Almost a month ago I posted information about a special auction that was taking place by XOX Audio Tools, they auctioned off the 100th Handle Guitar with proceeds going to Guitars Not Guns, who provide free guitars and free lessons to foster children, at-risk youth and other deserving children. Well the guitar was sold so here is an excerpt from the press release:

”Going once, going twice, Sold!  The charity auction for the 100 Limited Edition Handle guitar is closed. Thank you to everyone who helped make this such a successful event. The winning bidder is the American Jeff Auen; a musician and collector of extraordinary musical instruments.  This initiative was conceived by XOX Audio Tools, the producers of the Handle guitar, and all proceeds will go to the children’s charity Guitars not Guns (http://www.guitarsnotguns.org).

”This revolutionary carbon fiber guitar the Handle has already won the ‘Good Design’ award from the Chicago Athenaeum Museum and ‘the Most Innovative Product’ award of the NAMM 2008 show.  XOX Audio Tools is thrilled with the results of their first charitable venture.  “We are very happy to have been able to help Guitars not Guns so effectively, and we promise that these positive actions won’t finish here.  Expect to see other charitable events organized by XOX in the future!” explains Peter Solomon director of XOX Audio Tools.

When Jeff Auen found out he was the winner of the auction he was overjoyed and commented:  “Guitars not Guns is an admirable endeavor and I’m happy to help.  I would even wish I had more time to open a chapter myself!” He can’t wait till he receives his custom built 100th guitar and continues: “My sons and I have been collecting unique guitars. The Handle sure fits the bill. It is not a just showpiece though, I will be playing this guitar live. I’m a sucker for really well designed products. The Handle caught my eye (much like a Ferrari does). I can’t wait to get my hands on it.” ”

Congratulations Jeff on your new axe and for helping a worthy cause.

Have you ever wondered what guitar Mark Knopfler plays? Well okay Mark Knopfler actually owns around 70 guitars apparently including his ‘54 Strat, ‘58 Les Paul, Danelectro 59-DCs etc. but the guitar that always springs to mind for me are his Pensa guitars, in my memory this is the only guitar I’ve ever seen him play but when I just checked YouTube I can find videos of him playing everything but!?!

Anyway, much as I like his fine collection of vintage Fender’s and Gibson’s none of them have that amazing quality of his hand made Pensa MK model. The photo on the left is the MK2 which is made using a carved quilt (or flame Maple) top with the finest quality solid Mahogany body and a Maple or Mahogany neck with tilt back headstock. You have a choice of Rosewood or Ebony fingerboard with 12” radius, 24.6” scale length and 22 frets. You also have a choice of hardtail (string-through) or stop tail bridge and Gotoh, Schaller or Sperzel tuners; gold hardware is standard.

Now if you are thinking that this guitar looks like a Suhr guitar there is a good reason, back in 1985 Rudy Pensa, collaborating with his then employee, John Suhr, began building many amazing instruments that are considered classics today. He sold them through his shop Rudy’s Music Stop which he opened on 48th Street, New York City in 1978. John Suhr opened up his own small factory building custom guitars to order in 1997 and now makes one of the most sought after guitar brand.

I’ve always been “drawn” (ha ha) to hand painted guitars ever since I saw Joe Satriani’s black guitar with the silver doodles on it, I think someone stole that guitar while he was touring “Flying in a Blue Dream”? Anyway I digress. I just came across these fantastic Les Paul guitars hand illustrated by Colby Nichols and Josh Kenyon, not only are these one off guitars great to look at but the two pictured above, ”Legends in the Wood” and ”A Household Nightmare” are part of the ’Music Saves Lives Gibson Guitar Project‘, yes it is quite a mouthful.

Music Saves Lives has focused its main efforts on blood donation and the bone marrow registry, reaching out by sharing facts and educating. The guitars were auctioned off on eBay but you can still buy prints and T Shirts. Check out the other guitars that were part of this worthy cause.

The guitars used are Les Paul Melody Maker’s with a Mahogany body, Rosewood fretboard, Chrome wraparound tailpiece and specially designed single coil pickups.

