Oddballs, old and new.

[@leokimvideo]

Yep, old electronics has a unique smell of banned chemicals and ozone

[@honkytonkinson9787]

Why modern tech doesnt work, not enough lead and deadly fumes

[@SecondaryHomunculus]

His comment took me back to my bedroom in the 70s that had an ancient lamp & radio in a house that hadn't been wired since the 40s. 😂 Smell is a weird level of nostalgia -- I could actually bring that smell back almost fifty years later.

[@geemac7267]

This luthier has a better vocabulary than your English professor.

[@michaelpacinus242]

My English professor had a better ***** than my wife

[@MrTimcoronel]

but 'insruments' ;)

[@mightyV444]

​@@MrTimcoronel - Oh! Good spotting! 😀👍

[@michaelpacinus242]

@@mightyV444 like, period blood?

[@mightyV444]

@@michaelpacinus242 - Sure! If you're into that, you weirdo!? 😄

[@RexCoggins]

Hey Ted, that G-707 is actually an analog guitar controller made by Fujigen for Roland. There is no MIDI at all unless you plug it into a guitar synth that has MIDI, it will work fine with an analog synth such as a GR-300, or the GR-100 Electronic Guitar board. The “sensor” next to the bridge is a hexiphonic pickup, with outputs for each string. You are able to do the Ripley guitar tricks with it.

[@martin-1965]

I remember Mick Jones from The Clash coming on stage with his new band B.A.D. with one of those back in the late 1980s/early 90s and going "Time for the Dalek's handbag" as he plugged it in. As a Dr Who fan I found it amusing. Strange machines indeed. The guitarists revenge on keyboard players for the awful "Keytars" that became a thing in the 1980s 😂😂😂😂

[@RexCoggins]

@@martin-1965 keytars or as I call them: solidbody accordions 😆

[@garys-617]

The G-707 guitar was indeed made by Japanese manufacturer Fujigen, who back then were the very same company who made Ibanez guitars (along with Greco and a few others). So the guitar itself and it's build quality actually makes it a rather better instrument than most people give it credit for - look how sought-after and expensive 1980s Made In Japan Ibanez guitars are these days.... 🙂 Also, I believe if you pull off the volume/tone control knobs, you will find "Ibanez" moulded inside/underneath them....With the black rubber bands around them, they are the esteemed Ibanez "Suregrip" knobs, the only difference being that instead of gold/amber, they were moulded in clear plastic for Roland. Not a crappy guitar by any means 🙂

[@Ashi-sabaki]

heh I came to write in the same thing. I'd say the G-707 was a guitar with a hex output FOR synth control - you could get the same basic guts in the GK-1 gosh when you think about it, the GR-100 wasn't a synth at all. It was basically a hexaphonic effects unit (hex fuzz and filtering for "synthy" sounds, but not an actual synth...sort of the predecessor to the VG series) It was more of a 'regular guitar' than the others like the G 303,505,808 as the 707 didn't have the onboard hexfuzz like those, so on the GR-300 you didn't get that extra voicing. with the 707 I'm not exactly sure where the MIDI conversion took place in the 700 - I mean if the internal engine was running on MIDI or if the midi happened parallel to that -- after all you could bend on the 700s internal sounds, but bend info didn't get piped out for MIDI out

[@AdamRobertshaw]

I have the G-707 with GR-700 (the unit built for it) and a SynthAxe. A GR300 or 100 doesn't work properly with this guitar. After this guitar Ibanez (who were commissioned to build it using Fujigen) took the technology to make their IMG X-ING 2010 Midi guitar.

[@ElvisStansvik]

The krazy penetration on those frets was mesmerizing.

[@HunterJE]

It's always so satisfying in those situations where you can make capillary action do the fiddly work for you

[@Satchmoeddie]

Make that 7 people. My dad was about as musical as hogs in a slaughterhouse, but he decided to try to play lap steel anyway. So we had a 1953 Fender Champ set up around the house. A Champ lap steel and a Champ amp.

[@michaelpacinus242]

I’m slopping out icky slugs to this one 🎉

[@HunterJE]

But what I really want to know is what do you think about these peened-over tuner shafts? Do they have a tendency to lean? ;)

[@daverice2426]

14:03 I might've said "fluting" but "crenulations" really does roll off the tongue much better. Well played, Woodford.

