Author Topic: The john judge story (Read 996 times)

gyonnii · « **on:** March 24, 2009, 09:27:11 PM »

if any one is interested I was and always have been John Judge's best friend and I am a fellow Bassist but I came across the archive of who is John Judge and about the double neck Custom Alembic Bass...And some of what was said.The facts..well..I have the right first hand information about the man and the Bass, so if you have any questions or you are curious then fire away, I know who he performed with and everything about how the Bass came about and design

serialnumber12 · « **Reply #1 on:** March 25, 2009, 04:15:23 AM »

fill us in on the Bass & who's idea was it to create such an unique alembic & anything else noteworthy.

David Houck · « **Reply #2 on:** March 25, 2009, 08:36:44 AM »

Hi Johnny; welcome to the board.

senmen · « **Reply #3 on:** March 25, 2009, 10:24:14 AM »

Gyonnii,
plse let us know all about.
I played this bass some time ago as I visited the current owner, also a regular contributor to this forum.

Oliver (Spyderman)

speicky · « **Reply #4 on:** March 25, 2009, 10:45:08 AM »

Hello, Johnny,

a warm welcome to you from me as well. Great that you found this friendly and thoroughly sophisticated board.

I might be interested as well to hear or read all about the man behind the bass (no, not Oliver, I happen to know him in person ), the doubleneck itself, the design... well, please tell us everything !

best regards,
Christian

David Houck · « **Reply #5 on:** March 25, 2009, 10:45:22 AM »

For those of you who are relatively new, there have been numerous threads about the bass pictured above. Here is one from a couple years ago with several pictures provided by John.

hydrargyrum · « **Reply #6 on:** March 25, 2009, 02:36:54 PM »

Maybe the mystery will finally be resolved . . .

gyonnii · « **Reply #7 on:** March 25, 2009, 06:04:53 PM »

OK here we go and for the record I do this with John's permission to do so....First the Bass..it started out as John looking for the ultimate Bass to play and found Alembic a relatively new Company at the time...So he made a stop to the local guitar shop called Brian Guitars at the time in Westville, CT and the Bass started out to be a Just exotic wood 4 string Bass but John was in need of constant changes because of a upcoming band he was planning to launch called Legend...a power trio or very progressive rock...John had heard of Greg Lake using 8 string Bass on the ELP tour and liked the unique sound so he decided to change the design about 5 times..at which point the music store bowed out who was a friend of his and gave him direct contact with Alembic to Ron Wickersham who inturn assigned Larry Robinson the project of building the Bass...if you take off the back wooden plate cover in the silver grounding paint you will see carved made for John judge by Larry Robinson...will all the changes this Bass took 14 months to be built and delivered to John...So during the month I believe in FEB..I took John in a kind of bad snow condition road to New York airport to pick up the Bass...upon which we got home at 8:45 that night and gave the Bass time to warm up to room temp's after opening the Case we discovered that the back fretless head sandwich had a separation crack in the laminations..John was really upset because he had waitied too long for the Bass because his new Band had a premier date scheduled to perform..So it was too late to send it back for repair and the show must go on and every musician in the Tristate had bought tickets just to look at this marvelous wonder of a Bass...John wanted a stereo 8 string so he could split the 8 string into two amps and add distortion on one amp to help fill in the sound while the guitar player took solos...John back in the day used a Ampeg SVT and a Sunn Coliseum 880 rig along with a 200 watt Hiwatt with 4x12's a wall of sound..the Ampeg sat on the guitar players side...so much to tell here...the fretless was purely for John doing his solo and John being John ...he was way ahead of his time and his chops where way out there...I know I was one time one of his student...his style well..I don't like to compare but if I really had to....lots of simularities to Entwhistle in the finger rolls and power playing, add the slaps of Mark King with the Jazzy curiousness of Stanley Clarke...he really was a Bass Pioneer .Just in case you didn't notice the Gizmotron on the four string fretless, his other endorsement..he used it time to time. Now about the led's...yes the girls nipples did light up..and yes the dragons eyes lite up as the 12th fret marker...look closely at the inlays you can see the holes in the dragon's eyes ..but shortly after the leds shorted out behind the breast whcih he called Larry at Alembic about and was told it couldn't be fixed without ripping up the fingerboard. OK so now how did this design come about...John loved mythology (Greek) so if you ever had seen the Artistry from Ray Harryhausen in Jason and the Argronauts and the 7th voyage of Sinbad..well that was the inspiration..but what most People don't know was that John had designed 2 more Basses for Alembic to build after this double neck and I am in posession of the orignall drawings as which I was asked to help par take in the creation...One one the designs he wanted to have me help him build..which we have all the exotic wood for , but John wanted to use Alembic Pickup's and electronics for it and hardware...well I have said quite a lot tonight I will save more for my next posting in a few days I will post again on sunday night..any questions? fire away

