Guitar and Bass Smashing.

[Dingus]

Once a young man who I was giving some bass lessons to asked me in all seriousness what was the best way to set his guitar on fire. He was heavily into pyro -orientated hair metal bands and thought that burning his instrument in the right manner was just as important as the actual notes. A nice lad, but not the brightest .

I bumped into him in town one afternoon about fifteen years ago, having not seen him for a few years , and he had two amazingly attractive Scandanavian women with him and he told me his band were big in Denmark. , so what do I know about music?

[bartelby]

I hope the OP isn't a Muse fan then:

[url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matthew_Bellamy"]Matthew Bellamy[/url][color=#000000][font=sans-serif][size=3] of [/size][/font][/color][url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muse_(band)"]Muse[/url][color=#000000][font=sans-serif][size=3] has the world record at breaking guitars, destroying 140 during the [/size][/font][/color][url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absolution_(album)"]Absolution[/url][color=#000000][font=sans-serif][size=3] Tour.[/size][/font][/color]

[waynepunkdude]

[quote name='Dingus' timestamp='1386094502' post='2295693']
so what do I know about music?
[/quote]

About as much as you do about football apparently....

[Dingus]

[quote name='waynepunkdude' timestamp='1386097266' post='2295773']
About as much as you do about football apparently....
[/quote]

Thanks ,Wayne!

One day I hope to be able to match your own level of sports punditry , which so far has included such brilliant insights as " Alex Ferguson - he's a winner !" Obviously, you must have had some kind of professional training to come up with those kind of acute observations, and I can only hope that one day my own clumsy, amateurish attempts to make sense of The Beautiful Game will one day be able to match your own startling originality.

[RhysP]

[quote name='xilddx' timestamp='1386085032' post='2295511']
Yngwie did pretty much the same thing as Ritchie. But what didn't he do that wasn't the same as Ritchie?
[/quote]

It's funny because it's true....

[skej21]

I'm all smashing up your gear after the gig... I bloody hate the load-out!

[LukeFRC]

I do find smashing up your gear on stage a bit trite nowadays - walking cliches of what a band is.
Mind you I think the folk too scared of dings to take their guitars out the house are also in a similar bracket.



(Edit: I mean, if they have souls it's the equivalent of battery farming chickens.)

Edited December 3, 2013 by LukeFRC

[MoonBassAlpha]

Bill Nelson swapped his 335 for a Woolies Audition semi to set fire to on the "sunburst finish" tour. Even the "axe" on the album cover isn't a Gibbo, but the naked girl was a good distraction tactic...

[alyctes]

[quote name='gjones' timestamp='1386083887' post='2295488']
Richie Blackmore used to swap his strat for a cheapo woolworths special before sacrificing it on the alter of Rock 'N' Roll and the Marshall stacks he used to destroy were made of cardboard. It was all just pantomime for the teenage boys in the front row.

I hope this bit of inside information has calmed you down.
[/quote]

Has his audience taken to destroying stuff?

Edited December 3, 2013 by alyctes

[RhysP]

[quote name='skankdelvar' timestamp='1386092668' post='2295645']
As for destructive onstage mayhem, few have surpassed the late Ms Wendy O Williams (NSFW)


[size=3]Rare 'not topless' performance: Wendy chainsaws an Explorer[/size]
[/quote]

They used to mic up the chainsaw when she was doing it too as far as I can recall.

[FlatEric]

[quote name='skankdelvar' timestamp='1386092668' post='2295645']
Thank you for a most enlightening and entertaining blog post. Nice work, Sir.

As for guitar trashing, I'm not opposed in principle - people can do whatever they like with their own property and after all, it's only a bit of wood and metal. As for destructive onstage mayhem, few have surpassed the late Ms Wendy O Williams (NSFW)


[size=3]Rare 'not topless' performance: Wendy chainsaws an Explorer[/size]
[/quote]

Thanks SD.

Just like to make it clear that the post on my blog was about the aquisition of the parts from his Strat.

Although a massive fan of his playing, always a bit squeemish about a fine instrument being destroyed.
If defined by the likes of Jon (Bassassin) as "firewood" - I don't think I would have a problem.

Just wanted to make my position clear.

Cheers.

[Johnm93]

Hmmm, philosophy is always a fine pastime.
They do look like [they are?] spoiled juvenile yobs these days, but did it with purity back in the day.
Well, possibly.
Performance artists, even WOW, are simply performing, using cheap copies, for publicity and not art.
Also possible.
They all get my goat up because I have a natural tendancy to look after my bass, bike, bat, etc.
Certainly true.
The thieves who took a brand new Fender bass during the riots in Croydon and used it to smash into the Off Licence further down the road really do upset me. Them and all the other bad stuff previously mentioned.

[Lozz196]

I don`t like seeing people smash guitars/musical equipment. I see it as a waste. The original guys that did it fair enough, it was new and exciting back then but now it looks contrived and pointless to me, especially when you see them trot off to get their Squiers before doing it. I think a far more rock n roll thing to do would be to sign then auction the gear and give the proceeds to Great Ormond St Hospital.

