much predates the Frying Pan.â
âExcuse me?â says Kate.
âIt was a nineteen thirty-one prototype; a long thin guitar neck with a solid circular body, hence the Frying Pan. Arnold Rickenbacker, George Beauchamp, an assistant called Paul Barth, a guitar-maker called Harry Watson, they all had a hand in creating it. Itâs said that Beauchamp began by takingthe pickup from a Brunswick phonograph and attaching it to a piece of two-by-four with a single string. The pickup translated the vibration of the string and amplified it. Adding five more strings and giving the guitar a more conventional shape was just icing on the cake. The basic principle had been established.
âBy nineteen thirty-two Rickenbacker was manufacturing the Electro Spanish guitar, a perfectly modern looking piece of gear with f holes and fancy volume and tone controls, but the pickup is exactly like on the Frying Pan.â
Bob is aware that some of this may be a little technical for his listener, but she did ask for it, and he would never dream of talking down to a person just because she worked behind a bar. And besides itâs so much easier to talk about history and technology than it is to talk about whatâs really breaking his heart.
âAnyway,â Bob says, âbeing the first is nice, but it isnât everything. Some things are simply inevitable. If Beauchamp hadnât come up with the Frying Pan somebody else would have.
âLeo Fender was the first to mass-produce electric guitars. He made âem cheap and he made âem good. And if he hadnât started producing them, then Gibson certainly wouldnât have set up in competition, in which case Les Paul would never have been called in and the whole history of the electric guitar would have been different.
âBut note that I only say
different.
If Fender hadnât been the Henry Ford of guitars, somebody else would have been. If Les Paul hadnât invented that fat, eloquent humbucking sound, somebody else would. Thesethings were simply bound to happen.
âAnd after those few basic but crucial inventions, after those patents and practices, it didnât really matter. After that, the deluge. After that there came tens of thousands of designers and inventors, craftsman and manufacturers, customizers and luthiers, all trying to âreinventâ the electric guitar. But basically they were all too late. The job had been done and the party was over. The rest was just tidying and sweeping up.â
âYou certainly know your history,â Kate says.
âThose who donât know history are doomed to do bad cover versions,â he quips. âNow, thereâs a reasonable argument that says the best electric guitars are the biggest failures. You see, the pioneers of the electric guitar wanted a device that could reproduce the sound of an acoustic guitar as accurately and with as pure a tone as possible, so that it sounded exactly like an acoustic guitar only louder. But electric guitars never quite do that. They add muck and growl and distortion. And the strange thing is, people discovered they preferred it that way.â
Kateâs face shows confusion. She says, âWhy would people prefer muck and growl and distortion to accuracy and purity?â
âPeople are funny like that, Kate.â
Kate shakes her head sadly.
âAnd thatâs why they like effects too.â
âEffects? As in special effects?â
âIn a way, yes. If people liked a fuzzy signal, why not make a little machine that could create fuzz to order? And chorus. And phase. And tremolo. And echo.And chorus. And so on and so on.â
âThe more the merrier,â Kate adds glibly.
âFrankly, merriness is not one of the things Iâve ever really looked for in music,â says Bob. âBut yes, when it comes to guitar noise, less is generally not better. Jenny Slade may be many things but sheâs never been much of