Tell the story of your first guitar.

[Vamplifier]

A friend of mine got an electric guitar out of the blue and played it for me over the telephone. I went over to his house and watched him butcher some metal riffs. I wasn't into metal but I figured if that dork (I liked the guy, but he was a dork) could have an electric guitar, so could I. I had plenty of Joe Strummer, Prince and John Lennon fantasies.

Well, my friend's folks were rich and mine were not. My parents wouldn't buy a guitar, they gave me extra chores to do. For a year I toiled and finally on my 16th birthday they forked out $250 and bought me a guitar. I was from a very small town in a very geographically isolated area. We had a music store (of the marching band variety) and a pawn shop. My father being a frugal man and avid Consumer Reports reader opted for the most features.

The selection was poor. I ended up with an Aria Pro II Iron Man in metallic candy apple red. It had three humbuckers, a locking tremolo with fine tuners and it was a metal guitar. I hated metal. I couldn't play it on my lap because of the weird v-shape so I had to learn standing up. We couldn't afford an amp or lessons. So I would lean the headstock of my guitar against the drywall and let the vibrations amplify. After a few weeks my father ripped apart an RCA cord and rewired it so I could plug it into the stereo.

Learning to play was one of the most excruciating experiences of my life. I hated that guitar. The locking tremolo with fine tuners made for long tedious sessions of fiddling with allen wrenches and it never stayed in tune. I had to stand so close to the stereo with my homemade cable, I couldn't move. I had no lessons and no books. And it all sounded like crap. The worst part is, I was just getting into Sonic Youth at the time. I had no idea that Sonic Youth tuned their guitars weird so there was no point in me trying to learn by ear.
Bah! You kids with you internets have it so easy. Get off my lawn!!

[ShizamDaMan]

I was 17, going on 18. I had always enjoyed music, but my tastes were all over the place, including some truly awful pop-sensations I don't care to mention for fear of being laughed off this board.

Anyway, I had some friends in high school bands. They weren't great bands, but they sure looked like they were having a lot of fun while playing. I have to say what pushed me over the edge was hearing The Strokes for the first time. That did it for me, the way the guitars came together and formed intertwining melodies. I must have listened to Reptilia like a thousand times. I decided I was going to learn to play. Asked the parents for a guitar for my birthday, and got a Tradition Stratocaster copy with one of those weak Crate 15W amps. Not a horrible starter set if I do say so.

I got a teacher for the first six months before college. Luckily my teacher focused more on theory and technique than playing songs (which friends who took him used to criticize him on). It felt like I didn't learn that much, but as I moved to college and practiced on my own, I had good foundations laid and improved.

I look at myself now, 5 years later, and boy have I come far. I mod the hell out of own guitars/amps, have dabbled in recording, mixing and producing, and can put together coherent songs. I can't wait to see where another 5 years will take me.

[Fuzzhead]

My dad bought a Peavey Tracer from a pawn shop sometime in the mid-90's (I was born in '89) that had a terrible homemade picture of Woody Woodpecker painted on it. The paint was removed, but the nickname "Woody" stuck. Then in the spring of 2005, I picked it up out of boredom and learned some open chords and a few songs. For my 16th birthday that May, I got a black Squier Fat Strat with a mirror pickguard. So ugly. But it was my own guitar, and I loved it. Open chords turned into power chords, and I haven't looked back since.

"Woody" has since been Sharpied-upon, and remains in use. The Strat has been way-the-hell modded. Both are in my sig.

[Decepticon]

When I was 15 I had been teaching myself guitar for a few months on my dad's acoustic and occasionally he'd let me play his japanese strat through a marshall practice amp. I was desperate for my own guitar though a I wanted to start a punk band.
I went into the shop without a clue merely saying "I want a black guitar".
I looked at a few and ended up with an Encore something or other. It had a humbucker in the bridge which the bloke in the shop told me was good for punk stuff, he also recommended some Ibanez's but I hated the 'metal' look and the locking trems.
The guitar opened up a world of power chords and single string solos and it served me pretty well, until my dad gave me his strat as he doesn't really play guitar at all, and I ended up smashing the encore up a bit at a gig, then fixed it and sold it to my mate for £30 who learnt to play on it.

