mars_hall

We are

This was one of the finest little angry guitars I've ever owned. It was a dark cherry 1960 Les Paul Junior, in the true 3/4 sized form and it had its P-90 growl. It could get a tad noisy, strings left untouched, but she could sing, and she made your hands feel absolutely huge. Bought it in Indy for $160, as I recall, this after seeing it in a local ad paper, The Trader... So it was about 14 years old at the time and came from a kid living on the depressed side of town. Was intended to get me going for that articulated Leslie West sound... My apartment was burglarized on Christmas Eve that year while I was away doing the annual family get-together thing, with the Junior being snatched, along with my home stereo and tools. The police called me into the station to file a report, took my picture, and eventually the Junior would be returned, along with the stereo in about a month. Supposedly it had been recovered from a taxi driver who had a side hussle going as a fence. The tools would forever remain AWOL. When it came to court, the accused got a pass. Strange to me, but that's life. Months later, he happened to be in a bar where our band was playing and started up a conversation with me, while sitting up at the bar during our break. Never really got a straight/complete story out of him, but I suspect he was a snitch and it was implied that the whole burglary thing had been a setup to see what, if any activities, the band was up to on the side. We were your typical life of the party band and all that goes with that, but nothing out of control. The force, on the other hand, were a tad corrupt in those days with redneck heroes everywhere trying to make a name for themselves. I had been seeing a girl at that time for about a month, a right fine looker, who, the first time I'd seen her, just happened to wander into another gig/bar we'd played in November. We always drew a crowd and had a regular following, so a new pretty thing was always going to happen. She walked across the floor there in front of the stage while we were up there hitting it, and proceeded to pass out stone cold right there to the floor. With little second guessing, something inside told me I had to get to know this child better, at least for that night anyway. 😜 She was 21, educated, pretty, an ex-cheerleader, yet quite vulnerable, and yes totally strung out in life and values. She was also the daughter of the nearby air base commander, a girl who had grown up early with a wild crowd who lived off base and on the streets, just outside of San Antonio. Aside from the addiction and life choices, she had a lot going for her. Family wealth, brains, looks, personality, skills... And, well, skills... Within about 3 days of that first night, she would check herself into detox, and since she checked quite a few of the required boxes, I would go to visit her in detox. This, and presumably the base command connection, put me and the rest of the band on some kind of a special list to be watched by the locals. The pic from the police station ended up in a drawer in the office of the local highschool, where a freind and later singer in the band found it a couple of years later and returned it to me. I did look tired, but rarely got enough sleep during those days. Another time.... Carla, who was actually a good person, would later become a local politician and city councilman, only to die in the end of a damaged liver... Loved that Junior and it did teach me a lot of things about life! Does bring back an interwoven lot of strangely related memories and tales... Seems I sold the Junior to pick up an original, now vintage Firebird III, though it was only 11 years old at that time.

Sounds right to me... I definitely remember the driving in the freezing rain part, which started turning to snow later in the evening. At least four hours to Michigan, then the run for Brent's to O'Hare, so quite a long day of it for me. I prefer the growl of P-90s to most pickups and then I was a big fan of Leslie West's tone, so every time I see a Heritage with P-90s, I kind of go into deep and needy mode.

Bought this one from Dave who lives/lived near Detroit. I want to say this was back around 2017, while Ta was in Thailand and unaware 😜 Brent did the handoff on my way up to O'Hare to pick the little girl up. I like the uncluttered functionality of it. Lollar's and TP-6

Thank you John... All credit really goes to you!

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