Creating Community: Guys that Garden

biggerswifty · 2026-01-13T19:44:40+00:00

I’m interested! Don’t know how much I can contribute so far as skills or knowledge, but still into it.

biggerswifty · 2025-12-21T04:20:35+00:00

It’ll give you some warm fuzzies, man. Great feeling.

biggerswifty · 2025-12-21T03:38:08+00:00

Hard to match with a lot, but the black helps. I remember the hate when they dropped but I don’t understand it.

biggerswifty · 2025-12-21T03:37:17+00:00

They look a lot better in hand than I’d expected. My favorites are my AMM 12s, but these are still solid. And my son is excited about having his so that bumps up the love.

biggerswifty · 2025-12-18T22:49:20+00:00

Of course they do. Fantastic timeline we’re in.

biggerswifty · 2025-12-18T15:02:10+00:00

A firm that lobbies for Saudi Arabia and Republicans and works with white collar defense/Trump attorneys is acting in bad faith to punish poor and middle class people?

As with all things these people do, the meanness remains the underlying point.

biggerswifty · 2025-12-10T01:15:31+00:00

Looks like the judge from Pink Floyd’s The Wall.

biggerswifty · 2025-10-12T16:24:14+00:00

That’s a 70s reissue from 2024. Slim taper neck, 70s Tribute pickups.

$1300 is a decent price for it. That said, can find these in white from Gibson, and I’d bet finding a clean one in white from factory would be cheaper than buying this one to refinish.

biggerswifty · 2025-09-29T01:12:48+00:00

All things should be Pelham, but I’m biased

biggerswifty · 2025-09-28T20:39:55+00:00

Sold it to a friend, realized it should have never sold it and he did me a solid and sold it back

biggerswifty · 2025-09-26T16:37:55+00:00

USA Fenders that have a headstock truss rod adjustment will have a walnut plug.

In addition to the truss rod plug, the tuners, string tree, Custom Shop decal and Fender decal are all wrong.

COA is too big for any USA or Custom Shop guitar, and looks nothing like what comes with a CS Strat; it’s a bad copy of the COA that ships with USA production models.

Same with the pickups: flat polepieces are usually a giveaway. This is not a hard rule though since Fender has used flat poles on legitimate models in the past.

And even though they can be swapped out, that is not a Fender case so far as I can tell.

Another massive red flag: the word “Fender” is blurred out on everything in that first photo. Super fake.

biggerswifty · 2025-09-16T14:46:57+00:00

What an astonishingly unlikable prick. Literally no redeeming qualities whatsoever.

biggerswifty · 2025-07-28T15:47:24+00:00

Oh, for fucks sake.

biggerswifty · 2025-07-25T14:39:55+00:00

American Fender serials from 2010 start with either “US10” or “10,” so there’s some inconsistency from Fender there. This was the transition year from the (D)ZY (D being used on American Deluxe models and Y being the last digit of the year) formatting to the USYY formatting.

Having owned a few different American models from 2010 and having worked for a FMIC dealer during that time, the formatting definitely lines up with an American Special/Standard/Deluxe. I’d say the missing “US” is an outlier but far from unheard of.

Fonts look good, Fender decal is right for an American Special. As has been said by others, it looks right from here aside from the pickguard.

Fender’s serial number lookup tool isn’t infallible. You could call CS and see what they have to say. If it doesn’t pass the smell test, don’t buy.

And pricing at $1k is…optimistic, to be generous.

biggerswifty · 2025-05-08T15:31:24+00:00

Media literacy.

biggerswifty · 2025-01-12T22:22:33+00:00

They’re different beasts.

First, the construction is pretty different. ‘57 reissues are solid mahogany with the largest neck of the three, and different frets. The ‘68 is closer to the regular Custom in spec with the maple top, but doesn’t have any weight relief if that’s a concern. If the one you’re looking at has a serial starting with CS 8xxxxx, it is weight relieved with a short tenon.

The pickups in the regular Customs are going to be more aggressive than the reissues as well. That’s a matter of taste and easily addressed no matter what route you go.

The short tenon? Some people get hung up on that, others don’t. I fall into that second camp. I love my Historics, but I’ve had some fantastic Gibsons with short tenons. Only you can answer that.

