2015 - Julia, Rusty Steel, more tremolos

2015 - L.A.

Again a mild January week in Los Angeles. The weather is the good thing about L.A. and the entire show has a familiarity to it. You always meet the same people, shake hands and have fun - as much as possible - in the same places. And there are also guys like Daryl Jones, the Stones bass player, and his very likeable Tech Derek Phelbs, who I met last year in Madrid.

For Friday night Nathan had organized a session at Roscoe’s,  just around the corner from his place. I played five Doors songs and was accompanied by the best, including Peter Stroud (a great honor) and Chris Rodríguez, the Nashville guitarist and singer who has played with all kinds of greats (Vince Gill, Billy Joel, Keith Urban, Kenny Loggins, etc.)  Chris' specialty is singing the Loggins hit "Foot Loose" in a very powerful rendition.  We also used our new Julia guitar, named after my daughter.

Johnny Depp & The Hollywood Vampires

It was again a glorious concert in the college auditorium with Johnny Depp and the Hollywood Vampires. On the left is Felix, a good friend of Nathan’s and a very reliable security man, whom I have taken to heart, especially since he always reminds me of guys like Humphrey Bogart.

Abe Laboriel Jr., an incredibly powerful drummer. I have never experienced such energy before. And on top of that, he's a super likeable, hearty fellow. He played almost the whole evening. Here in the picture with his bandmate Brian Ray, one of the very first famous Duesenberg players (but Abe also has at least three of our guitars).

Johnny Depp was again extremely cool and tasteful, here seen with the "Planken" guitar. I've been his fan forever, more precisely since I saw him in the Jim Jarmusch movie "Dead Man" from 1995. This is really one of the best movies ever for me! And please note that Johnny is also singing now. He recently performed "Heroes" by David Bowie in a very charismatic way. See: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U8VnYZLWr_s

There were again various line-ups, among others with the daughter of bassist Bruce. Our new amp, however, was in constant use - and our new Rusty Steel design was well received.


By the way, the entire concert was recorded by the Sennheiser company using a new recording method.

And for the first time, our young Andrej L. was also with us shooting fotos together with Martin Huch.

Duesenberg open Tuners

These open tuners have been around since time immemorial for cheap mass-produced products - rude punched-out housings, worm gears with cogwheels that jam or run empty. However, there are still small manufacturers who use their traditional know-how and precise craftsmanship to produce fascinatingly beautiful open mechanisms in which the gears (cogwheel and worm shaft) are visible. And - if beautifully made - this can look extremely aesthetic.

At the end of the 1950s, however, the Grover company countered this with the so-called "closed" mechanism. Suddenly it was possible to manufacture products with greater precision at a much lower technical and financial cost using the then new, super-precise metal injection casting technology. One of the truly ingenious Grover patent claims at the time was that, as with a knife-edge bearing, the gearwheel screwed to the machine head shaft was automatically pulled against the worm shaft by the string tension - backlash and tolerances were virtually impossible! For this purpose, these machine heads were fixed from above using a central screw connection with a hexagonal threaded sleeve, which was essential for this new technology and also made the visually perfect positioning of the 6 machine heads extremely easy.

After this patent expired (approx. 20 years later), practically all major machine head manufacturers worth mentioning (Schaller, Gotoh etc.) happily adopted this in their production technology.

Of course, we also use this technology for all our traditionally designed Duesenberg machine heads. And this perfect design also requires our central screw connection using a threaded sleeve from above, which is still absolutely new for an open machine head. No slack in the gearing and visually much easier positioning!

Coupled with Duesenberg's own innovative string-through patent (Z-Tuner) and a 1:18 gear ratio, we have designed the first open, super perfect and super beautiful machine head, which also sets new technical standards.

Duesenberg - Spain

Even the crème de la crème of Spanish musicians have been well supplied with our instruments for quite some time.

The Rolling Stones-signed 49er guitar

We had given two guitars to the Stones: one to auction off for charity and the other for us. This guitar was somehow lost and just didn't want to come back to Hannover. Several emails were exchanged with Pierre Debeaufort, who sent back monosyllabic, useless answers every time for months. "The guitar is in London." "Yes, okay, but where exactly, please?" Luckily, I had met Sally Wood at the Madrid concert, who appeared on stage during a vocal rehearsal for "You Can't Always Get What You Want" together with Ronnie. Ronnie, a real gentleman, had greeted Paloma, my girlfriend, right away with "Hello Paloma" and the left and right kisses that are common in Spain. (Ronnie has a residence in Barcelona and therefore has a certain experience of Spain). At least that's how I got to know Sally, which later proved to be fruitful.

