by Craig J. Sorensen
(07/23/08)

Just because I get the question all the time doesn't mean I get tired of answering it. It's a bit of a hybrid, or so I'm told. It may be a cliché, but they don't make them like they used to.

I bought it from some guy in a Country band, God knows how many years ago. It was like new back then; you can see what it's like now. But that's just how I play, hard and to the point. It's technically a '58 Les Paul but it was between years, and yes, the figuring of the wood on the top is remarkable, though it's beat to shit now. The neck, well it's like a baseball bat. My most recent guitar tech said he could shave it down, make it easier to play. I said "you fuckin' better not!"

He was almost my most recent ex guitar tech just for the fucking suggestion! You don't fuck with the Mona Lisa. Yeah, I do have to fight that neck a bit, but that's just the way it is. It feels right, like Melissa's calf up in my hand.

Any advice for up-and-coming players? Well, my technique is nothing special.

I don't know. I guess there is one thing.

As long as I've been playing, and I've made some pretty good money along the way, I could have amassed a real army of guitars. My friend Roy has at least twenty-five, probably more like fifty! He's got a shitload of Strats, some Tele's a bunch of Les Pauls, he even has this butt ugly 90s lime-green shredder axe that just cracks me up. I mean, Roy never played anything but straight-ahead rock and blues. I bet he played that shredder axe like once, in the store, took a shining to it for some ungodly reason, took it home, and now it collects dust.

I'm sure you've heard the term "GAS." Guitar Acquisition Syndrome. I think Walter Becker of Steely Dan came up with it. He hit the nail on the head with that one. Some guys just can't have enough guitars, even when they already have more than they can ever play.

But me, I have two guitars. And before you ask, no, I don't have a stash on the side. I get that question all the fucking time. I hate that collector shit. There's one reason to not play a guitar and that's because it sounds like shit. And if that's the case, why buy the fucker? These collectors shell out $30,000 for a sunburst '59 with a nicely figured top and hang it away. Think about all those classical violins, what if all the Stradivariuses -- Stradivari? -- were in some prick's vault instead of in Anne Sophie Mutter's hand?

The past is the past. Now I have two fucking, working guitars. My fave, the '58 ½, and a '78 Les Paul for back up.

On occasion I strap on the '78 to get fresh strings or whatever, but I always can't wait to get back to numero uno. I know there's a risk of the fucker getting stolen, but have you ever seen me in a fistfight? Put it this way, where I go, the guitar goes. There have been a couple of attempts. I still have my 58 ½, and the bruises on my knuckles healed really well. See?

Groupies? Yeah, a few along the way. You know, groupies, they look mighty fine, especially when you're just moving up from the bar band scene to the big time. The groupies get prettier and more plentiful. On stage I'd play my best solos, and try not to look at them. Sometimes they'd flash me. You know, pull up their tops and give me an eyeload. Those bouncing breasts, big ones small ones, standing high, swinging low. A couple groupies have even let their pubes peek up from their wide zippers, then reach in and just let me know what they wanted me to do. Well, more than once I had to fight a, well, you know, a stiff one while coaxing out those solos!

And these crafty ladies always managed to get back stage and become a part of the refreshments. And yes, this was after Melissa and I hooked up. I'm not proud of that.

But two hundred fifty days on the road? You get lonely. Melissa never liked the road, at least not the way we did it. The town-to-town thing, you know, this day Detroit, next Toronto, then Buffalo, then some Podunk town whose name I can't pronounce. I couldn't figure out why she stayed with me. She never really liked my music, I mean she likes one kind of music: classical. Ever heard her play the violin? Fuckin' a. And when we're together, when I look in those eyes -- mmm.

Anyway, those early days were wild times. I mean, with a lead singer like Tony, wild man that he is, those parties got crazy. But the truth was, I didn't indulge in the groupies like he did. Don't get me wrong, I did indulge. But you know, it took a certain sort. A certain look. Those women who grabbed in their pants, lifted their tops or skirts, they never appealed to me beyond giving me stage wood. And the ones who were more appealing, well, you know, I'd get with them and by god they'd feel good and warm and wet on my --

I suppose I'm going too far now.

Well, I just assumed you wanted a PG rated interview. Yeah, I'll go on if you're sure.