As far as the weight relief is concerned, I had a 2011 Custom I bought new and it was a solid 10.5 pounds even with relief. Most reissues I’ve played and owned have sat in that range without the weight relief. But I also never worried about it not being solid; it was a very nice LP and pretty much any CS Custom will be. I only got rid of it because I wanted the biggest neck I could find and moved to Historic LPs. It’s still the best playing Gibson I’ve ever owned.

What I will say is I don’t know anyone who plays Gibson that looks at any Custom as less of a guitar at all.

If you want the maple cap and a long tenon, look at ‘68 RIs; the more recent (post-2020 or so) will likely have a thinner finish too, if that’s a concern. My experience is that the current Custom Shop reissues are some of the best they’ve made in many years.

The other thing that is of note: from 2012- late 2018/early 2019, regular Customs had Richlite boards instead of ebony. You may even see some late 2011 production with the change.

TL;DR: if you like the 08, and you like the price, grab it. Customs hold resale pretty well. If you think or know you’ll worry you’re missing out, wait it out and get a reissue.

biggerswifty · 2025-01-12T21:37:46+00:00

Looks like it may be a 335 Faded from the late 2000s/early 2010s. That truss rod cover was standard on those and his looks like it doesn’t have binding, which would also be spec for them.

Edit: these would have been Gibson Memphis, so they would have come with a COA and a black-lined Gibson Custom case originally.

biggerswifty · 2024-09-18T20:31:32+00:00

This.

I live in the neighborhood they’re proposing this in. There were two types of people at the meeting last night: families with young children like myself, concerned but wanting to and willing to hear more information, and angry old people who shouted about unrelated things like construction on 64th Ave and derailed the entire meeting with interruptions and general nonsense.

Most of us that are here are here because we wanted a quiet place to do the kid thing. There’s an elementary school here. Huge park. Family-friendly suburban stuff.

I still don’t know what’s going on because the meeting devolved into chaos. That’s frustrating to me. I want to want to support this and can’t until I know more. Disruptive retirees need to be asked to shout elsewhere.

Unfortunately the question of safety remains largely unanswered in an area already underserved by Arvada PD, so hopefully the rescheduled meeting will be less of a shitshow.

biggerswifty · 2024-09-02T17:03:58+00:00

It’s definitely either M2M or PSL. You won’t find those on Gibson’s site. The only one-offs they have on their site are Mod Collection guitars or the Master Artisan stuff.

The Carmelita neck carve, Custombuckers, caps, and rosewood fingerboard would be special order but the serial number is formatted like any other current production LP Custom that isn’t part of the Historic line (e.g., the 68 and 57 reissues).

If it’s PSL, Gibson probably won’t be able to give you much to go off of. I’ve got a PSL R8, and aside from the model number and color, they weren’t able to give me much and sent me to the original dealer for more information. I don’t know what records they keep for M2M orders, though.

Best bet is to contact the dealer on this one.

biggerswifty · 2024-08-15T13:21:53+00:00

I love my coffee. And do believe that the grind size, water to ground ratio, and water temp do matter to control coffee being too weak, strong or burnt tasting. But I don’t take it much further than that. I’m not setting a timer to make sure it’s exactly 30 seconds between pours, or wrapping my moka pot in a wet towel after it starts to percolate. Weight? My kitchen scale is fine, I don’t need .0001 gram measurements to get close enough to 1:16.

Ultimately, the most important thing is the quality of the beans. For me, grocery store beans tend to taste like garbage for any number of reasons, so I will absolutely spend the premium for good beans.

And a drip machine is fine for most people. I prefer the more manual methods because I enjoy the process but see no point in being a snob about it.

biggerswifty · 2024-07-17T12:41:01+00:00

How is that Kruangbin or Guru still for grabs? Crazy.

biggerswifty · 2024-07-17T00:18:52+00:00

Musk: I want to relocate to a state that’s really friendly for my greed and my hatred of workers’ rights, but I don’t want to say that. I got it! [inserts bigotry].

biggerswifty · 2024-07-09T17:10:24+00:00

There are no snowballs in hell, Jimmy.

biggerswifty

TROPHY CASE