For months afterward, the Outlaw still hadn't shown up, although I had emailed Pierre the exact delivery address and alternatively offered that one of us could pick up the guitar in London - if I knew where. My last hope was finally Chris Jagger, to whom I explained our dilemma. He immediately said: "I'm calling Sally Wood!"

No sooner said than done! In July I finally received an email from her, in which she first thanked me for the auction guitar, which after all had brought in £20,000. She also offered thanks for my ashtray initiative and asked just what kind of help I would need.

This was quickly explained and she immediately found out that the Outlaw had been safely stored in the Stones office in Chelsea for a long time.  Well, at last we find out! I wrote back that I would come by in person to pick up the instrument and she briefed the people in the office accordingly.

So I booked two return flights, one for me and one for the guitar, because I didn't want to check it as luggage. Because of the airfares, that wasn't even a luxury. So early in the morning I flew from Madrid to London Heathrow and from there traveled by train to Chelsea station and from there by cab to the sublime Stones office. I was warmly welcomed by a nice secretary, took a few photos, she generously got me a cab back to the station at the Stones cost and I disappeared with that valuable possession, safely tucked away in one of our excellent Duesenberg cases. And since the train to the airport didn't leave until an hour later, I celebrated the reunion with my guitar in a pub with a few drinks and English sausages with chips and ketchup.
At 7 pm I checked in. First there were problems with the stewardess: "You have to gate check your guitar!" "Wait, I have two tickets here. One for me and one for the guitar."  After a short consultation with the chief steward, she let me through with my guitar case and in the plane I strapped the guitar on the seat next to me. By the way, the two tickets were an idea of my already mentioned Swiss friend Kurt Scheidegger, who had flown out a Zemaitis guitar this way a long time ago. At night at half past eleven I was back in Madrid, everything was fine, but it had been a relatively difficult ordeal.

Parts - 2015

new Tremolos

Yes, the new pin-bearing tremolos, butter-soft and simply constructed!

Wandré / Davoli Pickups & Parts

And finally, these reproductions of the Wandré / Davoli pickups were in the program. I could not stop following this crazy theme and developing products from it. High tool costs, ultimately low sales, but I just had to have it. And after all, the Johnny Depp pickup was born from this conical shape.  There was not only a true to the original version, but also one that looked just as original from above, but had a taller housing, in which you could wonderfully accommodate various inner workings: Humbucker, Single-Twins, P-90 etc.

Soundcheck


Paloma Time (first working titel „Calypso")

Paloma Soundcheck:

Wrap Around Tailpiece with Ballend Stopper

„Frantz" Pickups

Guild guitars from the 60s had very tasteful P-90-style single-coil pickups with a wonderfully open sound. This thanks to much fewer windings and ceramic magnets. What could be more obvious than to put this design into a humbucker housing? No sooner said than done! Here you can hear it.

Italy

In May a beautiful quick trip to Italy, among other things in order to visit my Wandré friend Marco Ballestri. If you come via Genoa, it's worth visiting the Mercato Orientale, with an incredible range of fruit and vegetables.

Spin-Holder

As a guitarist and singer, I thought it would be nice and crowd-pleasing if I could quickly put away my guitar and do a little show dancing on stage while our other guitarist, Javi, holds the fort. With a "normal" guitar strap this is not so easy, because you have to pull it over your head. So I thought of a strap like the one used on a saxophone: just a central suspension. For this purpose I constructed a new neck mounting plate which had a keyhole-like recess in the middle. There you could hang the strap pin, whereby a small groove had to be made in the wood underneath, so that the pin finds its place. In addition, a solid stand with a horizontal end pin to hang up the guitar there and immediately have freedom of movement. Unfortunately, it has also ended up in the garage for now ...

Grand Royale - A draft

TRI-TONE-BASS

The cool thing about this bass is that it has three single twins in its oval caps, which you can connect in series for fat sounds by switching the middle pickup to the neck pickup and the bridge pickup.  The sliding saddles of the bridge can be locked sideways, which makes the construction "like one piece".

Duesen-Lamp

In Madrid I discovered a company that produced artificial illuminated signs in the 50’s look. We had these beautiful Duesenberg lamps made by them. I also had one of these gems installed in the Madrid Duesenberg store "Headbanger Guitars". There was also a nice presentation with los Dooros. Here with special guest Ramon Arroyo, guitarist of the well known Spanish band "Los Secretos". A brilliant musician, who always reminds me a little bit of Helge Schneider.

Angus Young Prototype

Los Dooros

Meanwhile we had a new drummer, Hugo Enrique Pastor, and you can see and hear: Such a Roland electro-drums is not that bad. Here a little blues in my practice cabin!