keurosix · « **Reply #8 on:** March 25, 2009, 07:44:20 PM »

Wonderful Johnny!
I was the second owner of the bass and repaired the LED's on the 8 string neck with the guidance of John Bringe, a guitar luthier who was a family friend (may he rest in peace.) I opted to repair only the side LED's without removing the fretboard because I did not want to ruin the inlays. Coincidentally, I was also one of the bassists in Legend with Kevin Nugent ( may HE rest in peace!) John might be interested to know that Legend did perform in New Haven, CT and I played the bass on stage.
Keurosix

gyonnii · « **Reply #9 on:** March 25, 2009, 09:04:31 PM »

The Bass had seen some limited gigs on the stage in John's hand's and I remember him telling me while doing some studio work in New York City at 53&3rd studio's that it was very awkward to carry around in the huge case and if I am not mistaken I believe that the Bass weight was something like 28lbs and as he started to pursue other musical genre's and due to some musical differences with the Legend project that it just wasn't practical anymore for him to own and it was time to release it and go forward in another direction...a bit of frustration he always told me.. Disco and pop was taking over and Rock & Roll was dying...I use to Laugh at him when he say that...and my reply was Rock is here to stay, But everything musically came back except for Rock as we knew it then...I know it temporary took a bite out of his and my sails and probably a lot of other players here also...did you personally know John... Keurosix..you said you where the second owner...I know John had sold the Bass but I thought it was to a music store...I think that is what he told me, I just never really asked him too much about selling it because I could see a kind of pain on his face and I know at times he had told me that one day he would get it back someday because of it being his design he later regretted selling it because it became a part of his playing method

peoplechipper · « **Reply #10 on:** March 26, 2009, 02:03:31 AM »

I remember that bass from Rotosound ads in Guitar Player in the early '80's, when I first picked up guitar and bass...didn't know who he was, but thought the bass was cool...
Tony.

gtrguy · « **Reply #11 on:** March 26, 2009, 09:44:14 AM »

I have an older guitar electronics book which has a photo of a strat-like guitar with big cutwawys and a ton of switches and I think it's a neck through. Anyway, it is also mentioned as somehow being involved with John Judge.

Anyone know anything about it also?
Bye, Dave

keurosix · « **Reply #12 on:** March 26, 2009, 04:33:45 PM »

Yes, Brian Cohen of Brian Guitars was involved in the transaction. I spent much time and money in his store. He was an exceptional business man and always knew how to line up special deals for his customers. When he offered me the bass, I couldn't refuse. John used to hang socially with some of my older brother's friends in Woodbridge. He recommended me for a progressive original group when he left to work with Legend. I guess I followed in his footsteps. I can verify that the bass was indeed 28 pounds, and close to 70 pounds in the anvil case! Carrying it put your fingers to sleep!

gtrguy · « **Reply #13 on:** March 27, 2009, 09:29:52 AM »

I had a request to post this John Judge guitar pic and thought folks might be interested here also. The image and text are from my 'Guitar Electronics for Musicians' book dated 1983. There are also several pictures of an Alembic series one in the book.
Bye,
Dave

gyonnii · « **Reply #14 on:** March 27, 2009, 03:32:59 PM »

I talk to John about this and sent him a picture of this..his words were that he had never seen this guitar or played it or ever made a statement about it. The only thing he had told me that he could remember was after a show one day was a rep from Schecter asking him about pick ups and tones and what kind of features he like liked on a Bass and guitar, but he never endorsed nor designed such a guitar. John is a Bassist but very multi-talented and very good on the guitar which he always had an Acoustic and electric handy on stage with him.