[New001]

about 8 years ago, i found this old beat up acoustic in my grandmother's basement. it was destined to die there so i was allowed to take it home. the neck was so warped, the strings rose about 1/4" above the frets (at the end by the soundhole). nonetheless, i taught myself "wish you were here" and "mr. jones", and thats when it all started for me

i dont use that guitar much anymore as it is unplayable and impractical to repair, however i do use it for acoustic slide playing and also as a microphone with a piezo inside

[Scruff]

Eight years back, my grandparents bought me a travel-size Art & Lutherie acoustic, and I started taking lessons. At the time, I didn't like the acoustic, since I couldn't get the same sound as what I was hearing on the music I wanted to play. Eventually, my parents caved a bought me a Squier Strat-pack.

Oh yeah, the good 'ol Squier strat and Fender Frontman 15 combo. I rocked that thing for a while, but was never really satisfied with it.

It wasn't until I bought my Epi Les Paul standard that I actually got into playing, and I've been playing catch up ever since. Looking back, I ought to have practiced more, but I never found reason to until I started getting decent tone, honestly.

Tone freak. So sue me.

[Timoren]

When I was 15 my mother wouldn't buy me a guitar because I hadn't stuck with piano or drums (neither of which where my choice). So I had to save all my pennies from working at my Mom's daycare to buy my first guitar, a red Squier II Stratocaster with a single layer pick guard, plywood body and all. As part of a deal that I cut with Mom, I got the Crate G10 practice amp, chord, stand and gig bag as my birthday present in March of 1990. I thought I was SOOOO COOL! For the following Christmas, as a reward for sticking to the guitar, I got an Applause AE38 in burgundy (almost purple) burst, which is still my favorite acoustic to this day. I still have the Squier II and Crate amp as well. I cant bring myself to get rid of either of them.

[asatbluesboy]

Ok, I'll try to be brief. Pardon me as I fail miserably.

My family is methodist, which means people usually played and I used to sing a lot and there were always instruments around. Mom played a bit of guitar and piano, grandma played a big bit of piano, and so on. I found the guitar very interesting, because all the cool kids seemed to play it and get a lot of chicks, and also because I could sing along while playing it (I have a thing with being self-sufficient). Lazy as I've always been, it took me until I was 10 (after messing up a lot with my grandmom's keyboard, a toy piano and flutes) to actually grab an acoustic and try to learn something in my school's music classes. One day, I believe it was the third class, I left the guitar in its bag on the ground and some kid I didn't see stepped on its headstock, breaking the neck at that point and ending my classes. The guitar was my stepdad's, so I got scared to death, but since he never played it it was cool.

When I was 12 I fell for a girl that was taking guitar lessons, which made me remember I've always wanted to play it, so I asked my parents and they gave me an acoustic (good brand, entry-level line) for my 13th birthday. I owe that girl my life, I tell you. She was a slut and didn't really care much for me, but playing the thing has been invaluable in my life.

Some months later I heard “Territorial Pissings� and my life was changed forever. I started saving birthday moneys and whatnot to get a Strat (a Chinese '96 Affinity Squier), a ZOOM 505 (which at the time I really thought could sound good; oh, the naïvety...) and an amp (which ended up being a Frontman 15R I miss a lot) a little after I turned 15. Of course I could never get a good distortion sound, but it was fun (and cheap) to be ignorant about the wonderful world of real guitar gear.

I could go on and on I was actually writing another paragraph on my --guitar story--, but I guess that's enough.

[Timoren]

When I was 15 my mother wouldn't buy me a guitar because I hadn't stuck with piano or drums (neither of which where my choice). So I had to save all my pennies from working at my Mom's daycare to buy my first guitar, a red Squier II Stratocaster with a single layer pick guard, plywood body and all. As part of a deal that I cut with Mom, I got the Crate G10 practice amp, chord, stand and gig bag as my birthday present in March of 1990. I thought I was SOOOO COOL! For the following Christmas, as a reward for sticking to the guitar, I got an Applause AE38 in burgundy (almost purple) burst, which is still my favorite acoustic to this day. I still have the Squier II and Crate amp as well. I cant bring myself to get rid of either of them.