Founder Jason Fazio developed his woodwork and steel skills creating artistic furniture and sculpture. But due to his keen interest in music his craftsmanship turned to Lutherie and JLF GUITAR was formed in 1995. Jason was inspired by the late Tony Zemaitas and chose to follow his style of combining wood with steel to create his instruments. The classic, pictured left has a mainly Mahogany body but also has a steel chambered section which houses the volume and tone controls for the single coil DiMarzio pickups and the top third of the guitar has a much thinner profile embellished with a sculpted steel design which makes for a very unique looking guitar. The guitar is finished with a Schaller fixed bridge and Grover machine heads.

Check out more of these unique Aussie guitars on the JLF Guitars website.

Last month I featured a twin neck guitar which had a custom Union Jack flag finish painted by Jim Fogarty, well Jim just contacted me to send me pictures of Si Bailey’s completed project so I wanted to post the photos here on Guitar Noize in all it’s blinged up gold hardware glory!

Si Bailey has posted a video on YouTube to show the finished instrument in action!

Lodestone Guitar Company make some very interesting looking instruments. As you can see from the photo the body is sculpted with some very striking lines that I think are just for looks, I can’t see any ergonomic reasons for them but the interesting thing is that the pickguard sits into the body slightly, you can just see from the photo that it looks slightly inset with a soft bevel surround, something I’ve never seen before on a guitar but I think is a nice enhancement to the traditional design. Solid alder bodies combine with rock maple and Indian rosewood necks for optimum resonance and tone transmission. And a beautifully crafted heel design offers easy access to the higher frets while providing enhanced stability. Uniquely, bridge saddles are precision engineered from advanced ceramic material to enhance clarity, dynamics, harmonic content and sustain, I would like to hear how the ceramic bridge enhances the sound! Pickups are courtesy of Seymour Duncan, a SSL-2 and a SH-1B ’59 for a warm vintage tone.

One of the most unique features of this instrument is the headstock which as you can see from this page has the machine heads angled back to reduce friction at the nut and also makes for a more natural position for tuning. There are four different models available and a number of finishes so check out the site for all the details.

If you were/are a fan of Motely Crue you will know who Nikki Sixx is, for those who don’t he is the bass player and composer of most of Motely Crue’s music. You will also probably be aware of the fact that Nikki along with most L.A. bands of the time has suffered from Heroin addiction for most of his colourful career so it is pretty disturbing to see the artwork on this Special edition Ovation which i presume depicts the time Nikki overdosed and was revived after being technically dead for a few minutes to find the walls covered in blood. Now there’s a nice fireside story he can tell his grandchildren! If you want to read about Motley Crue’s crazy years I recommend you check out The Dirt too, full of stories from each band member, Tommy’s chapters are particularly entertaining I think his first word in the book is “Dude!”

”The stunning graphic on the top, designed by world-renowned artist PR Brown, is applied on spruce and married to a super shallow body to provide exceptional acoustic balance and projection. The NS28-HD also features many other distinctive Ovation characteristics including a thin profile neck, vibration sensitive Slimline pickup and the OP4BT preamp with a built-in tuner. Twenty-five percent of Sixx’s royalties from the guitar will go to Running Wild In The Night, a charity he established in conjunction with Covenant House to rescue homeless and runaway youth from the streets.”

So some good came out of his Heroin addiction! No, not the guitar the charity! honestly…

via Guitar Player Gear Guide

The XOX Audio Tools Handle Guitar is one of the most unique guitars I’ve ever seen. Award winning designer Peter Solomon created this instrument using a mono-chassis, hollow sectioned construction which creates a resonance chamber similar to that of a semi-acoustic guitar. The ultra lightweight instrument is made from carbon fibre which apparently offers a much wider harmonic range than wood.

