ROCKET QUEEN playing the Lucky Dog Music Hall in
Worcester on 5/31. Same stage that The Rolling Stones played an
infamous surprise gig at in 1981 as they began their Tattoo You tour. It was cool to see the framed reviews of their show down in the dressing room....Humbled http://bit.ly/17Fmfkt
GNR's Izzy Stradlin' was a big fan of Gibson guitars and his coolest guitar was the white ES-175 hollowbody guitar he played during GNR's concert at The Ritz in 1988 that MTV filmed for a global audience. Our very own "Whiskey" Stradlin' discusses how he recreated that iconic guitar. "I always loved Izzy's 175 from that Ritz video but simply buying one was not an option. Gibson rarely ever made them in white and even Izzy himself had to have his custom painted. I bought a Tobacco Sunburst colored 175 but had the hardest time finding a skilled luthier who would refinish the guitar along with a bunch of other modifications it needed. I went through two different technicians who paint cars for a living and nearly 2 years before the guitar was finally finished this month. The headstock needed some work and almost all of the hardware and electronics had to be upgraded".
Although the guitar is typically used by Jazz musicians, Izzy began using his ES-175 because of blues-rocker George Thorogood. In a Rock n' Roll setting, the guitar's hollowbody design and humbucker pickups create a distinctly gritty tone, think "Bad to the Bone". Whiskey recently posted photos of the guitar's transformation from a two tone brown Jazz guitar to a custom painted ES-175 that faithfully captures every detail of Izzy's guitar, right down to the missing tone volume knob. www.Facebook.com/Whiskey.Stradlin