[@skullheadwater9839]

I have a spare bedroom with vintage radio's, record player's, reel to reels, speaker pulls, vintage guitar amps stack on top of each other. I know that smell well. It does smell.good, not the same fragrance but the same way a ditto sheet did in the 70s and 80s at school.

[@Meddled]

Do you store any spare apostrophes in there as well?

[@MuseumsBloke]

Ted: Love the sheer variety of stringed instruments you cover. You could feature a £15 child’s toy ukulele and we’d all still be riveted.

[@philwildcroft1764]

Adrian Belew is currently on tour with Beat playing the music of 1980s King Crimson and he's dug out his GR-300 synth because he used it on the originals. The 'controller' is a heavily modified Mustang rather than a Roland guitar. It seems to be mostly going OK although they did have an extended interval at a show a few days ago while the techs tried (successfully) to get the rig to stop misbehaving. Pat Metheny still tours with his GR-303 guitar/GR-300 synth combo.

[@BrunodeSouzaLino]

Pat does have a tech guy that only works on his GR-303 and he gets parts directly from Roland.

[@jesselemasters8676]

The pots on that Gibson are huge!!!

[@chrispile3878]

They are quite normally sized, as compared to those cheap Chinese pots.

[@Rusty-METAL-J]

The Torti-Shell Output plate is Sooooooooooooo gorgeous.

[@Satchmoeddie]

I would yellow those tuner buttons. That lap steel is in nice condition, BEAUTIFUL condition, but I would still put a linear pot on the tone control and install a new capacitor, and put the old parts in a small paper bag and put that in a plastic bag. I might even put Grover Sta Tites on it too.

[@willhoren9200]

It seems contradictory, but with tone pots an audio taper gives you the nice even adjustment, and linear taper suddenly jumps up at the last 10% of rotation. With volume pots, it's just the opposite. The youtuber 'wills easy guitar' has a video demonstrating this.

[@TheJonathanNewton]

I remember the Roland well. It was not a MIDI controller but a ”guitar synth”; the guitar controlled the synth in the floorboard. The MIDI protocol came just as Roland was about to release the 707, so they hastily tried to integrate it, but were unable to include anything else than MIDI *in*, meaning that another synth could control the floorboard but not vice versa! However, the hexaphonic pickup - the little black bar between the bridge humbucker and the bridge - was later used in true MIDI controller add-ons for guitars. The name indicates that it had one separate output for each string, which was necessary for the synth to be able to understand the input. On the 707, this necessitated a large parallel data cable between the guitar and the synth. You can see the large square port for it at around 26:30. The analogue jack was there to provide the possibility to plug it into an amp for guitar-style sounds while the synth module could go directly to a mixer. The synth module allowed you to disable individual strings, so you could get guitar-style sounds from some strings independently of synth sounds from other strings. However, the need for six individual inputs wasn’t the only limitation the digital synth module in the floorboard had. Another one was its poor interpretation of incoming string data, which would cause all kinds of glitches unless you played very exactly according to the standard 12 tones used in Western music. You’d get an odd noise even when a finger of yours ended up between frets. Hence also the reinforcement bar which was necessary to provide the stability needed for the guitar to deliver correct data. (Which is absolutely ridiculous imho since the neck is bolted; a neck-through design - which was all the rage around that time - would have provided much better stability from the beginning!) But the thing that really killed it off was that the synth module required two full cycles of string vibration to trigger properly. Since the lower notes on a guitar are so, well, low, that would cause notable latency when playing, rendering it partly unusable. Playing synth sounds from a guitar also meant that people who only heard the recordings thought that it was the keyboard player producing them. For instance, Eric Clapton used the 707 a bit on his ”Behind the Sun” album, only to have it draw a lot of flak from all the reviewers who wondered where the guitar solos were! You can hear it most prominently on the track ”Never Make You Cry”; most of the synth pirouettes there are apparently EC on a 707, but you’ll be forgiven for being unable to spot the difference. David Byrne used an earlier version, I think it was called the 505 or 303 or something, for a few tunes in the Talking Heads concert movie ”Stop Making Sense” (it’s the brown electric guitar and the blue floorboard). Ironically enough, that one actually performed much better and didn’t have the glitches the 707 had since it was all analogue! Sometimes, development does actually go backwards…

[@goodun2974]

What type of guitar Synth did Steve Morse use in conjunction with his Franken-Tele in the Dregs? I saw him using it several times around 1980.

