Doo-wah effect

c c johnson · Post by **c c johnson** » 26 Oct 2004 3:52 am

I have several emails concerning my spelling of kouth.I have always thought it should be spelled differently however Keoki Lake, a rich,educated, Canadian told me to spell it this way and I would never argue with a smart, rich, canadian.BTW Shot Jackson told me yrs ago that no gentleman would ever play a dobro. He said to me ,looking me straight in the eye,"Keep playing kid". I think Shot was 2 yrs older than me. CC

c c johnson · Post by **c c johnson** » 26 Oct 2004 4:05 am

I respectfully disagree John. Its much easier to start at the top. In 1959 I started a business,was highly successful, made millions over the yrs, got tired of working sluffed off, went to VP, went to office manager, went to mail room clerk, and the poor slob that I hired in the mail room in 1960 and is still there and not going up. I visit even after I retired 15 yrs ago and reallu feel for the folks that are trying to go up the ladder. Better to start at the top and its real easy to go down from there. That how I obtained so much kouth {canadian}. CC

Pete Burak · Post by **Pete Burak** » 26 Oct 2004 7:03 am

The tone knob on my Fender 400 works most excellently for the "effect" in question.
I have had so much fun with this technique that I actually had to take a break for a few days because my wrist was sore from bar slamming.
FWIW, I agree that the placement of the Fender tone knob (no need to move your right hand out of the string striking field to operate it), and its sturdy, knurled, construction, are a design asset with respect to the nature of the beast!

Steve Waltz · Post by **Steve Waltz** » 26 Oct 2004 8:14 am

I just wanted mention my attempt at the effect we're talking about. I use the tone knob on my stringmaster but I use a volume pedal to shut the sound off first, hit the notes with volume off before the downbeat, then throw the volume back on and use the tone knob. It just seems like it has a better effect. Maybe this is obvious to other people but I thought I'd just give my 2 cents.

I love to hear Vance Terry use this effect on his Billy Jack Wills recordings. And yes I know it was a bigsby.

Steve

Ray Montee · Post by **Ray Montee** » 31 Oct 2004 8:55 am

All comments here are respected......however I find extreme difficulty in understanding how one wraps "the pinky finger" around the tone control knob......at least, as it applies to olden day Rickenbacher guitars, since the earlier ones had only a volume control on the far side, away from the player and the later models had the tone control nearest the player and his/her right hip bone location. Could someone enlighten me if'n any of those references were to a Rick Bakelite?
My old Fender triple neck allowed me to use the tone control knob fairly easy but it was not the correct electronic pot and the difference between full bass and full treble was negligable. Never happy with it.
The Bigsby tone control was fabulous and in order to do the JB stuff referred to above, you simple had to be "QUICKER". Never had a problem with it. I alternately used the hand knob and the foot tone/volume pedal.
My foot tended to work like that of a spastik
so I much preferred the hand knob.
My Emmons tone knob was useless.......too much junk surrounding it and it was below the height of the top neck. I got a TALLER knob from Radio Shack and that helped..... manipulating the knob became easier however the pot was not of the correct type so the affect was less than satisfactory.
While attending one of Jeff Newmans' fine seminars here in Portland, during one of his strolls around the room, looking over the student's shoulder, he arrived behind me and instantly pointed out to me "WHAT's THAT?"
to which he answered his own rhetorical question.........."Oh sure, I see, (with one of his famous Newman chuckles) Jerry Byrd".
The Bigsby vol.tone pedal has always worked fine for me........but few people in the guitar business seem to have any idea on just how to wrap the string correctly. Aside from that, a great device to have.