(second block, fourth letter of the prisoners' quadratic tap code...)

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...am here to tap through the walls.


Thu Sep, 13 2007

How Could This Be?

Okay, recall the pig cop item the other day: where the rotten bastard threatened to make up charges against a motorist, who recorded the scene.

Naturally, the video from the cop's car is missing. Observes a commentor here, "Kind of like the front door of the Branch Davidian compound at Waco." Reader Doug sent me that link. It's clear that this is all a misunderstanding. The cop, you see, isn't "used to being questioned like that". You know; by people asking about their rights & stuff.

Good news? Well... the local police chief denies charges that he sexually harassed a teen-aged driver on the job as a patrol cop seven years ago.

And it turns out that the cop in the video is himself a great story of American redemption: he was able to convince a judge to expunge his criminal record of theft and assault convictions. You know; so he could "protect and serve".

Reader Ralph sent those two links along, with the admonition that "the fish rots from the head down".

Personally, I'm mystified. I simply don't understand how our public servants could be so cynically esteemed.

Sep 13, 07 | 7:56 am

AxeBites

Various guitars I see floating by, mostly Gibson and mostly eBay.

Early Norlin ES-335 -- 1970, in Walnut ("ES-335TDW"). This is a period-piece look and feel, and arguably the sound as well but that's to cut things very finely. A "classic" 335 would be the original of 1958 in the Sunburst or Natural finish, or the Cherry Red of 1959; the Walnut of 1970 (second year of that finish offering) is not really a "classic" 335. In the history of the Gibson aesthetic, this is analogous to, say, vertically-striped polyester bell-bottoms or Bahama Blue shag carpeting. None of this is to say that they're not cool guitars, and this is a nice one. Excellent photographs.

Chrome hardware, featuring the trapeze tailpiece (like my L-47 and I've always liked it) and ABR-1 bridge with period-typical nylon saddles. Bound rosewood fretboard, with small block markers, and then the crown inlay at the machine head. These would be the T-top Humbuckers. Vintage Nazis would moan that the upper bouts are pointy (the body templates were wearing-out in the factory) and the fourteen-degree machine head with the volute signals a sometimes not-fun era of the line, but these things really do rock or moan or whatever you want a 335-type semi-hollow to do. ...which, of course, is because it really is a 335.


In the months since I've let AxeBites languish all to bleedin' hell, Gibson's Robot Guitar technology has sifted out to other models than the original Les Paul application. I don't know how it's going: I still haven't even seen one of these self-tuners. I don't see piles of them burning on the sides of the highway, nor reverent hangings in display cases over bars, so who knows? This 2008 Robot SG is ready to rock in the Metallic Red. Nickel hardware; it's the stoptail wired for data to send to the tuners, with dual Humbuckers. It's a bound rosewood fretboard, but I really like the single-bound machine head with the crown inlay. That's a real cool old-school look, right there, to set off that crazy-ass color. {nod}