Blake Noble

A trade is in the works. If it works out, I'm trading for a car I would have just bought anyway. Yeah, you probably know what car it is. I'm just going to let go of the old vintage solid state Fender amp so that I can buy a 40 watt tube amp instead of relying on getting money out this deal to buy one instead.

So, in "Whole Lotta Love," do those first couple of lines really go: "You need coolant, El Camino I'm not fooling. I'm gonna send ya, Back to Geeeee-Emmmmm."

Cool. Robert Plant is in this picture.

wat

FMIC and GGC should seriously contemplate terminating their current contracts with Chinese builders. The Chinese are starting to bite them in the ass the same way the Koreans did with building and passing off fake high-dollar instruments. Fender has a plant in Mexico that could build their budget minded guitars (in fact, they used to do that in the '90s) and Gibson should follow suit and move Epiphone production closer to home with either a new Mexican or Canadian plant. It's been proven people would pay well into mid-range Fender and low-range Gibson prices for these guitars, so why not? Plus, I don't forsee prices of some models actually increasing all that much over current prices. It's a no-brainer. In fact, I would rather see production of a lot of Made In China junk be moved to either Canada or Mexico. Again, prices wouldn't jump exponentially. Of course, FMIC and GGC have held contracts with the Asian builders ever since they won those string of lawsuits in the '70s and early '80s, in an effort to keep foreign competition down and give budget-minded players an inexpensive new guitar. It worked at first and was a very smart move. Today, though, with the Chinese builders acting the way they are, it's something that can't be ignored. And the Chinese not only fake guitars, they fake other high-demand goods as well (for example, anything fashion-related) and try to pass them off as legitimate.

I couldn't sum it up better myself. The fortunate will drive Cadillacs and the less fortunate get Chevrolets. Maybe if someone less fortunate gets really, really lucky, they can slip behind the wheel of a Buick. What a fucking joke.

S'pose I should explain. To make a long story short, there was a big bunch of hoopla from CBS-Fender and Norlin-Gibson in the 1970s about rip-off guitars from Japan where just about every detail of their instruments were copied. Well, the end result from those lawsuits prevented anyone else but Fender and Gibson to use their headstock designs and make it hard for them to copy body designs and sell/distribute those copied products here. What the folks in the ad are trying to sell you are fake Fenders and Gibsons, made in the Chinese plants that produce Epiphones and Squiers, which are illegal to buy and sell in the U.S. as a result of the '70s lawsuits against the Japanese builders. For the record, the cheapest actual Gibson guitar is the Melody Maker which stickers in at almost $500 bucks. It is U.S. made. The cheapest Fender is a Standard Strat and those haven't sold at a price under $400 for quite some time now and even still those Fenders are made in Mexico.

FYI, this ad banner I found is considered illegal.

You call that funny? No. This is funny: http://lexington.craigslist.org/cto/1774793521.html I think I know where MDM lives ...

I've been practicing fairly religiously since February. I grew sort of tired of being the guy who could play with a guitar rather than actually play it well. What I mean by that is, I grew tired of playing music that was popular in the local music scene around here and to play that brand of rock/metal, that's all you really gotta know how to do. I've really sort of lost myself in Pink Floyd and Rory Gallagher these days. Gallagher really made blues click for me more so than SRV. As for how there is still plenty of cool stuff to left enjoy, I credit it mostly to guitars themselves not undergoing major changes, even electric guitars. Sure, you have electric guitars with active pickups, tone boost controls, tone circuit controls, and so on, but you can still buy electric guitars that are very similar if not exactly the same in construction to the originals. The Fender Telecaster initially debuted as the Fender Broadcaster in 1950, and, yep, Fender still does make a guitar exactly like it. Same story for the Stratocaster. Typically, this market refuses to accept any shocking standard equipment and overly complex stuff is a guaranteed failure or met with lukewarm response at best (Gibson Robot Guitars for example). Amplifiers are a different story, though ...

Much obliged. When the Camaro sells, step one will be putting the money I get out of it in a checking account instead of having it stowed away somewhere in the closet. After that, it's going to be a random search to various places, car lots ... private owners ... etc. I'm not going to rush into buying anything, I'm going to wait for the right car to come to me. If there is any remainder of money, I'm going to spend it on books for class and musical instruments. Fair plan. I've learned from my mistakes.

Maybe it's finally time to get that Arrowhead tattooed on your ass. Have a good one dude.

You put quite a bit of work into that car BV. It's a little surprising you're thinking of letting 'er go. I'm sure you'd easily make your money back on it, however. Me, on the other hand, I have a very bad problem with changing DDs very often. It isn't without reason, though. This Camaro has started to turn into a money pit for me and I'm not willing to put money in it anymore. The clutch and reverse synchro are coming close to biting the dust. I'm seriously considering an '94 to '96 Impala SS. This video should explain why: Then there is the always right T/A option.

The Camaro is for sale.

I started out driving a manual trans. ... I've driven the Camaro in the worst bumper to bumper traffic you could imagine. Who knew a pedal could be that much fun? And while I would prefer to have a car with a manual, I wouldn't let it knock me out of owning something nice. (You can retrofit a six-speed row-your-own in an Impala SS or a Caprice. )

Same here. My other primary addiction/interest, guitar, also factored to this as well. There is still plenty of cool gear out there to buy and that's still being built.

