It took me years to realize that Brian Jones used two, an “A” and a “D,” on “Not Fade Away.” “Matchbox,” however, was a snap. I started playing harmonica, Hohner Marine Bands and Blues Harps. I got good enough to folk around with Leadbelly’s “Titanic,” Harry Belafonte’s “Jamaica Farewell,” Chad Stuart & Jeremy Clyde’s “Yesterday’s Gone” and “A Summer Song.” The Stones’ version of “It’s All Over Now” was, I decided, a folk song. I bought a Beatles songbook of tracks from Something New, but they’d all been transposed into C, which was a dirty lie, so I didn’t learn “Things We Said Today” or “I’ll Cry Instead” for years.īut I had learned the beginning of “Malaguena.” A friend from Morton had taught me modal tuning that summer, which was easier: “Turn Your Money Green.” The strings were too high, the neck was too wide, it strayed out of tune, but it was my guitar. Like most first loves, it was unsatisfactory. So I bought one from a pawn shop on Wells avenue, a nylon-string slot-head Marco Polo for $20. Well, I was already a fan of The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, The Animals, and The Searchers. When I went off to Milwaukee and Marquette in 1964, my mom would send me money for haircuts.
She played the usual folk dreck, but I learned one good song from her, “Take Her Out Of Pity,” by John Stewart and the Kingston Trio: G-E minor-C-D 7 th, the same chords, I would discover, as dozens of other songs from Ritchie Valens’ “Donna” to The Shields’ “You Cheated” to The Safaris’ “Image Of A Girl.” In 1963, I had a girl friend who played a cheap acoustic. I just followed where Paul Burson, the rhythm guitarist, had his fingers on the top two strings. I played a little bass if Tim Slevin, the bass player, was forbidden band nights by his parents. I hung out AKA “managed” a group of friends in a band called The Tempests at Spalding Institute (the drummer was a Canadian from Woodruff, John Moffatt) from 1962 on.
“I can’t remember a time when I didn’t want a guitar. Mike Foster, Metamora, Illinois, A Fine Kettle Of Fish: Guitars I’ve Loved (and other instruments)