My Guitars & Me S1E2: Jared James Nichols
In this episode of My Guitars & Me we sit down backstage at London's Shepherd's Bush Empire with blues phenomenon Jared James Nichols to find out the story of two very different but no less special instruments.
First we learn about 'Dorothy' one of the very first Gibson Les Pauls ever made from 1952, which was found almost completely destroyed amidst the wreckage and devastation of a tornado in Washington, Illinois in 2013. Jared was gifted what was left of the guitar by a fan several years later, and Jared set about having it restored to playing condition and giving the guitar its very appropriate name.
The second instrument is Gold Glory – a goldtop version of Jared's Epiphone signature model, which has been with him for a significant chunk of his journey from Waukesha, Wisconsin to the world's biggest stages. He explains the power of a single-pickup guitar, and why a decade on this guitar is still holding its own amongst his prized vintage guitars.
First we learn about 'Dorothy' one of the very first Gibson Les Pauls ever made from 1952, which was found almost completely destroyed amidst the wreckage and devastation of a tornado in Washington, Illinois in 2013. Jared was gifted what was left of the guitar by a fan several years later, and Jared set about having it restored to playing condition and giving the guitar its very appropriate name.
The second instrument is Gold Glory – a goldtop version of Jared's Epiphone signature model, which has been with him for a significant chunk of his journey from Waukesha, Wisconsin to the world's biggest stages. He explains the power of a single-pickup guitar, and why a decade on this guitar is still holding its own amongst his prized vintage guitars.
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MusicTranscript
00:00 Hey everyone, Jared James Nichols here with Guitar.com, and this is My Guitars and Me.
00:04 The tornado that this guitar was in, there was many people lost their lives.
00:21 People lost everything they owned, their houses were gone.
00:24 There's footage of this tornado on YouTube, you can look it up.
00:27 It was horrible.
00:28 And the fact that now that I have this and I'm making music, it means a lot to me because
00:33 this guitar kind of embodies a lot of the spirit of like, it's not over, you know,
00:39 this guitar was left for dead, it was done.
00:41 But there's chunks missing off the sides here, as you can see on the bottom.
00:47 All that I asked him, he said that there was pieces of glass and asphalt.
00:52 And he said, "Man, if I leave this in here, it's gonna cut you."
00:57 And I said, "You know what, I'm gonna play the guitar.
01:00 Take out all of the things that will literally cut me."
01:03 I said, "But don't do anything else."
01:05 A lot of even this on the top, you can start to see, like as I, if I turn at the right
01:09 angle, you can start to see this has a, you know, a two-piece flame maple top.
01:14 So it's starting to pop out a little bit, but all of this on the top is already me.
01:18 This is actually from since I play fingerstyle, my pinky from sitting right there.
01:22 And then you can see here too, it's starting to, from pulling up on the strings.
01:27 I'm starting to lose a little finish there.
01:29 It's really guitar to guitar for me.
01:31 I'll play a Les Paul with 11s and I'll say, "Yeah, this is perfect."
01:34 Or I could play one of the 11s and say, "Now this feels horrible.
01:37 It's way too heavy."
01:39 But I'm playing guitar every single night, basically all around.
01:44 And I wanna have a neck that is, it has enough kind of size to it that it feels right in
01:51 my hands.
01:52 I can really get behind it and use it for leverage.
01:54 But also I don't want something that I'm literally just fighting.
01:57 I like to fight.
01:58 I have my action a little higher, but I like to fight it.
02:01 But I can't have a neck that's like just so overgrown, but this is like comfortable.
02:06 This feels like it belongs in my hand.
02:09 And as far as the fret wire goes, I put on, I guess it's called the Stevie Ray Vaughan
02:14 fret.
02:15 I think they're 6100 or something.
02:17 But what I love about this, like earlier, like I was saying, when it comes to doing
02:21 bending and stuff as far as the...it's just like, it's like bend heaven.
02:29 Check out this bend.
02:40 It doesn't choke out.
02:50 And that's what's another great quality about this guitar.
