Axe victim: hung up on these silver strings...

....like seagulls' cries, like churchbells in the night"...thus sang Bill Nelson and Be-Bop Deluxe back in the 70s, as their track encapsulated the pull of the electric guitar to the player.
  The pic above is of me posing with my beloved Fender Japan 1968 Reissue strat.

   Nowadays a sad and yet bizarre situation is taking place in some young people: what with console games that cozen you into believing that playing decent electric guitar is a result of either software or pressing lots of buttons with dexterity. I even have had the ultimate red carpet plucked from beneath my feet when some people have actually thought my guitar solos are some kind of software.
    Actually, before you click off, I'll grab you now, if I may: All the guitars you're about to view do get played: in fact, I've written and recorded quite a number of songs, assembling over the years a collection of tracks that I have also learnt (somewhat) to produce and engineer.
   In fact, you can get to them and hear them either by going to my home webpage here, which will also direct you to my online photo galleries...or if you want to go straight to the music and start listening, I have it all here at Shaun Reeder's Music
  I could of course bore you witless with what I used on each track, what soundcard and effects, etc; so that watching a plank warp would seem like a better use for your senses...but, gentleman that I am, I'll leave you to have a listen.
And I must not give you the impression that I lead a busy and funpacked life, surfing waves of creative abandon in infinite childlikeness: I have played guitar from the age of 14, when it was easier to ignore the challenge of socialising and escape a world to which I often felt I didn't belong; I would practise and play for hours using  a tinny little tape recorder as an amplifier, scrawping the stylus back and forth repeatedly on my vinyl in order to try and Play-Alonga-With Jeff Beck, Jan Akkerman and Santana. I found I seemed to be blessed with a flair for playing...and indeed, remember that as soon as I heard one particular track, something dropped into a slot into my heart and stayed there, never departing.....
....cue an imaginary soundtrack of a harp arpeggio here, for that timeslip effect....
 I was at a friend's party, guzzling Babycham and getting ratbagged on just 4 bottles, and this LP was on the deck. There was this backdrop of keyboards, a soft sizzle on a ride cymbal and then this guitar note. And I could have cried: as this note fell into my ears, it seemed to drop down a slot to my chest without touching the sides. When it hit my heart, it felt like some part of me knew itself, was united with something that would never pass or fade...like I knew at that moment that this was what I do as this is what I am.
   In fact, reading this now and remembering the moment, I wonder what and where would I be now, had I had more...strength, or forcibly chose not to embrace the damage and self-destruct that I soon would....
      Anyway, where  was I...?...ahh...
 That note was the infinitely touching opening bars of "Cause we've ended as lovers," by Jeff Beck. I reckon that even now, the drive to bend the fingers to the string is in some way an attempt to grab that very first note as it dropped into my heart, to recreate that meaning, that completeness...
   Since I met  God, or rather, He rescued me, I have come to believe that He built me in such a way that either I was fashioned for this gift, or it for me. Moreover, that this gift, paradoxically, is one not meant for me  but for other people, for their building...I am the bearer of it yet it does not belong to me. It is also a gift that requires its bearer to be active in bringing both me and others to He who gave me the gift, as He has so much more to give those who seek Him.
  I could apologise here for "getting all religious" on you all...but if I tried to speak of it in different terms, I fear I would be untruthful and as such doing you a disservice..and of course, what with free will being what it is, I know you're all growed up enough to either click off somewhere else or condemn me as a nutter. You wouldn't be the first, I tell you!
   I learnt something a few years ago(s'funny, I often need so many bashes around the head to get something into it): I found that I could effectively manipulate people's emotions by playing in a certain way. This feeling of...power, I guess, hit me quite forcibly, as though I suddenly saw that I had a responsibility over how I deployed the gift. Now, in secular language, I am hardly a saint by nature, but I find I have to guard the way I play, as if I could almost hurt someone if I just "fired it off" led completely by my feelings...
   Anyway: here's a piccie or two: this little babbsy is a fretless bass I bought cheaply very recently. Made by the stonkingly good Vintage company, it is a copy of a Fender jazz bass.

  This above is my "collection", the guitars I have played over the years and couldn't bear to part with: you can just see there are 2 strats, a Deluxe in addition to the '68 Reissue. There's a blue PRS Custom 24 snuggled between the strats, bought secondhand; of the 2  Les Pauls you see in the front row, the black one on the left is an excellent copy, again by Vintage(set neck an' all!). The one on the right is a Gibson Les Paul Standard in honeyburst. In the centre of the front row is something you don't see every day...yes, it's a Yamaha SG2000:

    
  There we are: just thought you'd like a better view. It is in fact NOT a SG2000S but an absolutely original SG2000(without the "S"): yer actual SG2000 was discontinued in the UK by 1980, whilst even in Japan they only kept going until 1988. When I got hold of this one, it was a rare find: it is in impeccably good condition, has a low serial number and had never been outside Japan before it got to me. It is almost certainly from either 1979 or 1980.
  Which just leaves a little acoustic I have, a baby travel guitar by Tanglewood....and we can symmetrically round proceedings off with my 5-string bass:

 This seductively surreal instrument is made from woods I had no idea existed, let alone had been razed and butchered in order to be crafted into this lovely 5-string bass. It is handmade by a Scottish luthier called Alan Cringean. If you've not heard of him, you will. In answer to any questions of "how good is it?", all I can say is that I had to part from my devastatingly excellent Status Graphite S2 Classic 5-string bass in order to get this.

 I think probably every single one of the above guitars, apart from the fretless bass, can be heard played by me at my music site. I'm sure you'll find something there out of the 15 or so tracks that you will like.