Big Decisions

I'm trying to decide...

For my last weekend of Californian exploration, do I go here, to Palm Springs, and check out a film shoot in the desert with sound artists, Lucky Dragons..


Or head up to San Fransisco, and go to an amazing music festival called OUTSIDE LANDS, where Cat Power, Temper Trap, Kings of Leon, and many other great bands are playing at Golden Gate Park..


Hmmmm.. put your votes in folks.

The 50's Diner Experience

I had to do it. How could I not? Check this place out. It's on Lincoln Blvd, not far from my home base, so I swung down for a bit of late lunch: a burger and fries, naturally. I have to say I wasn't particularly taken with the food, but the general vibe was 50's fresh, with these little juke box stations installed at each sitting place. Nice!

Walking the Hollywood Hills

Heather and Glasgow's mate Nicole took me out for a walk with the naughty 'Chili' Dog, into the Hollywood Hills. This was great. It made me realise how nice it must be, as a resident of the city, to be able to exit out the top edge of Hollywood, and ascend up and over the hills, and see the city below from a distance. It's really peaceful up there. There were folks riding horses along the ridge up above, and you can catch a glimpse of the HOLLYWOOD sign across one peak.

Fender MusicMaster '59 CHECKERBOARD TEMPTATION

I saw this little beaudy in a pawn shop up on Centinela today. Most likely a quite early (circa ~1959) Fender Musicmaster student model electric guitar, which has been modded at some stage to sport some kind of modern humbucker on a checked pickguard - quite cool in my opinion!

A tempting proposition, except the $800 asking price is just a little too high, considering I have my eye on a few other things, including an original 1963 example on Craigslist.. But why do I get the feeling I am going to live to regret passing over this one?

LA regular life snips in large format

OK, so, just to clear this one up: Yes, general items and consumables in the US of A does generally comes in LARGE size as standard. Here's the regular morning set-up of Milk, Ground Coffee and Orange juice I wake up to here to kick off my day:


Also, if you wanna get a regular sweet old regular [Aussie-style] flat white coffee, or a cafe latte, or whatever is your thing, you have to go to a real fancy place, like "Intelligentsia" and pay $5 for a cup of the fine black bean juice, with uber-special concierge style service from an ultra slick barrista hipster.


Intelligentsia on Abbott Kinney, Venice

All in all, it's been great in LA. Got a few more leads on guitars via Craigslist, and the city's fine array of Pawn Shops, still to follow up on before moving on.

Moody Times Down Venice Beach

Some images from down at Venice Beach in the moody late afternoon light.

Gibson Melody Maker (Circa 1968)

Pretty excited..

I spent yesterday trawling across LA, visiting pawn shops, looking for old guitars.

Spurred on by the discovery that you can actually put your push bike on a carry rack on the front of the public buses here, I headed for downtown and then peddled from there.

But, oh my Gosh, LA is large, sprawling, and then some. I must've covered 40km odd, including the ride all the way home down to Venice in the late evening hours - not bad for a little Aussie guy recovering from a nasty flu, still coughing his throat out. No-one here really seems to ride much.


The pay-off moment for the day was when I stopped in at this unassuming place, called "Royal Pawn Shop" and snooped around long enough to see the familiar Gibson "SG" style shape hanging on the wall, with some other obscure junk half hanging over the top of it.


A few minutes of twangin on the strings, and checking out the odd additions and modifications previous owners have made, I was pretty sold on it. It actually plays really well, and the guy initially thought the asking price was $110. Turns out that was a tag from another guitar. They wanted $300, but $200 sealed the deal. Stoked.


Later in the evening I made my way over to West Hollywood to check out the big guitar stores, like GUITAR CENTRE, where the salesman told me he sells guitars to my fellow Melbournite Guy Pearce. Across the road at Sam Ash, the young salesman cringed a bit when I told him I paid $200 for the old Gibson with the colourful past. He recommended I take it back for a refund if that was an option.. I think they have a different take on old wigged out guitars here than we do back in Oz. At least, different to my notion of a good buy.

Heck, I'm a happy camper.