Like I said, they'd feel nice, and the smell of a woman's sweat, well that always drove me wild, so I liked those girls who danced it up at the show. But none of that flashing shit. I know, I know. Picky, picky.

But as right as they felt on me, the smell of their skin, the sound of their voice, there was more to it. I don't know how to explain it.

See, there was this time...No, I probably shouldn't talk about it.

Aw, what the Hell! Like I said, I didn't go with many groupies. Tony could take on four at a time, I kid you not, so those that came for me, or at least said they did, and I didn't like, they just went to Tony or to Gary or Hunter or one of those studio musicians we used to bring along to fill out the sound after the second album. Anyway, I did occasionally indulge, but it was kind of a strange feeling. No, not just after, but during.

But there was this beautiful blonde. I hadn't even noticed her during the show. And she was really something to look at, so beautiful. Sorry Melissa. This woman -- she was at the party after the show. A couple of the guys, even Tony, tried to zero in on her, but she singled me out. We'd been on the road God knows how long. My cock was perpetually hard, or so it seemed. She had this strange sweet but slightly hot breath and as we talked, I wanted her worse and worse.

We hooked up in my room. She asked me to play a slow song, one of the ballads, yeah, it was the song Gaslamp. You know the one? Instrumental track from the third album, a long song that we didn't ever play on stage. It just never fit the show. Anyway, I played on my 58 ½ through a cheap little backstage amp. She did this slow, sexy dance. Christ, I've never seen the likes. Damn if I didn't get harder. Did I ever mention that I fuckin' hate strippers? But she peeled the clothes and moved her body like, oh, you know, one of those scarf dances or something. I stood, fully clothed, playing the song to razor perfection. I didn't dare stop. I'd never seen anything like this dance. I mean, she moved like a ballerina crossed with a gymnast crossed with an ice skater crossed with a belly dancer. I could smell her sweat growing. Christ, what beautiful sweat!

Well, she finally drew her panties down just as I played that outro arpeggio, D flat seven add nine. Wicked fucking chord. Wicked fucking woman.

She unstrapped my guitar, set it gently in its case and collapsed on me like a wetsuit. She smelled so good, I swear, this is the truth, this was the only time I hooked up with a groupie and Melissa didn't enter my head. Well -- I mean -- I did think about -- I'll come back to that.

Anyway, she cupped me like shrink-wrap. She unzipped my pants and coaxed me to the bed. Well, I had to have this woman, tanned skin and smell of sweat and these big blue eyes that glowed like jewels, locked on my face like lasers. But I didn't want to rush it. The guilt I should have had to fight was just gone, kidnapped or sniped, and I drew down on her. She kept fondling the calluses on my fingertips like they were diamonds. I drove into her long and hard. God how her body responded. It responded like the feel of my 58 ½.

But -- and this was the weird thing -- she didn't make a sound. Only the whisper of hard breath like the air pushed and pulled through the hole in the front of a bass drum. I'd turned on the radio when we first got on the bed. I turned it off. I wanted to hear her. I squeezed her nipples and her jaw spread like a rattler working down a fucking rabbit. I worked her clit, dug inside her and she pounded the bed like Hunter working out his best drum solo, and you know how that fucker can play. But not a sound from her throat.

At the backstage party she'd talked plenty, for Christ's sake. She'd talked some when we first got back to the room. But once she started her dance, she was like a soft wind, and the only sound was her controlled breath and the windmilling of her arms and legs. On the bed, it was the same thing. I started to feel weird. Deprived. Her belly rolled like a hurricane swept ocean, her plump breasts heaved like an opera-singer's. And not a sound from her pretty mouth!

I swear to God, I shoved my cock so hard into her I thought I'd see the tip poke up behind her tongue. I know, sounds fucking vicious, doesn't it? It wasn't, though. Anyway, her eyes were as wide as her mouth; she smiled like a Cheshire cat.

Not so much as a chirp! I fucked her and fucked her. I lost track of time. Her body kept twisting. She pulled every corner of the sheets out. Yup, even the lower ones, with her long fucking toes! She had three orgasms that I know of. I needed to piss, I needed to come. Sweat was draining from every pore, my balls were so hard it hurt and I could feel the come pushing like a fire hose with a closed nozzle. But I couldn't let go. My mouth was like Death Valley in August.

