Author Topic: Grateful dead (Read 1040 times)

bigredbass · « **Reply #15 on:** September 23, 2004, 10:08:24 PM »

Can SOMEBODY give me the 'USA Today' version of the controversy over this guitar? I 've never gotten the straight of it.

J o e y

David Houck · « **Reply #16 on:** September 24, 2004, 07:04:47 AM »

Joey; here's what I've been able to quickly patch together this morning.

From Susan,
http://club.alembic.com/Images/395/11103.html
Doug Irwin worked for Alembic when the instrument now known as the Wolf guitar was built. He was an apprentice with no previous guitar buliding experience. The instrument was designed and built at Alembic, originally sporting the Alembic Headstock and logo that Doug later replaced with his own. It did not have the Wolf inlay at first that was added by Doug years later ... Those instruments have had a myriad of changes done to them since their original construction.

From Mica,
http://club.alembic.com/Images/411/2525.html
Wasn't the story that Jerry put a wolf sticker on the guitar and when Doug repaired the peghead from a fall and refinished the guitar, he made an inlay replica of the sticker?

So it would appear to be the case that Wolf was built by Alembic. Jerry added a wolf sticker. The headstock was damaged in an accident. Irwin, no longer working for Alembic, repaired the headstock and replaced the logo with his own. At the same time, Irwin replaced the wolf sticker with a wolf inlay. The electronics have been modified from the original. Those mods may have been done by Irwin and/or others.

I guess the controversy lies in the fact that Irwin removed the Alembic logo and replaced it with his own, thus causing many deadheads and collectors to incorrectly assume that this famous guitar is an Irwin guitar.

flaxattack · « **Reply #17 on:** October 11, 2004, 12:32:04 PM »

if you go to dreamin.. look up my The direwolf custom. THAT wolf is going on my bal k
direwolf custom bass. Susan and i did some alterations to him- there is a preliminary ftc thread. am waiting for the final rendtion

flaxattack · « **Reply #18 on:** October 11, 2004, 12:37:24 PM »

heres anotehr shot of it
botton line, ny 7/74
saunders and garcia

andrewknight · « **Reply #19 on:** December 01, 2004, 06:48:43 AM »

Here is a good site for learning about Jerry's guitars. Yep, Wolf began as a sticker that got turned into an inlay by Doug Irwin when Jerry had Doug refinish the guitar.
http://dozin.com/jers/guitars.html

The interview with Irwin is a good read.

AndrewK

grateful · « **Reply #20 on:** January 05, 2005, 06:34:59 AM »

The first time the PA was set up as a wall with all speakers behind the band was at Boston Music Hall, November 30th 1973. There was no Wolf sticker on Jerry's guitar at that point.

marcm · « **Reply #21 on:** January 05, 2005, 07:34:02 AM »

hi mark

i was there too, when i was a sophomore at m.i.t. (it seems that we are contemporaries). it was a great show

my memory agrees with yours: there was no wolf sticker

marc

grateful · « **Reply #22 on:** January 10, 2005, 07:29:14 AM »

Hi Marc,

I was a sophomore at W.P.I. I know there was no wolf sticker because of the photo in Dick's Pick's Vol 14 which features that show.

Mark

bsee · « **Reply #23 on:** January 14, 2005, 11:45:18 PM »

Hooray for WPI (though I would have been about a dozen years behind you)

marcm · « **Reply #24 on:** January 15, 2005, 09:05:50 AM »

hi mark

i didn't take the very reasonable step of pulling out the dp14 cd book and checking the pictures. from '72 to '77 i went to shows with pretty much the same group of friends, and the next show i saw with them after the music hall show was the boston garden show the following june (immortalized, so to speak, in dp12). we had binoculars at the garden, and we saw the wolf sticker for the first time: hey, wow, check that out! i think that's new! what is it? did he have that at the music hall show? i don't think it was there at the music hall and other comments to that effect. of course we had no way of knowing from 150 feet away whether it was a sticker or an inlay, and for all we knew it could have been a representation of the disney character goofy. i was far more interested in devoting my binoc-time to checking out phil's technique and his bass

the next time i saw the dead after that, at the 9 june 1976 boston music hall show, i had the front-row-center seat and jerry had a different guitar, white with a t-shaped cut-out in what looked like an aluminum peghead. a few years later a friend bought an almost-identical-looking guitar, a travis bean

marc

richbass939 · « **Reply #25 on:** January 15, 2005, 02:24:07 PM »

This thread made me think of a roadie/sound man with a band I saw a bunch of times in the mid 1970s. The rumor was that he had worked with the Dead earlier. His name was Bobby Brandenburg and he went by Cutter. I don't know why I remember that after 30 years but I'm sure that is his name. Do any of you Deadheads know anything about it, true or false?
Rich

marcm · « **Reply #26 on:** January 16, 2005, 07:29:57 AM »

rich

i'm certainly not an expert on the dead's crew, but i've heard a lot of their names in thirty-five years of being a fan and i don't recall a bobby brandenburg. the nickname 'cutter' sounds vaguely familiar, but it does have a generic 'dead-roadie' kind of sound to it. two vaguely-similar names that come immediately to mind are stewart brand, who was involved in the acid tests; and sam cutler, who managed the proto-dead in the very early days

a quick check of 'dark star', 'sweet chaos', and 'living with the dead' didn't turn anything up. i have a good friend in california who knows more lore than i do; i'll ask him

marc

David Houck · « **Reply #27 on:** January 16, 2005, 08:10:13 AM »

In the severties, Stewart Brand was busy publishing the Whole Earth Catalog and the Co-Evolution Quarterly, now known as Whole Earth.
http://www.wholeearthmag.com/

richbass939 · « **Reply #28 on:** January 16, 2005, 01:24:26 PM »

Marc,
Thanks for looking into it. I don't know of too much more that might help. I know it wasn't Cutler; it definitely was Cutter. He was a BIG guy with straight dark hair and glasses (I think). He had a little bit of a limp from polio as a kid, so I was told. But I do remember that he could pick up and carry two Marshall bottoms with a lead head on top. If he did in fact have a disability it certainly didn't slow him down.
Rich

lbpesq · « **Reply #29 on:** February 01, 2005, 01:05:15 PM »

Check out the pictures accompanying this ebay listing for a wolf guitar magnet. Great before (Alembic) and after (Irwin) pictures of Jerry's Wolf guitar. Make sure you scroll down to see both. It looks like the earlier picture still has the wolf decal, before the inlay. Also check out the peghead where, above the Alembic logo, is what looks like one of those bent-over flute playing figures you see in New Mexico all over the place (I can't remember the name, but I know there is one).

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=447&item=3871151314&rd=1

Bill, tgo