[@tonyisyourpal]

Close… the GR700 only has a MIDI *out* as standard (there are a few out there with a MIDI in retrofit by Roland, but the number is vanishingly small). Also, it’s an analogue synth - the oscillators are digitally controlled so that they don’t suffer tuning problems (so much) when they heat up, and you can play the synth straight away, without leaving it to warm up first. The JX3P is essentially version 1 of the GR700’s synth board with a keyboard and sequencer wrapped around it. Getting the guitar interface “right” (or as right as they could get it, anyway) took so long that the synthesiser part was finished a couple of years before the rest of it. Most famous use is probably the “horn section” on You Can Call Me Al, played by Adrian Belew… (or Turbo Lover by Judas Priest, depending on on your tastes ;) )

[@TheJonathanNewton]

@@tonyisyourpal ok, well, it *has* been 40 years after all since it first came out... Wasn't there something about Roland being physically unable to fit a full MIDI control onto the circuit board too? *GR-700* was indeed the correct name, thanks.

[@stewsim]

I had a G-707, and a G-505 Used them with a stupidly huge GR-300/700/50 rig for a decade or so. Big fun!

[@TheDevnul]

I had the G-707 also. The tracking was so bad. It was cool for what it did. I sold it 6 months after buying it.

[@dohabandit]

@3:25 that smell isn't ozone, it's a PHENOLIC smell. Those old electronics and especially the PCB's used on pontentiometers or the bakelite plastics contained phenol. bakelite is pretty much made from phenol.

[@matyaskrasznai5998]

If you are one of those 6 proove that we are more than 6 pepole here!

[@Guitarwolfluke]

Here

[@1777DK]

Here.

[@AgressiveElevatorMusic]

Reporting in

[@Mojen_Marc_Music]

Here.

[@ChrisCanMakeStuff]

Here

[@lexluthier8290]

Many many moons ago I went to a Holdsworth gig here in the UK where he was hoping to use his Symthaxe - no more than a few seconds into the first number it started alternately cutting out and making some REALLY weird noises (not in a good way). Thus ensued 45 minutes of various techs running on stage with Alan (no mean techie himself) trying to fix the thing. They must have come close to totally disassembling the beast before finally admitting defeat. The remainder of the gig was played on a 'normal' electric guitar. A fantastic invention no doubt, but not one you'd want to fritz out on you in a live situation. I've spotted a few used ones for sale over the years, somewhere north of 10 grand a pop. Personally, I'd rather buy a nice car and stick to my trusty Squiers and Epiphones!

[@brucefreedman3655]

Welcome back Ted! You were missed more than you’ll ever know! What a marvelous pair of extraordinary instruments.

[@stephenrosenthal5337]

Of course you drop the Grumman warbird reference. Of course you do.

[@mikebeacom4883]

Betcha that plexiglass is war surplus.

[@KarlKarsnark]

Glad to know I'm not the only one with a Gem and the Holograms cover band. \m/

[@snoopstp4189]

@22:05 "so much of what makes a guitar sound like a guitar are the artifacts of the physical effort needed to play"... I wish I had said that,,, brilliant!

[@briancooper4620]

Highest compliment I can pay...your ingenuity reminds me of the smartest man I've ever known, my dad. That little fix for the bubbled finish was minimalist and brilliant.

[@sjgreaves]

FWIW the bar on the G-700 was (IIRC) intended to reduce overtones or harmonics from the guitar because they can confuse the pitch to MIDI electronics. Back in the day I had a GR300 synth and the strat-like controller which worked pretty well. I ended up fitting EMGs to the guitar and Roland were super helpful in helping me figure out where to hook the pickups to the onboard power and also in sending me a replacement volume dual gang pot of the correct values. Ironically Parker do produce a version of the fly that has the MIDI pickup on it, Adrian Belew still uses these I believe, and I think Roland have made synth/electronics boxes that work with these controllers more recently too. I enjoyed mine - well until I blew my combo speaker with too much square wave bass hahaha... fun time

[@beenaplumber8379]

