Name: Jeroen Sevink (aka Jerry Knives from the Jerry Knives Band)
Hometown: The Netherlands
Guitar: Custom-modded Japanese Jackson Explorer
Jeroen Sevink has been experimenting with guitars his whole life, and he even builds his own pedals. “I call this sweet guitar Industrial Steampunk-style," he says. “It still has its standard neck, which I think is amazing, so I left it as-is. But that's about all that is standard."
All of the electronics were seriously replaced with the help of an electrician friend. "The front pup is now a Sustainiac," says Sevink. "It's very, very sensitive to interference—a sheer drama to build into your guitar. It's like having a built-in EBow—fantastic!" Though the trimmings look unusual, Sevink swears they don't affect playability: "It's balanced, easy to play, and it sounds beautiful on everything from shoegaze to metal."
Sevink developed severe sleep apnea a few years ago and felt too run-down to play music "I had to stop with just about all my bands," he recalls. "I felt I might as well be dead if I couldn't make music anymore." For a while Sevink tried sleeping with a continuous-air-pressure machine. "After trying a million different masks, I gave up," he says. "I decided I'd rather live with the illusion that I was sleeping well then be kept awake by this Borg-like contraption meant to make me sleep better."
But that's why this guitar has so much emotional value for Sevink. "To make a long story short," he says, "in building this guitar, I've used various parts of the sleep apnea equipment I gathered over the years. This guitar represents saying goodbye to a lesser period in my life, and reminds me how I retook the wheel to rearrange my life so I could return to doing what I love most: making music."
Send your guitar story to submissions@premierguitar.com.
[Updated 9/22/21]
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Reader: Cary Cummings
Hometown: Seattle, WA
Guitar: Labrocaster
Cary Cummings’ dog-obsessed axes have appeared in this column in the past? Do any of our readers have a cat-o-caster? If so, please share.
I started with an older Warmoth Strat-style alder body from an old project and added a Warmoth vintage-style, 1-piece maple neck with 6100 frets, a 43 mm nut slot, and a Fatback profile. It wasn’t quite right. I sanded the profile down to a comfortable 0.96" at the first fret and finished it off with a wipe-on polyurethane finish and affixed my signature Labrador graphic to the headstock. The Labrador on the headstock is an homage to my three Labrador retrievers and to my previous three who have crossed the Rainbow Bridge. And if ever there was a breed of dog that is a happy clown, it is a Labrador retriever. Just looking at them makes me smile.
A set of Guyker Dopamine vintage locking tuners in blue and rose started me down the yellow-brick road. My entourage included a blue anodized aluminum pickguard and backplate, a red metal switch tip, and purple stainless steel saddles for the Fender American Special bridge and jack plate. Pretty.
Cary’s love for his herd of Labs inspired him to create a signature logo for the headstock.
Let’s get down to the nitty-gritty. It’s wired up with 22 AWG pushback cloth wire, 3XCTS 250K pots, an Oak Grigsby switch, a Switchcraft jack, and a 0.015 ceramic disk capacitor. The capacitor takes the treble off but not so much midrange that comes standard in so many guitars. The bridge pickup is a Seymour Duncan Red Devil, the middle is a Duncan Hot Stack, and the neck is a Duncan Parallel Axis Stack—all noiseless.
The final touch is the D’Addario elliptical-shaped strap buttons. Now, when I rock out in my living room, sending the guitar flying over my shoulder and around my back, nothing gets damaged!
Cary Cummings and one of his Labrador retrievers.
