Impulse Buy

Tonight, the following words finally won me over: "Vintage Kay acoustic, all original, nice straight neck, nice action, a very cool guitar, super nice condition, has the original soft case. $25.00 for lower USA lower 48 states shipping."


My first guitar purchase in about 8 years

It didn't take long to finalize the buy, relatively speaking.  It started the day before, after my workplace's Holiday Gala (it's in honor of Christmas mostly), when I popped my head into a Best Buy to pick up the new GNR album for $.99, because another Best Buy near work had it for that price, so I figured every location was running the same deal.  Not the case here, but this location did have an adjacent guitar shop, so I decided to saunter around there for a bit.  In other words, a cute girl walked into that room, so I followed her.

Once in the room though, my eyes immediately affixed on a guitar that I had wanted since I was about 15-years-old.  It was an Ovation guitar styled almost identical to the guitar Mark Kendall played on MTV Unplugged during Great White's incredible performance of "Babe, I'm Gonna Leave You" in 1990.  I always felt that performance was one of the reasons that show succeeded.  Mark Kendall was more or less the main reason I wanted to learn how to play guitar.  He was one of the biggest influences throughout my adolesence (Shawn Michaels was the other).



All things considered, I think Mark Kendall hit closer to home as a direct influence on my life.  There were two things I immediately knew that I had in common with him: we were both Taurus and our last names started with a "K" (not that I readily admit it nowadays).  He was listed as The K in their "Hooked" album, and that's where my pen name originated.  I thought he was the coolest-looking musician of the day, and yet he didn't have any visible tattooes or piercings.  It was my proof that I could be cool without either.  Whether or not I was ever cool is another story, but I did learn to play guitar.  Eventually, I even had my first (and only) ever live performance in July 2003, but gradually after that time, I slipped away from music as a hobby.  It was replaced with local wrestling, and Impact Zone Wrestling acquired the majority of my free time.

My first interest in getting a new guitar came unexpectedly while I was on an overnight trip to Flagstaff this past summer.  I popped my head into a Super Pawn shop to browse, and I saw a guitar there with my name on it.  Literally!




That guitar was extremely enticing at the time, especially since Gilby Clarke has given me a fondness towards pawnshop guitars.  But it was marked around $350 and (the real deal breaker) it had a broken tuning key.  I opted against the impulse purchase (as I do with >90% of impulse buys) but I mentioned it to the guys in The Mixology Project when I got back, and they schooled me briefly on the history of Kay guitars, noting that it was a line of guitars from Montgomery Wards.  Their history lesson wasn't fully accurate, but it was intriguing enough to be memorable to me.  At that point, I made a mental note to make my next guitar purchase be a Kay guitar.

Therefore, the biggest drawback on Saturday evening to buying this (original) "dream" guitar wasn't that it was priced at $450, even though I knew I wouldn't get more than $200 of play out of it, but I would be breaking that promise to myself.  I went home and jumped on eBay to price Kay guitars.  I saw a rather attractive Kay guitar priced very cheap with an intriguing write-up:

Up for bidding is a VINTAGE KAY Acoustic Parlor Guitar from the 1950's or 60's!!
This Vintage guitar belonged to my brother in law who was the drummer for-
John Lennon & The Elephant's Memory Plastic Ono Band!!
Let me explain a little more in detail -
Elephant's Memory were a great NYC band signed to the APPLE record label.
John liked this band so much he chose them to be his new backing band.
My brother in law played with John on -
the "Sometime In New York City" album as well as played live,
and in the studio w/ him on numerous occasions as well as TV show appearances.
They spent alot of time together in the early 70's.
I grew up around the greatest stories a kid could have believe me! =)
I heard stories about everyone that a teenager becoming a musician idolizes! 
He played w/ everyone from Louis Armstrong to Jimi Hendrix!
He was a great drummer, a great friend and an amazing brother!
I miss him everyday very much.
Please read about Elephant's Memory here -http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elephant's_Memory
And here he is playing "New York City" w/ John Lennon -
LIVE @ Madison Square Garden 1972-http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UBUMpEwvLLQ

We used to jam on the holidays with this little guitar...good times!
I got this guitar after he passed away 11 years ago.
It's a special guitar to me but -
- sadly it must go to a new home so I don't lose mine. =)

THIS IS A REAL DEAL PIECE OF ROCK N ROLL HISTORY!

This wonderful classic guitar in good visual condition but it may need some restoration work.
It has a "Steel reinforced neck" so the truss rod is not adjustable at all.
The neck might need a reset or a bolt down like I see people do or just file the bridge down.
It has high action past the 5th fret but is comfy for playing before that.
It has it's dings & dents but it's a real vintage guitar that's been everywhere...so, yeah it's cool!
This could be an amazing project guitar to turn into something insane!
It comes with the original Alligator style case w/ Blue inside...groovy old school man!

It's selling here for alot less than anyone else who sells these types would sell it for!
Save your $$$ and buy this one! Just give it some love and it will be one sweet killer guitar!
THIS GUITAR IS A CLASSIC PIECE of ROCK N ROLL HISTORY!!!!

This is great sounding old parlor guitar and I've written many songs on it!
It's a real Beauty too, pretty & stylish.
This cool guitar is ideal for collecting, a great conversation piece or great for display!!!!
Would make a great Holiday Gift Idea for the musician, or John Lennon fan!
It is a beautiful example of the original Made in USA VALCO guitars of the 50's & 60's!

Honestly, I am not sure how much of that write-up I believe is true, but it was priced at a starting bid of $79.  Unfortunately, there was only an hour left on the auction when I came across it.  It ended with no bidders.  Afterwards, I wrote the seller to note my interest and I gave him a straight-up deal on what I was looking for mostly.  I think he was offended.  His response was helpful and polite, but he basically noted that this guitar was for serious collectors only.

Luckily, there were several other Kay guitars available on eBay for varying prices from $50 to $5,000.

The seller of the aforementioned eBay auction did note a few things to be wary about when buying a guitar sight-unseen, namely how difficult it is to ship a guitar through the mail and a few key terms to indicate if a guitar is "ready-to-play" or a "fixer-upper."

Shortly thereafter, my attention started leaning towards this guitar.  I liked how the neck had the brand name clearly displayed, just so there was no question that it was "my" guitar.  Plus, the music note on the pick guard was classic.  It was only priced at $150 for the guitar and the original case.  And the seller had a 9500 rating with eBay.  The auction listed it as "SUPER NICE" (another apt description of myself) so I felt this seller was being honest (especially based on his positive feedback and comments).

Not that I bought it immediately!

I first saw the auction on Saturday night, and it was a "Buy It Now" listing open for the next 23 days.  Originally, I planned to buy it after Christmas if it were still available and if I hadn't found any other guitar by then.  But the next morning, I looked at the auction a couple more times, and later that day, I found myself deciding that I would be quite disappointed if someone else bought it.  I figured I had enough waiter's remorse to risk having buyer's remorse.  Plus, it was about $300 less than what I was almost willing to pay 24 hours early for a guitar, so I decided to buy it.

Spending $175 so close to Christmas was not an issue.  I simply used my Cashback balance with Discover card to fund the purchase (something I had previously planned to do in November 2009 when I bought my new television on Black Friday).  Now begins a waiting game for it to arrive, but like What Made Milwaukee Famous said, "the waiting's not the anguish, it's the ride!"