I remember these guitars. Every music store had one on display for about a year as I recall. Not long. I didn't like them! (Secretly I thought they were pretty cool.) It seemed to be a way to invite all the out-of-work rock guitarists into the world of synth-pop, which was the reason they were out of work in the first place. I tried one out. The tracking was horrible, and as I recall it didn't know what to do with string bends. I also remember how weird (and secretly cool) it was to play a guitar string but hear a piano, with a very slight lag. (The piano might have been a later instrument than these - can't remember. I was synth-curious but closeted for a long time.) It sounds all wrong to strum a piano though. It's like you have to learn how to play all over again to make a guitar synth sound like a keyboard instrument. Then I saw a guy playing one in a local pop-rock cover band. I bit my lip and secretly admired how cool it actually looked in a proper stage setting, and how good the actual guitar sounded through a proper amp with several nice digital effects. But I still hated what it represented - the fall of rock and the rise of 80s synth-pop. A pox on them!

[@AndrewAHayes]

@@beenaplumber8379 I found it was best to play triads with the strings finger plucked all at the same time, if you were used to finger picking it made life a bit easier, I only ever tried one out in a music shop but couldn't see the point in them as the guitar was terrible and shouldn't really be used as a regular guitar and as you also pointed out so was the tracking, also it sometimes got the pitch wrong, I play both guitar and keyboard instruments and if I felt the need to play a keyboard part I would do just that.

[@beenaplumber8379]

@@AndrewAHayes I'm primarily a fingerstyle bassist with large fingers. I'm kinda clumsy on a six-string unless it's a classical with wide string spacing. I find guitar synths in general are unforgiving of slop. The G-700 had no velocity, as I recall, so sloppiness was just as loud as the melody. I understand more modern units are much better though, with full dynamic sensitivity. The keyboardist in my previous band played a Strat he modified with some sort of synth transducer, and it worked well for him. He was primarily a keyboardist though. When he used the synth interface that Strat, he was still playing it as a guitar, usually doubled with a quiet synth to give it a weird character.

[@paulhendershott667]

I loved your comment on wondrous smell of early electronics! I restore Antique radios from the 1920's through the 1940's along with vintage Ham radio transmitters and receivers from the same period, and the smell of these old radios is intoxicating for an electronics Geek!

[@planespeaking]

Like magic with the krazy glue. Awesome

[@wingracer1614]

He's not wrong, the good old original Krazy glue just flows better than any other CA glue. In fact, too good for many applications but something like this, it's ideal.

[@donhall2759]

That's one good thing about poly finishes; you can wick CA under the chips and fix things, invisibly.

[@Tape_Recorder]

I liked it when you mentioned spear point crenulations. Whilst typing this, it asked if I meant crenellations. Now I’ve learned two new words. 🧠 ⬆️

[@dlewtweentorla1210]

The G-707 /700 was introduced in 1982, Jimmy Page was given one of the first one's and used it to write the soundtrack to Death Wish 2. I remember being so excited to check it out at the Canadian Music Show held at the CNE

[@RedThr3e]

Mud or icepicks was the perfect way to put the sound difference into words.

[@stevenkarnisky411]

Between the vid and the comments section I now know more than I ever wanted to know about synth guitars. That "handle" just wouldn't fit into my plans, nor against my fat body. The lap steel is a work of art; simple and durable. I will remember the tuner knob replacement technique, and the Krazy usage of Krazy glue! My first exposure to CA glue was in the early sixties, when my high school part-time job was at a plastic and rubber fabrication shop. Being in Rochester, NY, we did a lot of work for Kodak. At breaktime, one of the guys brought in a bottle of Eastman 910. He said, "Let's see if this stuff is as good as they say!", painted a glue ring on the bottom of a glass ash tray, slammed it down on the break table, counted aloud to ten, then lifted the entire table by the ash tray! Sixty odd years later, I wonder if my exercise asthma was induced by all the MEK fumes I inhaled on that job...

[@Kevin-mx1vi]

No way you inhaled MEK fumes and _didn't_ suffer some bad effects. When I was in the print supply industry (1990-2005) MEK was treated as carcinogenic.

[@markmiwurdz2248]

@Kevin-mx1vi. Back in the last century, my brother was an apprentice printer. He fell for the old prank of being asked to collect some MEK (was it methyl - ethyl - ketone to give its full name maybe?) in a plastic bowl. By the time he had carried it back to the printing machine, the MEK liquid had eaten through the plastic and the bowl was empty! Eventually MEK was banned from use in the printing industry under COSHH rules and regulations. However, some years later, I did watch a so - called “machine team leader” cleaning a dot matrix print head on a mailing machine with MEK. He was throwing it about quite liberally, unaware of the possible side effects. Stay safe and well.

