I was born in Nashville,Tenn... December 1950. It was the middle of the worst blizzard on record. Still, all of my relatives had to get to the hospital somehow to see me. My uncles all loved that Country/Western music, especially the pedal steel guitar. I was more interested in Chet Atkins and Merle Travis and those big Gibsons and Gretsches they played. I think I was 10 years old when I got one of those crystal radio sets and I tuned in to the pop stations WKDA, WMAK and the R&B stations WVOL & WLAC. Many nights I went to sleep with that earplug cranking just waiting for my favorite song "Apache!" I would come home from school, and watch those country music shows on TV. What a great guitar education I was getting, not to mention the quality of the great players themselves!! Besides Chet and Merle, there was Hank Garland, Jim Colvard, Jimmy Capps, Don Rich, and Grady Martin.
When the Fender guitars starting
seeping into town in the 50's and 60's, we just hated them!!
They looked so cheap with their bolt-on necks and huge plastic
pickguards. No neck angle, no carved top, just two flat planks
of wood! And the pickups were terribly weak! The only reason
anyboby played a Fender, was because they just couldn't afford
a Gibson. We loved those Gibson 335's and Byrdlands, and of course,
the Gretsch Country Gentleman !!
I started playing professionally
at age15, and like most kids , I delivered papers. I was making
money and could afford to buy guitars, motorcycles, and hamburgers.
What else was there on Earth.....girls! The most popular music
store in town was Hewgley's located on Commerce between 7th &
8th. Any Saturday, you could see Grady Martin (drunk) or Jimi
Hendrix (lots of stories) or Duane Allman (more stories).
I was playing a 335 through a Twin. I loved the Les Pauls but
they were just too heavy. I had a chance to buy a 1961
SG Les Paul (fretless wonder,white, 3 gold pickups) from our
bass players brother for $300 and that guitar was probably my
all time favorite. My band was lined up to tour New England playing
for the mob in towns like Pawtucket, Rhode Island and North Attleboro,
Mass. We were in Providence when we went out for breakfast after
work and somebody broke into our bus and stole that SG. I was
destroyed. I called the club owner and he said he could get it
back when they tried to fence it!! Meanwhile, I was to go see
Sylvio DiPippo at his music store in town and pick out something
to play. All he had was a Fender Stratocaster!! I was destroyed!!
A cheap flat Fender to take to the gig that night. After 2 weeks,
I got used to that Fender and later when I got my first Marshall
stack, those weak pickups somehow didn't seem to matter anymore.
I began my work on custom
instruments in 1974 when I met Bill Lawrence. He had just been
relocated to Nashville from Michigan and was in the process of
setting up the new Gibson Guitar factory. We were constantly
going over previous designs and redesigning the latest test models
for Gibson. Then Bill decided to leave Gibson and start our own
company. Thus was born Lawrence Sound Research. We combined all
of our newest ideas in guitar pickups as well as the best of
the good old days. Several versions of pickups were released
including the first soundhole acoustic/magnetic pickup,
the L-90. We went ahead with full scale guitar designs and brought
in Tom Holmes to help with production. I took over the in-house
Custom Shop doing custom modifications and installations.
Some time later, I left to
start my own shop and picked up work from the Nashville area
professionals as well as the local music stores. After many years
in Nashville, I packed up and moved to Los Angeles to work with
my good friend Fred Walecki of Westwood Music. I had met Fred
while on tour with Waylon Jennings. Fred was responsible for
major gains in the guitar sciences and had the top Los Angeles
clientele as proof of his great understanding of instruments.
About a year later, we made
our best move when we brought Rick Turner in to work with us.
Rick is best known for his work with the Alembic Guitar company
in the early 70's, as well as the popular Rick Turner Guitars
of today. He is probably the most savvy guy in instrument engineering
that I know of and no one is more dedicated to consistency and
quality of work. During this period, I also hooked up with Robin
Whittle of Real World Interfaces in Melbourne,Australia and helped
him market his wonderful modifications to the Roland line of
synthesizers here in the U.S. These were a complete circuitry
redesign and hardware upgrade to the Roland line up. Our mods
to the MT-32, D-110, D-10, and D-20 are now legendary and have
been very successful worldwide.
Neely Custom Guitars has evolved over the last 35 years. It incorporates my many years of playing the guitar professionally with the wonderful designers and musicians I've been able to work with. My years in college studying electronics, architectural drawing, and computers have blended with years of building guitars to aid in the designs of my own line of instruments. My NepTuneinterval correction has been installed on over 200 guitars as an aftermarket modification and is incorporated in every acoustic or electric guitar that I build.