I'm glad they don't. The minute that a certain form of rock goes mainstream, that's when it really goes downhill. I'd hate to see bands like the one linked to in the video as well as similar bands like Clutch, Boris, etc. become very popular, spawn countless imitators, become cliche, then fall out of fashion and subsequently get dragged down with the bands that they influenced and helped to lay the foundation for. Although something needs to come along and kill out the current crop of metalcore/fauxcore/[genre]core bands that are so popular and so horrible. I'll be honest, mainstream metal was better back in the '80s than it is now. I'd rather listen to Tesla or Whitesnake over Bullet For My Valentine (ew) Five Finger Death Punch (double ewwww). The best music doesn't need mainstream exposure.

The more this country continues to squander away what little greatness we have left, the more I grow to resent it. Our politicians have the intelligence quotients of a damn 4 year old.

I dunno ... There seemed to be quite a few people requesting Ford build a bare bones V-8 Mustang recently. Perhaps stereos have to be standard now due to their integrated designs, but I don't see how you couldn't design a door panel to have interchangeable trim pieces to house either a module for a power window control system or a window crank. And nothing says A/C has to be standard. You can still use the same dials for the interior, just mark them different. You're thinking of it backwards. Think of it as adding a V-8 or whatever option to a Camaro LT. That's what I'm trying to say.

HURR DURR 240 HORSEPOWER IS SO MUCH BETTER THAN 350!!!! THE WING BRAH MAKES ME FASTER!!!! HURR DURR HOW DO FIX FAULTY FUEL INJECTION!!!

Wahh-wahh 1,000 watt FM/Satellite stereo system with an iPod input. Wahh-wahh air-conditioning. Wahh-wahh power windows. Brakes? You had to list brakes? Dude ... seriously? Uh, yeah. I think we can all agree we all want brakes. Even the Cutlass has power-assist brakes. That's from 1972, if you didn't remember. Thinking about it, everything I've owned has had brakes. No brakes ... dude, that should be a deal breaker for all of us. I can install my own radio if I'm just going to absolutely fucking die without one. Until I bought the Camaro, I lived without functioning air conditioning in everything I had. I could do it again if I had to. Power windows? Those add weight, brah. More weight makes you go slower. I've had crank windows in three different cars (S10, then Sonoma, then Cutlass). It doesn't bother me to reach down and push a lever forward or back. Please, don't take this post the wrong way. But dual-zone climate control, Sirius radio, and leather seats that massage your ass and give you an enema while you drive ... those things are luxuries. Things you can live without. Things that should all be option boxes on an order sheet so that I don't have to pay for them if I don't want them, which honestly I don't. That's the whole point here. In 1969, you could order a car anyway you wanted it. You didn't have to opt for a car costing thousands more than what you wanted to pay to get a V-8 under the hood. You could choose the base car, add the V-8, and drop all of the nonsense. You weren't forced into option groups and packages to get what you wanted while adding on stuff you didn't want. Why should a V-8 Camaro, for example, HAVE to come with leather-fucking seats and a big ol' set of factory 20 inch tires that come at a 1.5k premium? I don't want either of 'em, nor do I want a 2,000 watt RockAlPioneer surround sound, high-definition stereo system. I just want the base Camaro, not even the RS Camaro, not even an "LT" Camaro, with crank-windows, just a heater, and some sort of V-8 option ringing up for 19k even. GM could build it. Give me one reason why they couldn't without using the excuse involving the words "market", "demands", and "it." (There's nothing wrong with the V-6 in the Camaro or most any other car anymore. Don't get me wrong.) It's not the styling of newer cars that's depressing. The Camaro, Challenger, Mustang, Charger, 300C, the Caprice (whenever GM sells it in civilian trim), the current and upcoming Malibu, the Fusion, the Taurus, the Alfas that might be sold here soon ... those are all great looking cars without being something the mega-elite can buy. It's the details which suck a massive amount of chode through a bendy straw.

There isn't much listed in this thread you could finance for 60 months for under $500 dollars. That is what's really depressing. (I'm going to rant now. You might want to rep this down on read the next post.) Back in the day, there was something exciting for every budget. Nova SS, hello? Dodge Demon anyone? Forget about inexpensive a V-8 Mustang or Camaro could be? You used to be able to buy one with crank windows and a hole in the dash where the stereo goes. Honestly, cars like that need to make a resurgence. And there isn't any excuse why we can't have something excessive and stupidly ridiculous for about $19k that doesn't have the wheelbase of a pack of gum. Today's technology can make cars like that economical but still be able to make your friends ask, "Why in the hell did you think you needed that?" You shouldn't have to explain why. You had the extra few bucks to finance that option, even with the part-time job you have to support yourself through college. To get the good stuff, soon there won't be any choice but to be the dude with two PhDs and playing golf with Bill (and I do mean Gates).

The number coil pack for cylinders 2 and 5, if I remember correctly, were the cause for the engine to set off the "oh shit" light the last time. It hasn't come back so far but the fuel gauge continues to lose function, as is the clutch at the moment. Pressure on the pedal now sporadically ranges from awful to great. The hydraulic fluid level is fine. I'm fully expecting the last remaining unchanged coil pack to go bad anytime now as well; the throttle response is starting to get lumpy in the mid-range gears like it did the last time. I don't mind routine maintenance but ...

Cue "cut vs. uncut" debate. I'm going to call this one while I'm at it: someone here is going to ask for photos.

Ooh. A challenge. Here's goes. Glenn Beck with a hat: Hitler with a hat: Therefore, Glenn Beck is the Hilter incarnate.