[@Tim_Duran]

"Its like a handful of baby teeth!" 😮

[@HammerSandwich9]

I laughed at that one!

[@alexcorona]

Oddballs are my favorite. PS I love lapsteels.

[@jonathanlonie3065]

Roland gr 505 was my main guitar all through the eighties...absolutely loved it!

[@OzziePete1]

19:01 "And now for something completely different..."😄

[@dinartefreitas3344]

One of the Best luthiers in the World.yes indeed

[@Libra1059]

@@dinartefreitas3344 He is definitely on a higher level than most!

[@ellenrugowski6255]

There were a few guitarists who made the G-707 their main instrument. In the late 80s & early 90s there was regional band called Warp Drive (they were sort of but not quite a hair metal band), whose lead vocalist also played lead guitar. His main guitar was a G-707, that he not only used for faux keyboard parts, but used for both rhythm and lead guitar parts.

[@Metalcop5150]

Steve Stevens was another "big name" who used the Roland GR707!

[@max2173]

Treating the 6 people who like lap steels well, whilst ignoring the 4 of us who want to see a ukulele on the bench!

[@TotalDec]

You can hear in his voice, that you shouldn't hold your breath for a uke vid. If I were you, I'd move on. Everyone else here, is happy.

[@newtonlkh]

it's so satisfying to see the superglue soak into the fret end bubble and fill the gap!!!

[@upanbyudesign5323]

Nice job on the Lap Steel, the sound from that was a sunny afternoon.

[@daveroberts4933]

I know exactly what you mean about the old electronics smell! I love it too!

[@QuestionMan]

I know that smell from my grandfather's electonics instruments and the shortwave radio he passed on to me. Had "that" smell.

[@bcook6960]

Yesss! Midweek Ted!!

[@RobMods]

8:13 you had the jack wired backwards. That's why the bridge and strings were buzzing.

[@yobentley7274]

I know that smell you mention from my dad's HAM Radio hobby days in the '60's and '70's and from often visiting old electronic repair and parts shops with him as a kid. There are still places you can experience that smell. The old electronic tube smell. I like it. One of a kind.

[@LowEndMarauder]

Hot dust smell lol. My tube amp almost brings me there

[@FederinzC]

Fascinating, thanks for the video! My father-in-law once found a Roland midi "Strat" in the trash bin at his job as a mover. Absolutely superb guitar, of course he kept it. Roland maybe made kind of the right move making "normal" electric guitars with midi capability. He uses as normal guitar, and when the experimental itch comes ... though he admits himself that he'd rather turn to his old synths (also found at his job) than to mess with the guitar midi system.

[@gordonholland3406]

Krazt satisfying fret end repair Ted!

[@miaouew]

20:30 thank you for mentioning AH! One of my faves. Love your channel!

[@joemcgraw5529]

That Gibson is very rare ,I have 2 Gibson BR9 lapsteels with matching amp from 48,they really can sound good I saw the band Foghat back in the late 80s and he was playing a BR9 and really sounded amazing,yes the song Slow Ride comes to mind

[@devschlong]

I've had a br9 for probably 25 years. Great fun.

[@ShannonFerguson]

Thanks for showing us these unique guitars.

[@unisonosc1617]

On the G-707 guitar controller, its mate was the GR-700 6 voice analog synthesizer. It was basically a floorboard hybrid of the Roland JX-3P and Juno 106. The only digital part is the note and knob data from the guitar to the synth unit. The GR-700 unit does all the sound generation starting with a single DCO analog oscillator per voice. It does not process an electric guitar signal at all. Regarding 5 pin din MIDI it was created by Dave Smith of Sequential Circuits. Before that companies used (and still do) analog CV and gate voltages with main standard being 1V per octave and 5V gate signals. There is some variance with companies like Korg and Buchla using different voltage standards. Regarding the "stabilizing bar" that runs parallel to the neck, it was originally intended to minimize dead spots that would interfere with note generation.

[@monday6524]

I love it when the oddballs come out. Always interesting history.