God, I wanted to make her cry out.

Then Melissa came to my mind. Melissa, and her lovemaking music. See, she plays that violin beautifully, and her moans were sweet like that, the soft words she whispered in my ear when we made love sweetly. But she could make angry grunts snorted through her nose and bit my earlobe so hard I thought she'd rip it off.

This blonde was so beautiful. So desirable. She might have been Aphrodite. But she sounded like a stringless electric guitar. Nice fretwork, nice electronics, prefect carved body. Mute as a fucking fish. But in this silence I saw something clearer, right there while my slapping cock was making more noise than her voice.

Back then, I did have a bunch of guitars. I switched guitar to guitar every show.

I looked down at that blonde and I went as limp as overcooked pasta. The woman's eyes widened when my cock got pushed from her pussy. "What's the matter, hon?" Her voice, when she used it, was beautiful, but it was now wasted. All wasted and empty.

I told her I was married. She said she knew, that all she wanted was to share the beauty of my music with me. That struck me funny. I said, "No, you don't get it. I feel guilty about cheating on my wife."

She looked at me for a long time, then kind of smiled, tilted her pretty head real cute like. She lay there, all spread out, beautiful and smelling like sweat and smoke and whisky and sex. Nothing wrong with this woman, far from it.

"We're done, aren't we," she finally said.

"Yeah, we're done." I couldn't lie.

She sighed, got up, and dressed as seductively as she'd undressed, but I looked away the entire time. She came over to me and kissed my cheek. "You fuck really great. Next time you're in Cleveland, you look me up if you change your mind."

"I won't, I can't."

"Pity, hon." She kissed my cheek, grinned and she was gone.

Anyone who gives a shit knows Melissa and I split for almost a year. Right after that tour. I mean, I had to come clean. I had to tell her about the lies. I told her how much I loved her, how fucking bad I felt, but she split, and who could blame her. I didn't touch another woman. There was no other woman for me than Melissa. I sold all my guitars but the '58 ½ and the '78. But the next album sucked ass, and that was because my head wasn't right. I questioned my tone, I questioned my picking, my fretting, questioned everything. The band went on the road to try to shore up from that suckass album. But I quit to come back and beg Melissa. You heard me: badass rocker begging on bended knee to be taken back. Hat in hand, heart on sleeve, dick on the butcher block, offering a nice, big cleaver.

Thank god, she took me back after a while and some very honest pleading. That's the whole truth and nothing but the truth.

First time we got in bed after that, after I luxuriated on her lips, kissing and sucking every inch of her mouth, when finally allowed myself to dip inside her and heard the long lost song of her Stradivarius-playing-Bach voice, well the desperate need I left on the road with that groupie in Cleveland came welling back. But this was more powerful still, and I would have never thought that possible. Melissa and I rocked back and forth, just rolling together, no fancy porn approved sprawling. Curled like a tight little ball. Just long, deep kisses and slow strokes like a power ballad that fills half a CD.

A power ballad. Long and slow, teasing, growing. Harmonies turning discordant, reuniting, time signature getting lost in the passion of the playing, then returning when the drummer pushes the "one" with an accented bass drum beat and a huge cymbal crash. We came together, just like in the movies, our voices at crescendo, filling the room.

I suppose Melissa will be pissed when she reads this "kiss and tell" thing, but this isn't about sex, right? It's about music. And since the band is recording again, we play fewer shows. We aren't getting any younger, so we have to organize better. The critics said the last album was our best. Wait until they hear the one we're working on now! We don't make as much money, that's the sign of the times, but all that time in the studio, not just playing the same tunes night after night, is paying off. And we're making enough to keep in the music.

And here's the moral of the story.

Hey. I heard that snicker. Even rockers have morals!

The simple truth: guitars are meant to be played, to be loved body and soul. Look for the right one and don't compromise. It may take some time, but you'll know when it's the right one. Don't be stupid when you find it. Don't let it go. I've made all the fucking mistakes, and I know what it means to make it right.

I have two guitars for the shows -- in case my '58 ½ breaks down.

But I need only one Melissa.

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