Beside ...

a first class Spanish ham and the old controversy ...

And something else about Spain including a small robber pistol ...

To be able to live in Spain is the best thing that could happen to me. The people here are simply pleasant people, they are communicative, a little mystical, more relaxed and they don't fear any loss of control.

However, as soon as you start doing business in Spain, the dark sides of this country often appear. Every day the news announces that another mayor has gone to jail for corruption or bribery. Recently it came to light that a bank has been distributing "black" VISA cards for 11 years to exactly 86 higher ups in various political parties and to economic leaders, with which everyone could "draw" no less than 50,000 black euros per year. With us in Germany, President Wulff had to resign for a benefit of € 700. Every Spaniard would only laugh about it. Here tax evasion and other illegalities total in the millions! Even the husband of the king's daughter is threatened with a sentence of about 20 years! He has not only written huge invoices to state institutions for work not done at all, nor paid one Eurocent in taxes for the millions and millions of dollars collected! And Juan Carlos, the king himself, had to apologize to the Spanish people for going elephant hunting in the company of women. And this was long before it was revealed in 2020 that he had received 100 million in black money from the Saudis as commission for his mediation in the matter of a gigantic railroad installation and that he had supposedly signed over 65 million of it to his lover Corinna. What kind of situations are these!

Spain, it is like a living body to which a myriad of leeches have been attached, and every leech sucks itself full of everything that can be taken. And most Spanish employers have the same sucking mentality towards their subordinates, which means that for most employees a sense of responsibility is a foreign word.  Why take responsibility when you don't earn shit? Shortly before he went to prison, the President of the Spanish Employers' Association announced that Spaniards had to work more and earn less.

So no wonder that there are a lot of irregularities here!  Now to my story:

Raimundo & FEDEX

My good friend and guitarist Raimundo Amador owns two Duesenberg guitars. And he wanted to have some things modified on them. So: have both guitars picked up by Fedex and shipped to me in Madrid.

Since Raimundo only had one case, I sent him a box with the guitar case in it via Fedex on Thursday, December 11th under the Fedex number 804473476396. I also instructed Fedex to pick up the two boxes from him on December 12th.

The following happened:

When the driver of "Correo Expres Sevilla" on behalf of Fedex wanted to pick up the boxes from Mr. Amador on Friday at 15: DP-PUNKT 00 o'clock, my parcel with the box and case had not yet arrived at Raimundo's. That's why the driver said he would come back later.

At 6:10 p.m. (according to Fedex research) the same driver came and brought the case I had sent. Raimundo opened it and packed the guitar inside together with the driver and taped the box back together. The driver then received the two packages, but did not leave a duplicate of the shipping documents. So, no receipt.

The driver also had to take care of the delivery of a ham to Raimundo's neighbors. He had already called them to find out if anyone would be at home. The phone number of the driver "Daniel" was stored in the neighbor's cell phone. In addition, the neighbor's son had watched the driver carrying the two boxes from Mr. Raimundo's house.

After the guitars had still not arrived at my house on Wednesday, December 17th, I informed the responsible Fedex office. Here I was informed that the Fedex driver could not pick up the two packages at 15.00 because they were not yet ready.

Thereupon Antonia Amador, Raimundo's wife, got the phone number from the neighbor and called the driver. This "Daniel" admitted to having picked up the guitars at 6:10 p.m. and also reported that he had seen them in the morning of Saturday (December 20) still in the warehouse of his company.

This sounded very questionable. Pretty sure that this Daniel had no order to pick something up from Raimundo, while Raimundo assumed that this driver had exactly that order. When packing the guitar, the driver naturally saw that it was a valuable guitar. And so he took the opportunity to take possession of the guitars.

It all was revealed thanks to the sleuthing intelligence of Antonia Amador. This gifted woman is super smart, but because she is a Gypsy, she can practically neither read nor write. This unfortunately happens in Spain with many older members of this group, because Franco treated these people just as badly as Hitler treated various population groups in Nazi Germany. Those who do not learn to read are less trouble and easier to keep under the thumb!  But the thing with the various witnesses, including threats from the Amadors (better not mess with Gitanos!) made this guy so nervous that he finally decided to give up.

Well, the guitars actually arrived the next day. The guy even called before at half past nine, he had them and needed the exact sender and recipient address. Of course, he used it to create an official waybill so that everything is in order again. So I let it go and didn't report it.

Dept. Dieter's good advice - AUDI

kundenbetreuung@audi.de 19.7.2015

Good afternoon.

Since I am actually a fan of your make, I would like to take the liberty here to give you some food for thought.

First, kudos: over more than the last decade, you've brought super designs to fruition. Especially the large sedans and the 2-door cars are just picture perfect and absolutely elegant.