[@donkeyboy585]

New band name. Celluloid Rot

[@c3N3q]

Last time I had the same thought when I heard the words Solder Sucker. 👍

[@ianthescourge1]

I absolutely love your videos so much. I don't even own a guitar. You are simply a master of your craft and you never cease to bring excellent content. Absolute legend :D

[@SecondaryHomunculus]

I've been a musician for 40+ of my 51 years, love odd instruments. That lap steel is beautiful. One of the things I absolutely CANNOT get the hang of. I'll stick with my basses, Theremin, and assorted other playthings.

[@GilgaFrank]

Some viewers may recall the abysmal Sigue Sigue Sputnik playing (or just posing with) a Roland G-707, presumably just because it looked cool.

[@rickmccl71]

Yes! I'm old enough to be a 'viewer'. I was going to mention them; they were also describable as "an imperfect vehicle for synth technology" . The main instrument that Sigue Sigue Sputnik played was the music industry.

[@GilgaFrank]

@@rickmccl71 They came, they went, they left no lasting mark on music. I doubt anyone's mentioned them or even thought about them in years, including the people in the band.

[@kevindaly5093]

Thanks for your presentation of the Roland, and inspired comments. I remember well when they were first introduced, and the excitement of playing one at a local high-end music store. For us young guitar players, it was the musical equivalent of space travel. Great memories. I ended up instead with Charvel Model 4, a guitar I still own and enjoy today.

[@Libra1059]

The knobs on that Gibson BR3 look fantastic! I never saw these before on anything Gibson made. Original?

[@NorthBayRepublic]

Yes ! They look like speed knobs sans the paint and numbers

[@Libra1059]

@@NorthBayRepublic I wish someone made these! I would buy them.

[@davidbales8053]

Neat trick on those scaly fret ends!

[@jessejamez5985]

Beautiful sound is beautiful sound. People and their high horses.

[@MikeM-Colorado]

Good to see that BR-3. I have one just like it. The tuners on mine are original and work fine. The pickup became extremely microphonic - sounded awesome right before it quit altogether. Lindy Fralin was able to rewind it good as new. The capacitor on mine was bad, as you would expect. The wood is amazing - a chunk of 75-year-old Honduran Mahogany.

[@DerekHerbst747]

Those paper and wax capacitors absorb moisture over time and change capacitance. It's very likely that a new 0.22uF will restore the linearity of the tone control. It's the wax that's hydrophilic.

[@peterstephen1562]

Hey , magnetic pickups having the worst susceptabilty to emfs when lying on their backs.But the single coil airyness sounds so good. Some Fender pedal steels have two single coils with one having a pot across to remove the coil from service. So in a poor emf environment the pickup can be noise bucked or for pure single coil sound the other coil is shunted and all degrees between.

[@mrclaus859]

Thanks for posting Ted

[@finmuso423]

I believe the bar on the G-707 was described by Roland as for 'adding stability' to the neck for the purpose of reducing unwanted vibration triggering the synth. (A guitar that doesn't vibrate?!?!?) They were wild things to play when hooked-up to the floor unit, but in my limited experience I remember the synth/guitar controller partnership was very intuitive and simple to use.

[@michaelpacinus242]

I’m five thousand years old and I love your videos!

[@Boris_Chang]

You got me beat by 25 score.

[@valleyviewable]

As soon as you said “Rush Geeks” I had a vision of several high school buddies from the ‘70’s riding in a rusty ‘71 Dodge Dart diggin’ on the AM radio

[@Geeman002]

A bit of a wonky one, Ted, but a Ted talk is necessary, wonky or not, although I love the lap steel, that was interesting. MIDI - that’s the wonky one 😊 Nice reference to an F6F. Thanks for the fun watch!

[@BeddGBugga]

That lap guitar is absolutely sturdy 😍

[@johnmitchelljr]

Well done. Thank you. My ears are happy.

[@RyoCanCan]

I loooove those old, weird guitar instruments. One of my absolute faves is the Casio EG-5 or the DG-20, EG being the ''more guitar'' model. Times were different back then.

[@jeromestevenfaigin6059]

Mine now is the Roland GK-3 and using a GI-20 allows me to get sound from any sound module or keyboard using it's sound module. My first MIDI guitar was a Casio/Ibanez PG-780 and after taking it's original pickups and filing them in the round metal file can, made the guitar part of it sounded like a worth wild Strat the MIDI side was extremely fun to play. Only to find out later that the techs were not trained on how to repair them and that it was too expensive to keep it running at it's best! Only later I could fix it today by changing the electrolytic capacitors from the main board inside the guitar's interior. I'm OK using the GK-3 today.

