sullyville

when i had my white strat built some twenty years ago, it came with a fender logo on it. i was always kinda not a fan of that, and i eventually took it off with some rubbing alcohol. i slapped a sully logo on it, and that never felt right, either. so i decided to make a logo with the name of the store, and the year they went in business (which was the same year i had this guitar made).

i came up with a few variations, so lemme know what you think is the best layout.

hey all,

I got an email from kaitlyn's mom, who gave me the link to the mcdonald's commercial that kaitlyn shot about a month or so ago. she told me that the more hits the page gets, the better the chances are of it airing. so everyone, please take a minute and watch the video. she's the guitar player in the commercial. the black mini strat is hers, and YES, she can really play.

here's the short commercial:

http://www.happymeal.com/en_US/#Video_Page

here's the director's cut, which is better:

http://www.happymeal.com/en_US/#ExtendedTVC

if you watch closely in the directors cut, she does the "raise your goblet to the gods of rock" move from school of rock. that was a part of our early lessons.

and here she is a year or so ago at a talent show:

happy saint patrick's day, yo!

sixteen years ago this morning, i stood in a hallway in cedars-sinai hospital in beverly hills until it was time for me to enter the operating room (his was a scheduled c-section delivery). i was so sure that i was going to have a son the entire pregnancy, but all of a sudden, a thought hit me; what if it's a girl? more appropriately, what if it was a girl, and i'd spent 9 months mentally planning for a son? how uncool would that be to this little girl if i hesitated for just a moment at her birth and thought "oh! ...it's a girl!" i instantly snapped to it and got very excited over the prospect of a daughter. yes, i was going to have a daughter named scarlett (long before ms. johansen begun her movie career), and i couldn't wait.

i stood in the hall, looking out the window at the los angeles hard rock cafe, where there was a sign on the building that read "world population now" and it had numbers running up by the second. i thought that was kinda neat and it was something i oddly felt a part of. yeah, i know, it's a little odd; i was twenty, for god's sake. the fact that i was still alive after what i've done to myself was a miracle in itself.

anyone who knows me knows that i have a son, who is 16 years old today. this has been the first birthday of his that has really hit me from a wonderment kind of angle. i know that i didn't go through as much reflection at his 1st, 5th, 10th birthdays. perhaps it's because i remember his age so well. i wonder if 16 year old sully and he would have been friends. i think if anything, i'd be contributing to his delinquency. :)

he and i have been through a lot together, and i couldn't be prouder of him. he's a well mannered boy who's kind to others, has a good sense of humor, and is a pretty smart kid (he may be graduating HS a year early). yeah, there have been ups and downs, but there have been way more good times than bad. i'm a very fortunate person, to say the least.

in 1993 - 94, i worked at sound warehouse in schaumburg, il. we had a great crew of people, and i got to listen to a lot of great music and make friends with people who will always be close to my heart.

we had this disc we'd play by french singer mireille mathieu called mireille mathieu chante piaf, (a tribute album where she sings the songs of edith piaf) and while it was kinda hokey sometimes, many of the songs were great. keep in mind that at this time, i'm 22, and cut my teeth on kiss, motley crue, queen, ozzy, etc....

my 2 years of high school french enabled me to pick out a few lyrics here and there. thanks to that, i've always LOVED "non, je ne regrette rien" (translated into "no, i regret nothing" or "no regrets") and always viewed it similar to frank sinatra's "my way." i've loved that song dearly, even though i didn't understand what 90% of the lyrics were. to me, it's always been one of those "play it at my funeral" songs. yeah, i know it's morbid, but consider the source.

all that aside, mrs sully and i watched la vie en rose last night, and if you haven't seen it, by all means go pick up the dvd. i've spent some of the day listening to edith piaf, and found these videos on youtube.

non, je ne regrette rien:

la vie en rose:

it's amazing to me that these clips still exist, and it also makes me thankful to live in a world where such things are so easily available.

anyway, if nothing else, enjoy knowing that i love (and have for years) edith piaf; right along with motley crue.

continuing along with recording this weekend, i grabbed another one of my ozzy backing tracks and gave crazy train a whirl. i had a lot of fun picking the tones that i was going to use, and after recording it, i was pretty happy with how it came out. so much so that i decided to have more fun and make a little video out of it! of course, i had to throw my crankdaddy shirt on to help spread the word (yo, fishy, i can do the same for you if you can fire up a cafe press store and make a WCP shirt!), and here it is!

i think jackson should use it for a commercial. ;D

no, not the snow. it was neat and all, but 2 days of snow is enough for me.

i posted some pix of my white charvel a few weeks ago, and when i was on my flickr page, i noted that someone had counted one of them as a favorite. so i hit the link to their flickr page, and fuckin' a, it belongs to Noe the G! who's he, you ask? well, he was the founding editor of guitar world magazine. yeah, that one. so i sent him a quick note letting him know that i was honored that he added me as a contact, and that i totally knew who he is. he messaged back stating that it made his day to hear from me. earlier today, he posted some pictures of his charvel that grover jackson made for him back in the day. it's kickass, for sure.

how cool of a world do we live in when a simple photograph can be a catalyst of brief, yet positive communication?

one thing that i try to remember to do is to randomly reach out to a pal with a text or whatever letting them know that i appreciate them. sometimes a kind word out of the blue can positively impact someone's day when they need it most. if you don't do that, i highly recommend it.

i posted this on my flickr page, but here's a photo shoutout to my newest flickr contact, doctor noe:

in march!

earlier today, i pulled the strats out for a group shot. since i got the charvel, it's made me think of my first custom built guitar, which was a present i got myself for my 16th birthday oh so long ago. i remember it cost me $340.

there was a little music shop near me, and the owner used to build a few parts guitars here and there. a few of my friends had some, and i wanted one of my own. originally, it was to be based off of jake's white charvel, but i found this neck in his shop, and it felt so awesome (i've recently figured out that it's a chandler...or more accurately, a paul c's neck and body). funny, even though it has a v-trem on it, i never got the bar for it (i told steve i didn't need it), nor has there ever been a back plate on it.

a few months after i got the guitar, it was stolen and wound up in a pawn shop. luckily, the owner of the pawn shop called the guy who built my guitar (very strange coincidence) asking how much he could get for this white strat with no serial number. steve (the guy who built my guitar) called me and asked if i had my guitar. i said, "sure! it's at my singer's house!" he told me that in reality, it was in a pawn shop in oak park, il. i went and got my guitar back, and have had it since.

it's changed a little over the years; for its 10th bday, i got the pearloid guard (it was originally white), and i also modded the rout to accept a jake style configuration (it had one for a few years) and eventually returned it back to how it was (s/s/s).

it's been beat on, kicked, dropped, and the victim of many other types of teenage angst. but now, it mainly sits quietly with the others. i have to refret it, and will do so soon. you can see how badly the frets have worn down in one of the pix. this guitar and i have been through a hell of a lot together, that's for sure. it's funny to see it next to the charvel, as when it was new, it was as white as the charvel is now. here it is in its weathered glory.

oh, the green jake guitar is a warmoth body + a chandler strathead neck that has the most stripey, kickass slab of rosewood i've ever seen.

 

kaitlyn just called me.

she booked a movie.

yep. she's going to be in an american girl movie, playing the best friend of the main character.

now, i know that the american girl stuff is way popular for girls 7-10 or so, but i had no idea that they did movies and stuff about them. i thought that they were just dolls. nope. there's one coming out that abagail breslin (olive in little miss sunshine) is starring in. so i'd say it's a pretty big deal.

i couldn't be prouder. way to go, kid.