I am a musician, guitar tech, and founder of Strange Guitarworks. When not working on guitars, I create experimental music under the moniker of UFO Death Cult, utilizing microtonal instruments of my own design. I also am slowly learning to speak German. Ausgezeichnet! "Intonation is a social construct."
Author's posts
Aug 31 2019
Acoustic bridge coming off: FIXED!
Acoustic guitars can be designed to sound good, or can be designed to last – it can’t really be both. Most builders try to find a middle ground, and many are very successful at finding a perfect balance. However, guitars are mostly made of wood, and sometimes wood just won’t cooperate. Occasionally we see this …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.strangeguitarworks.com/acoustic-bridge-coming-off-fixed/
May 16 2019
Installing a Kahler into a PRS
We rarely see Kahler equipped guitars in our shop – I don’t remember seeing any at all in the last seven years. Yet over the last two months we’ve seen at least five (three of which we removed and returned the guitar to stock, like so: http://www.strangeguitarworks.com/filling-a-kahler-route/). A few weeks back our friend Gregg asked …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.strangeguitarworks.com/installing-a-kahler-into-a-prs/
Mar 18 2019
Enter the PLEK
The day has finally arrived: we got a Plek machine. As many of you are aware, we always strive for perfection, and invest in tools of the highest quality to ensure that your guitar will be the best it can possibly be. Getting a Plek was the next logical step for us, and let me …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.strangeguitarworks.com/enter-the-plek/
Jan 02 2019
Fixing a broken Gibson truss rod on a vintage Grabber
We repair quite a few broken truss rods here at Strange Guitarworks, and oftentimes it’s not a simple endeavor. Every repair is unique, which is one of the reasons we love our jobs: it’s never boring. Fixing this broken Gibson truss rod in this vintage Grabber was a doozy: the headstock was broken off, the …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.strangeguitarworks.com/fixing-a-broken-gibson-truss-rod/
Apr 25 2018
Restoring a Harmony Sovereign for The Brian Jonestown Massacre
We were recently contacted by the mercurial musician Anton Newcomb of The Brian Jonestown Massacre to restore his Harmony Sovereign acoustic guitar. To say this guitar was beat up is a vast understatement: the neck was pulling almost completely off and was horribly bowed, the frets were a disaster, the back was cracked, and almost …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.strangeguitarworks.com/restoring-a-harmony-sovereign-for-the-brian-jonestown-massacre/
Mar 18 2018
Replacing a broken truss rod
Most people think of the truss rod as the smoking gun regarding an instrument’s playability. Action too high? Tighten the truss rod. Action too low? Loosen the truss rod. This kind of advice runs rampant on forums all over the internet, and it’s dead wrong. Guitar necks have an optimal relief of between .1mm (.004″) …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.strangeguitarworks.com/replacing-a-broken-truss-rod/
Sep 01 2017
It’s our five year anniversary!
On September 1st, 2012, Strange Guitarworks was born. It doesn’t seem like that long ago – this has been so much fun that I’ve hardly noticed that five whole years have slipped by. To be honest, I don’t really know exactly how to remark upon this admittedly small, but perhaps significant milestone. When I consider …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.strangeguitarworks.com/five-year-anniversary/
Apr 17 2017
Mr. Fred’s weird banjo thing
Our friend, Mr. PH Fred, always has the oddest guitars, and the oddest requests for modifications of those guitars. Last time, he had us turn an acoustic guitar into a Stratocaster (check it out here: Elvis Meets Nixon). This time, he made what seemed like a pretty easy request, to install a Lollar Charlie Christian …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.strangeguitarworks.com/mr-freds-weird-banjo-thing/
Mar 07 2017
Elvis meets Nixon
The most requested document from the National Archives isn’t the Bill of Rights, nor even the Constitution – it’s this photo: Elvis meets Nixon. Yeah, it really happened. A bizarre moment in American history, to be sure – and one that inspired a madcap project here in our shop. Some background: one of our regular …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.strangeguitarworks.com/elvis-meets-nixon/
Jan 28 2017
Benjamin’s Fender Hello Kitty microtonal Strat of Doom™
I have an oft-repeated mantra at the shop: “Intonation is a social construct”. Over the last several hundred years, western music has largely standardized into an equal tempered system, dividing the octave into twelve notes with a ratio equal to the 12th root of 2 (12√2 = 2 1⁄12 ≈ 1.059463)(12 tone equal temperament is also known as …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.strangeguitarworks.com/benjamins-fender-hello-kitty-microtonal-strat-of-doom/