[btendanftf]

My first guitar came around when I was ten. I'll never forget doing all the odd jobs, such as running phone lines underneath our neighbor's house (there happened to be a dead cat under there too) and washing dishes at our family's restuarant. Well one day I finally had enough money for my first guitar, an Austin strat copy. One hundred and fifty dollars I payed for it. HEHEHE IN ONE DOLLAR BILLS!!!. Needless to say the guys in the music shop and me bonded that day.

[Phase_Cancelled]

i as bored one day and tried to get my mom to teach me to play guitar, meaning campfire and bluegrass. She's more of a ragtime piano maid. (Grandpa on the other hand, is a banj-ist.) That lasted all of three days because at that time, mom's 30-year-old AMAZING acoustic had never been set up, i mean the ivory bridge was completely rounded like somebody bought it and stuck it in there, no shaving.
Dad got me a black ibanez RG at a pawn shop for christmas and a crate like a week later. My brother got a vintage TAMA superstar 28" set worth $5g's (we didn't know that, also at a pawn shop) and dad got a USA spector bass for like $500. i mostly got skunked, but we all learned to play. Mom hated to play with us because she's a hater like i have become, as in "can't find anything you don't hate on the radio" type hate.
I mauled the RG with a handle and badly done trans blue paint and thick, visible from the side decals. it doesn't ever leave the house.
here ends my longest post.

[Wylde_Overdrive]

i woke up christmas morning, saw a large box marked Fender and proceeded to ask my dad "you got me part of a car?" then i took it to my band teacher at school to have him tune it/fix it to keep it in tune. i took lessons for about a month, then decided to learn on my own. it's been 5 years now, and it's the only hobby i've ever stuck with.

[messy bedroom]

well i think there's a similar thread that runs through us guitar players. my family didn't have a lot of cash in terms of extra's. but i had asked for a guitar since i was 4 every year at xmas i'd go through the sear catalog and ask for the coolest looking strat copy. never got one. this went on for a few years. finally after 5 years my parents took a good hint. when i was 9 i got an encore acoustic. sort of a student sized guitar it had steel strings on it even though it had classical machine heads on it. i began taking lessons from a teacher at school. (i still use this guitar but now with nylon strings. it sounds good in a lo-fi cheap guitar way) then i saved up for an electric saving birthday money chore money any money that could be obtained. going to the store for your parents and keeping the change is the fast track to success.

anyways a year later i went down to the hock shop in town and got a red strat copy made by harmony for $100 they wanted $150 but my dad talked him down after he pointed out some wiring issues and so... (the things dad's are good for) and he gave me a free strap. for the next year i used a big boom box straight out of the 80's like break dance style... plugged in with a 1/4" to rca but it had a volume bass mid and high knob and it worked. the best thing is it distorted really easily and i thought that sounded cool because i was into classic rock like the kinks and the who and the grunge fall out that was happening like green days dookie or weeezer or smashing pumpkins "today" intro anything that had an easy enough riff to imitate. i still have this too but i dont use it.

its now 14 years later. and i still suck but i suck with heart dammit !

[Ambiance]

My sister is 20 years older than I, and an amazing amazing guitarist.

I was 14 and I wasn't really into anything other than skateboarding and video games at the time when she came in with a silvertone strat and her old peavey amp.

I was, and still am, REALLY into Black Sabbath and she showed me how to play electric funeral. I was ****in psyched. My friend was learning to play the drums about the same time from his dad and that's been our passions ever since.

I forged my style through static, dissonance and mostly odd time signatures(due to us having no clue what a 4/4 beat was) with my friend banging and clanking behind me.

I think I wrote some of my best riffs in those first 2 years, with absolutely no clue as to chords or scales... I didn't even tune my guitar, I used my tuner to see what the guitar was tuned to so that I could go back and play the riffs I wrote in the same tuning.

I then wanted a bass and I figured out that if i loosened my strings alot it sounded like one..

Things just kinda fell into place for me.

Now I'm about as versed in the ordinary musical stuff as most guitar players.. but I miss the old days of having no ****ing clue what I was doing other than what sounded cool.

[asatbluesboy]

Originally posted by Ambiance
I miss the old days of having no ****ing clue what I was doing other than what sounded cool.

I hear you, brother.