XOX Audio Tools is being put on auction his desired 100th Handle guitar, the last of its numbered and limited edition, to help the music program Guitars not Guns which is a non-profit organization that offers free guitars and free lessons to underprivileged children and teens with bases in Canada, Usa and UK. This project is an alternative to violence. I think this would also benefit Aussie kids too, maybe it will make its way over here sometime.

As of April 21 the guitar will be displayed on eBay and it will be auctioned on May1, 2008. One lucky bidder is going to be proud owner of a special unique collectors edition Handle guitar and they are going to feel really good knowing they helped many children in the process.

”We decided that our most important and valuable guitar, the last of our limited edition, would be raffled to the highest bidder and the proceeds from this would be given directly to GNG to use to their best potential to help the most children possible.” explains Peter Solomon, Director of XOX.

For more information on how to get involved with this auction check out XOX Audio Tools - Guitars Not Guns.

UPDATE: The auction can be found here so get bidding!

If you are in the market for a European hand made guitar you should definitely check out Finland’s Ruokangas Guitars. The model shown in the photo above is the Duke Deluxe which features an exotic carved top made from a highly figured flamed Arctic Birch which is very rare originating from the northern parts of Finland so I imagine the price tag on this particular guitar would be fairly high, I found this one for sale priced at $5000. The body is made from Spanish Cedar a wood favoured by many classical guitar makers for its tone and strength. The neck is a 3-piece laminated Spanish Cedar neck with genuine Pearl inlays for the logo and the 12th fret of the Ebony fretboard. Now the nut is made from Moose chin bone and I don’t think I have ever heard anyone using that before, but it adds to the exotic nature of this instrument! The Truss Rod in the neck is a 2-way which is adjustable at the body rather than the headstock, which is normal for these type of Truss Rods. The pickups are either Ruokangas Dukebucker or SingleSonic pickups and the hardware is all Schaller: tune-o-matic bridge and tailpiece; locking tuners and straplocks. The standard wiring with Dukebucker pickups includes 3 push/pull pots and a 3-way toggle switch. The most common controls are vol-tone-tone - and the push/pull functions are phaseswitch and splitting of both pickups. There is also a 20 year warranty!!

Check out www.ruokangas.com for more information including detailed information on the wood selection for their guitars, the choice of neck profiles on offer and their construction techniques. Also be sure to check out their ‘Virtual Workshop’ in the ‘Features’ section where you can build your own guitar.

I love checking out boutique electric guitars I think that I would be so much happier knowing that so much individual attention went into creating my instrument rather than a bunch of machines and robots in a factory line… unfortunately that kind of craftmanship comes at a price and so I have to make do with what I have for now, although my ‘94 Patrick Eggle was a production line guitar in the mass produced Fender or Gibson sense and it was made in England… which makes a nice change! Anyway I’m waffling on as usual so I’ll get down to business!

I just came across Grosh Guitars and whilst idling clicking through the vast array of guitars they have produced I came across the Custom Carved Top pictured above and just had to feature it here on Guitar Noize.

”Don Grosh Custom Guitars was established in 1993 with the singular goal of producing the world’s finest custom electric guitars and basses. We achieve this goal by paying careful attention to all aspects of each instrument we build. By utilizing a “Bench Style” building process, as opposed to a production line, we ensure that each and every instrument produced is up to our exacting standards. Our team of highly experienced builders constructs each instrument as a complete cohesive creation”

There are little details about this exact model but there is an overview of features on his site that explain how each guitar is crafted, I managed to figure out that the Custom Carve top has a highly figured Maple top with Basswood or Mahogany back and a solid Maple neck with Rosewood fingerboard.

” Necks are equipped with the Don Grosh exclusive truss rod. This double welded bar design is much more stable and stronger than standard truss rod design, and is about two times the weight. This creates greater sustain and better tone transfer from neck to body, resulting in a much more alive sounding guitar.”

The thing I really like about this particular model is that it has a very similar look to Greg Howe’s current ESP guitar that he has been using on the videos posted on his website but the figured maple gives it a bit more of a classic look. This would be a really nice addition to my guitar collection… nudge nudge, wink wink… Don? Are you there? Ah well…