin in a matter of days. My need for a real guitar was now becoming an obsession and I must have been driving them all insane, carping on about guitars.
Finally, my father announced that he would make one. As I thought he could walk on water, I was happy with this idea. Make one he did. It was a tribute to his ability to make something out of nothing and overcome problems in the process.
It was made from plywood (top and back). A piece of 2x1 for the neck (unshaped, although the edges were sanded down). Sides were linoleum tacked to the plywood with carpet tacks and gaps filled with polyfilla.
The sound hole was egg-shaped and slightly off centre (to my horror). The bridge was stuck on with wood glue, assisted by two large screws through the top. It still came off after each performance, however.
The real piece de resistance were the frets. Fret-wire was outside of our rationale so my father screwed two screws either side of the neck for each fret and carefully soldered strips of metal, liberated from his day job, between the screws. The tuners were made at his workplace metal shop and with nothing to model them on had been constructed of heavy metal with large screw pegs which wound up the strings.
At this point, a locking nut had to be tightened with pliers or a spanner to keep the string in tune. The whole amazing construction was finished off in Newcastle United’s colours (the paint never actually dried completely).
Of course, it didn’t really work! The next bet as soon as a string was tightened, the paint got on my clothes, it was impossible to tune and if I did manage to get through a verse of Tom Dooley there was a pile of frets on the floor where I stood.
Wish I still had it though.
Finally, I got a real guitar. My uncle Joe, who was an electrician, got it from a workmate for a few pounds. He brought it to the house and I was ecstatic. A real guitar! With a name on the top: “Rossetti”. It was a cello guitar with f holes and a trapeze tailpiece. It had an adjustable bridge, as last something to fiddle with. God, I loved that guitar, but disaster was about to strike.
click here to see Life in the Bus Lane Continued
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