macchie solari (sunspots)

a wander round the marshes (and back through hackney wick) with TG yesterday.  today there's a plan to meet up with minty and go for a wander round bethnal green. 

someone from the american primitive guitar group has posted a 1910 photo of william pester playing his hawaiian guitar at his hut in palm springs, california. pester was one of the nature boys, possibly the first (together with eden ahbez and gipsy boots in the 40ies) who took up a back-to-the-land lifestyle, vegetarianism, sunbathing. one of the antecedents of the later 'hippies'. 

this led horsemouth off down into the lands of hawaiian 'slack key' guitar, a different fingerpicked hawaiian guitar style often with a dropped note e.g. instead of an open g chord dgdgbd the third string would be dropped a half tone dgdf#bd giving the opportunity to hammer on f# to g. 

horsemouth has a resonator guitar (bought from minty's dad) and he also has a lap steel (essentially a plank with the guitar fittings on it and a pick up used on sorrows of tomorrow). he mostly pays slide on the laramie guitar but he also has a jumbo guild guitar with a raised action (he recorded funeral music on this). 

so, to recap horsemouth's guitar collection: 

- two nylon strung guitars (a paesold and an almeria used on let all mortal flesh keep silence). there's a third at his parents. 

- his usual gigging set up: the hohner (tuned standard) and the laramie (tuned nashville) 

- the guild jumbo (used on funeral music) and the resonator (used on noah)

- a lap steel and a banjolin

- there's an electric (a telecaster copy) round at howard's. 

and further his musical instrument collection;

- a indian harmonium (tuned +50%)

- melodica, glockenspiel, a cheap keyboard, an electric fan powered organ, a bass guitar, a crash cymbal and a marching drum, an omnichord, a thumb piano, a tambourine.