[Dingus]

[quote name='skankdelvar' timestamp='1386092668' post='2295645']
Thank you for a most enlightening and entertaining blog post. Nice work, Sir.

As for guitar trashing, I'm not opposed in principle - people can do whatever they like with their own property and after all, it's only a bit of wood and metal. As for destructive onstage mayhem, few have surpassed the late Ms Wendy O Williams (NSFW)


[size=3]Rare 'not topless' performance: Wendy chainsaws an Explorer[/size]
[/quote]
[quote name='RhysP' timestamp='1386103422' post='2295915']
They used to mic up the chainsaw when she was doing it too as far as I can recall.
[/quote]

Never mind the guitar and the chainsaw, keep your eyes on the ping pong balls...

[skankdelvar]

[quote name='FlatEric' timestamp='1386104768' post='2295934']
Thanks SD.

Just like to make it clear that the post on my blog was about the aquisition of the parts from his Strat.

Although a massive fan of his playing, always a bit squeemish about a fine instrument being destroyed.
If defined by the likes of Jon (Bassassin) as "firewood" - I don't think I would have a problem.

Just wanted to make my position clear.

Cheers.
[/quote]

Quite so and clearly understood

[Musky]

Although it does seem something of a cliche nowadays, the persistence of smashing up instruments does suggest that there's still an audience for this sort of behaviour. In fact some of these acts of willful vandalism have achieved 'legendary' status.

But as with so many things in life it's not what you do but how you do it. Even by the late sixties The Who's routine gear smashing was looking tired compared to their earlier efforts.

Whilst not in the same league as trashing a guitar, I watched a former band mate shred five of his six strings in front of a fairly sedate Berlin audience. The place went bananas. I mean completely nuts and stayed that way for the rest of the gig. For some reason people respond to that kind of thing, and Neil Young's similar antics in 2009 (with the aid of string cutters) seems to have gone down pretty well with his audience.

So if it works, why not? Just choose your moments - it's such a fine line between clever and stupid.

[alyctes]

[quote name='Lozz196' timestamp='1386107721' post='2295993']
I don`t like seeing people smash guitars/musical equipment. I see it as a waste. The original guys that did it fair enough, it was new and exciting back then but now it looks contrived and pointless to me, especially when you see them trot off to get their Squiers before doing it. I think a far more rock n roll thing to do would be to sign then auction the gear and give the proceeds to Great Ormond St Hospital.
[/quote]

This

[borisbrain]

[quote name='skej21' timestamp='1386098803' post='2295811']
I'm all smashing up your gear after the gig... I bloody hate the load-out!
[/quote]

Classic.

Incidentally, my lot has been asked by a PR agency to play an event in London in April, a punk gig that they stipulated will require guitar destruction at its conclusion. Certainly a bit naff, I thought, until they mentioned the fee. And when they ventured to pay the cost of expendable guitars we said "Great! How many pieces ya want?"

BB

[Bassman Sam]

The first live band I ever saw was Deep Purple at the Green's Playhouse in Glasgow in 1969 at the age of 14. Richie Blackmore trashed a Strat during "Wring That Neck". I was gob smacked and I thought it was great showmanship. After seeing them over the years, it was clear that he was changing to cheap guitars and looked so contrived.

I bet Inti would have called him a clown.

[Graham]

Only time I've seen it look good was at the last ever Mistress gig where Drunk smashed his PRS at the end.

It was a great end to one of the best gigs I've been to and a fitting end to a show full of stage-diving and violent pits and giving it a real feel of finality as it was known to be their last performance.

[redbandit599]

Only legitimate way to smash a guitar is over the heads of all the numpties who insist on filming every blooming thing on their phones....

[BetaFunk]

It looks like The Who weren't the first to smash their instruments on stage. It seems that Jerry Lee Lewis and Charles Mingus beat them to it some years before before but The Who and especially Pete Townshend certainly made it a popular thing for rock groups to do.

[Marc S]

Only just seen this thread, so I'm a bit late to add my thoughts,

Yes, it's all very rock & roll, to smash up your gear on stage
but as others have said, it's now rather passe & old hat

I'm not quite with you on the instruments having a "soul"
but I wouldn't want to criticise you over this point
I'd absolutely hate to see my instruments smashed up
particularly the older ones and my DB - shock, horror!

And it does seem a rather petulant gesture on the part of musicians who smash gear up now that it has been done to death

I did once hear a theory, that such an act is also a way of getting out of playing more encores....
..... bit extreme way though....

[KevB]

The thing I found odd about the Blackmore clip is that it looked like they had gone to the trouble of scalloping the frets on the cheapo instrument destined to be destroyed. Can't believe they came out of the factory like that did they? I suppose some manufacturer might have done it if they had ordered a job lot to get through an entire world tour or something but then you'd think they would have made a better job of the headstock shape.