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Travels With Bill Through his over 30 years as a guitar technician, Bill has had the opportunity to interview, chat with and learn from some of the greats in the guitar world, both players and those on the technical side of guitars. Here are some anecdotes and information on some of the people and guitars Bill has worked with.
 | With Alan Rogan, guitar tech to The Who, Pink Floyd, Rolling Stones, CSNY and AC/DC. We met in 1976 when I sold him my '64 Fender jazz bass for the Entwhistle collection. Here we are at a Who show in California getting specs on Townshend's Strat for a Guitar Player magazine article on stars' guitars. |  | It is a pleasure to restore and maintain the guitars of New Mexico's own Al Hurricane and Tiny Morrie. Here is Tiny's 1959 Fender. Interesting factoid: Tiny did the lovely paint job himself.
|  | I am honored to be asked to be the set up man on these wonderful Manouche gypsy-style guitars made in the Selmer Macafarri tradition. They go through a detailed inspection and are set up with Manouche brand strings made special for the company in England. They are faithful reproductions of the guitars made famous by Django and Joseph Reinhardt circa 1930s in The Hot Club of France. Please see my links page for their availability in NM. |  | On a guitar buy in LA last year I got to inspect Bigsby guitar #002. I've been commissioned by local swing musician and music archivist John Feldman to build a replica of this guitar.
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 | After The Handsome Family's set at their recent CD release party for Last Days of Wonder with the HF's Brett Sparks. Brett and Rennie are wonderful folks and discovering their music and tweaking some of their interesting instruments has been a blast. So much talent! |  | Cyril Jordan of San Francisco's Flaming Groovies was great fun. He came over to my shop to have me refurbish his Dan Armstrong guitar and to try out a few of my vintage Gibsons for a CD project. Interesting tidbit for you trivia buffs: in 1969 Led Zepplin opened for the Groovies at the Fillmore. He is a gas. |  | Myself and CA guitar maker Paul Gambon got to sit down for over an hour at NAMM and discuss all things Stratocaster with Bill Carson (middle). I could barely write fast enough as Carson told us so much about the guitars we love. He was Leo Fender's right hand man and a great guitarist as well. Carson was involved in body and tremolo design and sales with Fender since the early 1950s and stayed with the company until the late 1990s. |  | Here's a shot of the amazing guitarist Andy Latimer from English progressive rock band "Camel" rockin' at the Royal Albert Hall last year. I've had the good fortune to spend many gigs with Andy and journey with him on a never ending quest for "that" tone. Seymour Duncan calls him a "tone monster" ... and I have to agree! |  | Back stage at a Chris Isaak show with Hershel, the amazing guitarist in the band, and wardrobe lady extraordinaire Gillian Etherington. On the road and in the studio, Chris Isaak and Silvertone were a pleasure to tech for.
|  | At the first Santa Fe, NM Django Festival with Albuquerque's own John Sandlin of Le Chat Lunatique (l) and Hot Club of San Francisco's Paul Mahling (middle). I'm hoisting Paul's guitar that I worked on years ago, now well beat up from years of touring. Even in this picture you can see the wear on it.
| We've got too much travelin' for one page to contain...so here's Page 2 of Travels with Bill.
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