marcusnieman said:
Nice.... just today, my guitar tech called me and had me come by the shop. Smokin Joe had just dropped off his strats after being on the road - the blue one in this video (custom shop sixty two) and his REAL Charley's strat like mine..... very cool. I noodled around on both for a couple minutes. Oh yeah, he plays cables for strings..... thirteens at standard tuning!!!
Sorry you can't join us Marcus.
Smokin' Joe blew me away when I saw him here a few years back, amazing player. And he's LOUD. He had two Twins at the 100 Club, & he blew up one of them in the first set! Really nice guy too, quiet & modest. And he's a big guy, so maybe 13s don't feel too big to him.
In comparison, Alex Schultz isn't a big guy, but he used 12s when I last spoke to him (about 20 years ago now.
)
I'm gonna be controversial here - I love The Blasters, scarily good live band, but with Dave Alvin on guitar, not Hollywood Fats. I never bought into the Hollywood Fats legend, he just didn't do it for me. Even when he was in the James Harman band, I preferred Kid Ramos. There are so many great blues guitarists in the US, I just don't understand why Fats is revered so much.
I guess this is where I duck?