02:54 Stays in tune great and it just doesn't choke out when you go for the...it's awesome.
02:59 You know what's crazy about these pickups though, man?
03:04 Like if I were to like tune this low, like...it's just crazy that it still has the thing.
03:18 And if you put it through a big amp...anyways, I'll actually do some playing.
03:25 Here we go, boys.
03:34 [guitar]
03:54 [drums]
04:09 Growing up, I'm from the same town as Les Paul, Waukesha, Wisconsin.
04:34 And before I even played guitar, I knew the shape of a Les Paul.
04:37 So when I first started to play, I tried everything.
04:40 I tried strats, I tried SG, everything, but I kept coming back to a Les Paul.
04:45 And when I really started to try and become like a guitar player, I said, "I'm going to
04:49 do this."
04:50 Playing with my fingers, doing this stuff.
04:53 I remember there was a few things.
04:54 I always thought that the neck pickup was in my way.
04:59 First thing, because with my fingers, I wanted to come over here and do picking.
05:03 And then also, whenever I'd flip there, I always felt like...how can I say it?
05:09 It sounded like, duddy.
05:11 It sounded kind of just like, not good.
05:14 So I was like, "I don't use it anyways."
05:16 So I had a Les Paul Custom at the time.
05:18 I was probably 20 years old.
05:21 I ripped out the pickups.
05:23 I ripped out the neck pickup.
05:24 I ripped out the toggle switch.
05:25 I ripped out the volume and tone.
05:27 And at that time, it was those two, and I had these two on the bottom.
05:30 I remember people started to say to me, "Dude, what's wrong with your guitar?"
05:34 Kind of like, "What'd you do to it?"
05:36 So I'm not using it, so I got rid of it.
05:38 There's something about playing a single pickup guitar.
05:42 It forces you to play different.
05:44 It forces you to be all in, in the moment.
05:47 It's like you have to react with your volume and your tone.
05:51 If I have my volume at like three, that's my clean.
05:55 So going through, it's like, here's my three, right?
05:58 [GUITAR PLAYING]
06:03 And as I bring that up, there's like seven.
06:06 [GUITAR PLAYING]
06:09 And then I come up, and then there's my 10.
06:16 [GUITAR PLAYING]
06:20 [GUITAR PLAYING]
06:23 Same lick.
06:29 [GUITAR PLAYING]
06:33 Even lower.
06:35 [GUITAR PLAYING]
06:39 So there's something about, I only got one.
06:47 And if you've never tried one as a player,
06:49 I would say pick one up and just give it a chance.
06:52 It'll force you to play different.
06:54 This guitar right here is straight out of the box.
06:57 Every sound-- I put strings on it three days ago, but--
07:00 [GUITAR PLAYING]
07:04 [GUITAR PLAYING]
07:07 Straight out of the box.
07:23 When I hold it, when I feel it, it's
07:25 like it's such a piece of who I am
07:29 that no matter how far along I was in reverence or like
07:33 holy grail guitars, there's something about this
07:35 that I still love.
07:37 I still love the fact of that I got to fight it.
07:41 There's no neck pickup.
07:43 It just forces me to play a certain way.
07:46 And I think, honestly, my whole career, I'll always
07:50 have one of these with me.
07:51 [GUITAR PLAYING]
07:54 [GUITAR PLAYING]
07:58 [GUITAR PLAYING]
08:01 [GUITAR PLAYING]
08:05 [GUITAR PLAYING]
08:33 [GUITAR PLAYING]
08:37 Thank you so much for hanging out with me
08:46 and checking out Gold Glory and Dorothy
08:49 and taking time to listen to me talk.
08:51 And I hope to see you at a tour stop soon.
08:54 I'll be all over this year supporting my brand new record.
08:57 Take care.
08:57 Make sure to have fun playing your guitar.
09:00 Music is supposed to be fun, so keep it fun.
09:02 I'll see you on the road.
09:03 Peace, power.
09:04 [GUITAR PLAYING]
09:07 (upbeat music)