Second - the radiator grille - no praise: Also for more than 10 years I have been following your design development, because for me the radiator grille is something like "the face of the car". And what you have done there over the years is pretty disastrous!
a) Making the grille higher wasn't a bad idea, ultimately moving towards a more identifiable shape. However, placing the license plate in the middle of the grille was a design blunder of the first order. The license plate belongs underneath in any case!!! In addition, you have these wonderful 4 rings. One could bring them nevertheless still better to the validity!
b) And now you have changed the actually already quite pleasing and also quite better identifiable higher form, by installing two corners on the top left and right. This was the worst idea, because the grille now has something of a Darth Vader look - especially with the integrated license plate. Extremely ugly and inelegant!

Third: RS3 - for me an unserious design, in which currently all car manufacturers try. You as AUDI would have been better off leaving it alone.

Greetings.

Here on the right is my suggestion:

Very close to the Hyundai ...

Now finally a little video showing a “Paloma”-prototype:

On the edge ... Finally one of my hate letters

After it was no longer bearable in my old BMW-BAUR convertible at almost 40° spanish outside temperature, I decided to have an air conditioning system installed. I had not found anyone in Spain who could do this. So I googled further and found a company in Frankfurt - FBS-Fahrzeugnachrüstung GmbH.They ruined everything you could ruin for an enormous amount of money. 
I should also mention that on the way back to Madrid I noticed that not only the horn, but also my CD player/radio was out of order.  And they had also reinstalled it upside down.  Absolutely avoid this company!

So it came to my angry, following letter. 

Mr. Wohlrab. (the managing director) 
Your company is a real mess, to put it in a nutshell!  And the fish starts to stink from the head.  This means that you are ultimately responsible for what your employees provide.  And with a spoiled boss, you shouldn't be surprised about spoiled employees!

It all started when you couldn't keep the agreed ten working days.  In view of the delivery modalities you described, you should not only have ordered the required parts much earlier, but also checked their quality and function much earlier.  Besides a lot of nerves, that alone cost me € 850 for return flights to Madrid plus a good € 300 now for the return from Madrid to Frankfurt. 

In addition, your "achievement" of leaving us a Berlingo van without air conditioning and practically without a drop of gasoline for the next three days at 40° C in Frankfurt was unbelievably unfashionable and cheap and in no way befits a company that advertises itself as "specializing in air conditioning for special vehicles".

Now back to Frankfurt for pickup: First of all, my car won't start!  After your employee has given me a jump start, I notice that the indicator light of the fuel gauge is on because the fuel level is practically zero.  Firstly, I had left the car at least a quarter full, and secondly, it is simply pathetic to hand over a car without a drop of fuel to a customer who leaves a good € 4,000 in your company after all that has happened before. I had to find out that the trunk was not locked.  After all, it contained objects worth almost € 800,-! The fact that your parking lot is locked at night does not say anything at all!  Anyone can go or drive in there during the day and could have just opened the trunk and stolen the things inside.  The fact that the air conditioning finally works after five weeks is the only sad plus point of your work. 

Next: Shortly after we were on the highway towards Freiburg, I had to realize that the horn doesn't work anymore.  And I had previously - especially in Frankfurt - The horn must be used abundantly.  After three hours we arrive in Freiburg at our hotel and I have to realize that the parking light cannot be switched off even though the ignition key has been removed.  After switching on the ignition I also had to find out that the low beam light is still working even though the light switch is turned off. I.e. we drove from Frankfurt to Freiburg with the air conditioning on and the dipped headlights on.  So how can a battery recharge itself?  And that means for me that simply nobody has checked these things. In addition, the idle point of the engine is below normal when the car is stationary.  That should have been checked after installation as well.  And then, after the air conditioning was installed, one of your employees drove my car into the parking lot, left the trunk open and also did not care that the car remained there with the parking lights on. No wonder the battery is at zero and my car won't start!

In the end, your employees ruined my light switch during the work and removed the contact to the horn. According to an ADAC employee the relay for the horn is working! But this ADAC man has found a way to switch off the light with more or less violent blows on the light switch. But to feel at least a little bit safer for the further journey, I preferred to buy a new battery in Freiburg the next morning.

Mr. Wohlrab, that's not how it works! For this you are a babbler of the first order, whereas your appearance is enough of a stupid and impudent pimp! You are outraged by foreigners, but you employ foreigners, and your repertoire of standard excuses is all the more implausible. You look ridiculous and just don't give a damn about your employees and your customers.

If I can do anything legal to put you and your business out of business, I will do it immediately!

The best thing for everyone would be to go up your ass!