[@evilutionltd]

I still have a G-707. Bought it in London UK about 30 years ago for an equivalent of $100. Never had the pedal and the previous owner had scalloped the higher part of the fretboard and changed the pickups. It's a nice guitar to play.

[@dohabandit]

Glenn Tipton from Judas Priest used the GR-707 on the Turbo album.

[@Krullmatic]

You made that lap steel sing! Sounds great!

[@_-_Michael_-_]

That end playing clip… If you told me it was the sound from the original huge module, I would belive you 😂😂😂

[@elbowache]

That tuning was the uplift melody for the Nickelodeon show Doug.

[@NintenDub]

War quality pots for sure.nice. its amazing to think of a day where everything worth a frick was made right here in America

[@rolanddring-sandberg4432]

For some strange Reason I Love the Roland 🙂

[@michaeldorcey9305]

Such a vast difference between the two, but the video is fascinating because of it.

[@pcar928fan]

I have a fantastic silver 707 with a great GR700!!! I had a red guitar that was actually even better, but sold that one with its 700 many years ago. They are so fun! A couple of guys from Japan who work for Roland came to my house in early 2024 and played it. They said they didn’t even have one in the Roland museum! So cool! The guitar player for Petra used one of these in the mid 80’s on one song. He hated it and told me it sucked! LOL! You also mentioned the Parker Fly! I have TWO of those! A classic and a Supreme! I am sure you are shocked to know that! LOL!

[@blues61]

I guess I'm one of six. lol. :-) I've got a 1941 Kalamazoo KEH 100 lap steel with a P-13 pickup. Love playing Blues on it in open G tuning. I ended up replacing the pots (cleaning the old ones didn't work) and the tuners (one tuner was bent beyond repair) to make it more playable. Of course, I saved all the old hardware but I'll likely have left this mortal coil when this lap steel gets a new owner.

[@wbfaulk]

The BR-3, the BR-4, and the later specialty model intended mostly for used-car salesmen, the BR-5-49.

[@devschlong]

😂 You beat me to it.

[@markusm.lambers8893]

When you spoke about the Roland synthesizer guitarre, you forget someone very well known man, in the 'newer' canadian music history! The former member of the 'Guess Who' and 'Bachman-Turner Overdrive' and also as a solo musician, coming from Winnipeg (sometimes they self said: 'Vancouver', ... !) - Mr. Randolf Charles Bachman - Who now +80 years old, and the last living, of four brothers, that had also 'create' BTO, and 'Brave Belt', in the begining of the 1970-is, when Randy left 'Guess Who'. After he choose to break up with BTO in 1979/80, he found a group called 'Iron Horse', and he experimented also with such new things, as the 'Roland Synthesizer guitarre'. After only two 'record- albums', he set up, nearly the same guys and additionaly with Fred Turner, they now called 'Union', the next 'R. Bachman- Project'. As a restless musician, ... he always is/was during his whole carriere ! ! Are you from Canada? Please remember of Mr. R. Bachman, he is worth, every small word, you can write down here, to give him some respect and/or honor! I am a big 'fan' of R.C.B. , BTO and the Guess Who , since 1974, when I heard the first time: "You ain't seen nothin' yet" on FM-radio, here in Germany for the very first time. As an 11 year old boy, and then slowly turning into a young man and also to a grown up, in the following years, ... this tune, and BTO are still a part of my life, ... and I will never forget, where are my roots are coming from, ... ! Good heavy rock music, with simple and intuitive guitare-riffs and mind-blowing refrains. I will never forget the 'tune of my life' ! Please take a look at my vita, on 'QRZ.com' ! Sorry for my bad English, it is not my native tounge, ... if there are any, or many mistakes, that I made in grammar or spelling, please appologies the faults, that I made! 73 de Markus - db9pz- (my HAM-radio call) - JN39fq - 3miles/5km east of LX -

[@henryhunter5026]

What a delightful little thing that Gibson is, sounds good too. I had a friend who played in a band in which the guitarist owned one of those Roland synth guitars, it cost so much money that they used it on everything, it was really good at slow doom laden tunes.

