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I have been a very big fan of the rock group Living Colour since around 1984. You know I have all of the vinyl and cds they issued.  So of course when I recently was contacted by the guitarist  for the band about my work, I was very excited.  We set up a phone chat to talk guitars stuff.  That phone chat  was a cool eye opener for me. I discovered Vernon was like myself, a big science fiction fan.  We also discussed some similar childhood memories like AFX slot cars and cool Irwin Allen TV shows like Land Of The Giants, Voyage to The Bottom of the Sea and Lost in Space.  

Along with Land of the Giants, Lost in Space is one of my all-time favorite television series. I decided that along with some design preference cues from Vernon like the particular neck shape he prefers,  I would incorporate some aesthetics form both the original series and the Netflix reboot.   Can you spot them?  Anyone who’s seen Living colour live or heard their music knows Vernon is a very experimental guitarist.  He not only pushes the limits of what can be done with the traditional analog electric guitar, but he also incorporates lots of digital sampling, Triggering and sequencing in his style. Because its one of the things that caught my attention about his playing back in the day, I definitely wanted to bring this part of his style to my composition for him.  For this part, I chose a Fishman Triple Play wireless MIDI guitar system.  This was a challenge for me because I needed to make a few new parts to mount the hexophonic pickup for the system. This was necessary because of my non traditional bridge design.  For all the particulars on this build, Check the list on the right. Everything for this composition  was made in my shop with the exception of the tuners and the wireless MIDI (musical instrument digital interface) guitar system.

This build was an opportunity to utilize more  of the current technologies now in use in my studio. These include CNC milling, 3D printing and also resin casting.

What a wonderful time to be a luthier!