Here's an interesting tidbit on the black LP at the bottom left of that photo. That's a '78 Custom and it used to belong to Bob Mayo, who was Peter Frampton's keyboard player and 2nd guitarist for a period of 25 years. Bob also played with Joe Walsh and Foreigner at different points in his career. Tragically, he died at the age of 52 of a heart attack while on tour with Frampton in Europe in 2004. Apparently, Bob's family lives somewhere around here in upstate NY (he was a NYC native), and his son sold or traded in the guitar to a local music store that Dave does a lot of business with. They knew his penchant for LP's and asked him if he'd be interested in it. Dave loves black LP's (as you can see from the above photo!), but was a little concerned about the condition of the instrument. Though you can't see it in the photo, it's beat up pretty well, naturally "road-reliced" from years of touring. The store owner suggested that Dave take it for a few days, gig with it, and see if he wanted to buy it, and he took him up on the offer.
Apparently, the guitar was in worse shape than it looked, because while Dave was playing it on stage a couple nights later, the headstock spontaneously snapped off!! He took it back to the store and explained what had happened and swore up & down that he hadn't abused the instrument in any way--the headstock just broke while playing the guitar normally. Must have been a crack in it that just picked that moment to let go. Fortunately, the store owner knew him well enough to believe his story. They had the headstock repaired by a local luthier who's a real craftsman, and Dave tells me that unless you knew what had happened to it, you'd never even notice the repair. Dave decided to go ahead and buy the guitar, and got a good price on it because of its condition. There are chunks of wood missing in spots, numerous dings, scratches & gouges, and the paint is worn down to bare wood in spots on the back. But it also has Bob Mayo's signature on the back, written in silver Sharpie. A pretty cool old axe with some genuine history and character!
