The Current's Guitar Collection: Lou Barlow, Gretsch 12-string hollow-body
by Luke Taylor
November 20, 2013
When Lou Barlow visited The Current's studios with Sebadoh, we asked him about his guitar. Here's what he had to say.
What kind of guitar is this?
This is a Gretsch 12-string; probably has a special name, but it's a 12-string Gretsch, electric guitar, semi hollow body. It's from the 60s, I would assume.
It looks like you've made some modifications.
Yeah. Quite a few of my songs were written on four strings. I had started writing my early songs on ukulele, so then when I decided to electrify them, I used a four-string guitar, and then I thought the four-string guitar didn't really sound heavy enough or thick enough.
So I had a dream that I saw a 12-string Gibson SG with an ankh at the top of it. I woke up and I thought, "I've got to see if there's a 12-string SG." And there are no 12-string SGs.
But I started looking, and I found a 12-string Hamer guitar that had an ankh on top of it, just like the dream that I had. So I took that 12-string, and rather than doubling all four strings that I use, I just doubled the heavy two, so basically I use a standard six-string set, double the top heavy strings and leave the bottom two as singles so I can play leads and it's sort of normal sounding.
Eventually, the Hamer broke. I had a Mosrite; that also broke. I broke both of them during shows.
Then I finally found this Gretsch, and it was the best-sounding one I had found. I had the pickups changed. I took it to a guy who seemed kind of intrigued by what I was doing and really helped me out. He designed this nut that has just the four strings in it.
It was a cheap guitar. The guitar itself was not even in mint condition, which it certainly is not anymore — it's certainly not worth much! (laugh) It's probably the least valuable Gretsch that you can find.
I have four or five different tunings that I go to with this. They're all basically open tunings, they're folky kind of open tunings. Because it's a semi hollow-body, it gets this great resonance when I play it, so I can play a lot of feedback. I love it.
Do you remember where did you found it?
I can't remember. I'm sure I found it in Boston. I don't remember; I'm not really a gearhead.
So this whole setup, this sound, came to you in a dream?
I did dream about it, although the tone of this guitar, the Gretsch — there was a band in the 80s called the Neats who were from Boston. They were sort of contemporaries of R.E.M. and you could probably even say the Replacements and others like them. The Neats were like a college-rock band before they called that kind of music "alternative" or anything like that.
They would always play Gretsches, these just wonderful, huge, strummy guitars that were simultaneously seeming to be influenced by 60s stuff but then also had a very new wave edge to it, danceable. And then also in a way they were kind of post punk. Somehow, the Neats were this great combination of things and they made a huge impression on me.
So the open Gretsch sound is something that, when I finally did find this, I'm like, "Oh yeah, here it is." Because I loved that sound. I just love an open, full, strummy guitar sound, and the Neats were a band that I think did it particularly well back then and who influenced me quite a bit.
Thanks to AJ at Bay State Vintage Guitars in Boston for his insights on ankhs on headstocks.