[@BNGamesYT]

The Badn Orgy also uses a G-707 which is why my brother bought one of them. Very uncomfortable guitar to play and the bridge pickup is pretty weak too.

[@obiwanjacobi]

I had a Casio MG510 (Ibanez made guitar + built-in MIDI) for years I used to compose my ideas into an Atari ST1040 computer running Cubase. I "recently" upgraded a 2nd hand MG510 that had a broken 6-coil pickup with the Roland GTK3 that is still one of my main axes...

[@RuthlessMojo]

That MIDI guitar is actually quite cool. I have a Fishman Triple Play installed on a Les Paul. It allows you to do some pretty cool stuff particularly when connected to the software Fishman supply with it or connecting it to a DAW and using Plugins.

[@jeremyschuhmann9671]

FYI, the abrupt, all or nothing tone control is something that was done intentionally on many lap steels (some Tele players do it too) to make it easier to get the “Boo-wah” sound that was a popular special effect, particularly in Western Swing music. It is achieved by using a high-value LINEAR potentiometer, along with larger than normal capacitor (Fender Stringmasters have a 1 MegOhm linear pot with a .047 uFd cap). Here’s a link to someone demonstrating the sound kzbin.info/www/bejne/sJKmk2l9gZp6ppY.

[@ForeverDownByLaw]

Maybe the Roland's "support bar" is stopping the neck from being easily adjusted? I wonder if loosening the screws on it a bit first would allow the truss rod to turn more easily, then re-tighten the support. Or, maybe pre-tension the neck, then snug up the truss rod?

[@crunchyfrog555]

I always lusted after a G707 back in the day. I've always been more of a synth nerd than guitar, so something that crossed the bridge was beautiful to me. Of course now years later when I have a load of synths and have messed around galore with getting them to talk to one another in various ways, I know how bloody hard it is to meld guitar and digital MIDI together. Nobody does a decent note tracking thing that's remotely usable. But you can get some neat effects with envelope tracking. That's about it.

[@HittingImage]

Pat Metheny is still using the Roland guitar synth. He uses a GR-303 which was made by Ibanez. it uses the same hex pickup and synth module as the 707. It is featured on one of his most well known tunes "Are you giing with me". Check it out!

[@nicolen.9642]

Indeed, the lapsteel is beautiful!! The baby teeth...lol, cute.

[@fulci6734]

Thank you Ted 👍👍👍🎸🎥🎬

[@RobertVeasquez]

I used the Roland GR for many years. I really didn’t understand how to set it up but I worked it the best I could. I now use the Roland GR55 which perfect it isn’t, it was a far better system. One user of the GR 707 is Chuck Loeb. A video on KZbin shows him using it in the fusion band, Steps Ahead.

[@davidj6008]

Good video I enjoy you covering the "Oddball" instrument, i.e., old school construction/materials etc. Variety is spicy Great job

[@tbonky]

Ok, you know it’s Wednesday, I know it’s Wednesday but I wasn’t expecting a Ted Woodford vid to show up today. What a treat! Thanks

[@jschinker]

WAIT. This doesn't mean we have to start the week OVER, does it? We were halfway through...

[@devschlong]

When did you expect it? He said it would be a few days late.

[@beenaplumber8379]

@@devschlong We addicts are, by nature, generally impatient.

[@Workerbee-zy5nx]

At 19:33, this guitar combo was Featured on Space 1999 with a gent playing for a crowd of Moon base alpha crew. He knew how to play it good.🎸🎸🎸🎸⬆️

[@pedroleal7118]

That lapsteel is a fine specimen! Sounded great too, after some face lift, great job! The orinal G-707 was supposed to aloud you to swap necks...I believe there were fretless ones, ence the stabilizer arm...

[@pedroleal7118]

Same for the Bass version!

[@philliplee1193]

I’m only here to comment that the Telecaster pickup started out being that thing from a lap steel. Thusly the poles were flat. Thusly on a Telecaster the middle strings didn’t get the signal enough. The steel plate underneath altered the shape of the magnetic field overall. And Leo started this slant bridge pickup thing to spike up the high notes, which I find to be annoying. I ordered a set of Tele pickups due to the vaunted reputation of the things. I pushed up poles 3 and 4. The non-magnetic plate covering the neck pickup removed discovering that those too were all flat, pushed those up too. Amplified music was a beautiful thing in those days though and this Gibsun is a beautiful instrument.