How I Broke My Larrivée
I have been playing mostly acoustic guitar for the last four months. I started writing songs in the Fall and played once at the open mike at the Lizard Lounge. However, a few weeks ago the most disturbing thing happened to me while I was playing my Larrivée. The guitar broke. I heard a tremendous CRACK while I was playing and the front face of it split open. At first I thought I had broken a string, which is not not easy on an acoustic guitar.
And as soon as I realized that my fingers were not hurt, I knew. I just knew. I knew the guitar had broken in a substantial way. But it took me a moment to find it – it’s a little bigger than a hair-line crack, but the same basic thing. In addition, when I pulled the strap off the guitar I discovered that the strap-peg, which I had converted to a 1/4″ jack for the microphone, was loose. That is a really bad sign for several reasons. The first is that I recall someone at the store telling me that if I had an internal microphone installed with a jack through the strap-peg I would be at a higher risk of breaking the guitar. The second is that the strap-peg is in a structurally significant part of the guitar – directly in-line (but perpendicular) with the bridge exactly halfway up the depth of the body. If you took statics in college, you can probably imagine that this can’t be a good place to have structural damage.
I have since some to realize that I’m pretty hard on acoustic guitars. I bend the strings. I bang on the face with my hands. I rock the neck back and forth to create tremolo. I pound the strings with the side of the pick. To me, it’s all about using every aspect of the instrument to create different sounds. I don’t just pick it up and strum chords or play sweet arpeggios. And there’s nothing wrong with any of those styles, but mine is certainly rougher on the instrument than many. The next week, a friend of mine who is a musician offered to lend me his guitar and I recall saying, “No, I can’t. I can’t even afford to get this one fixed and I don’t want to break another one.”
In the next few days, I will bring the guitar into The Music Emporium. This Boston-area institution pretty much sets the standard for what an acoustic instrument shop should be. Way back in the day, they were located in Porter Square in Cambridge. I bought my first classical guitar there when I was a kid. They eventually moved just over the line into Lexington on Massachusetts Avenue. They sell, maintain and repair all manner of stringed instruments. Acoustic guitars, classical guitars, finger-style as well as some hollow-body electrics. I bought this guitar at that store back about eight years ago.
Anyway, about 12 hours after breaking it, I made this video. As you can probably tell if you watch it, I was still pretty upset about the whole thing. I just felt like I had to record what I was playing for posterity. I really do need to apologize for the audio in this clip. It’s my first YouTube, I don’t have much gear for this sort of thing and I just wanted to lay it down. This is the middle section, the solo, of a song I wrote called I Think I Am A Terrible Guy.
So why did the guitar break? It’s a combination of a number of factors. I know, ultimately, it’s probably not because of the way I play, although that can’t help much. As I have thought about it, it really comes down to these issues:
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I didn’t have a humidification device in the guitar
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My apartment cycles from hot to cold twice a day and when the heat comes on, it blows steam out like you wouldn’t believe
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I sent the guitar across the Atlantic and back in a container ship
Now, as for that last point, of course I detuned it and so forth before putting it on a cargo ship. But when I moved back from London, that ship must have gone through the Arctic circle. There was some stuff that we shipped that literally transmuted into something else. I will never forget the container of Olive Oil that we had shipped by accident. It was not Olive Oil any more. Whatever had frozen it had transformed it into some other matter.
In the end, it’s probably all my fault. But. Still. Sucks. Badly.
Comments
Comment from DaveO
Time February 11, 2009 at 1:06 pm
Yeah, Jon, I know. I know. I just wish Uncle Sam and my lawyers would let me pay for them later too.
Comment from Someone WHoknows
Time February 20, 2009 at 3:18 am
For years, Larrivee did not properly treat their top woods, and I doubt anything has changed since I worked there. In my opinion, everyone who paid for a cracked top repair from Larrivee since 1999 should form a class action lawsuit and get their repair costs back.
Comment from will fehlow
Time February 27, 2009 at 6:12 pm
wow! who knew!? that’s some mighty fine guitar abuse, more please…
Comment from Jeremy Ross
Time March 10, 2009 at 2:42 pm
The solo is killer, Dave. Maybe the solo alone broke the guitar.
Comment from David Alexander
Time March 14, 2009 at 4:15 pm
it can be troumatic to have a broken guitar im a writer myself..my larrivee iv had for 10 years was smashed over my friends face as he inturupted a group of thugs in the middle of robbing me in my house about a month ago, i think it was the closest thing in my life that iv ever lost,i wasnt even concerned for my friends face as we were lifted into the ambulance. I actually felt my eyes fill with tears of trauma for what had just happened but it was only my guitar i was thinking about nothing else was that important,it felt like my heart had just been smashed over his face,i couldnt even swallow or breath properly..im now trying to get some money together for another guitar,i really cant afford it but ill not survive much longer with out one,my guitar was the heart beat of my left hand as well as my mental stability.,NOW I AM SLOWLY GOING CRAZY…!.,!,,CRAZY GOING SLOWLY AM I..!,,!,.AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH..!..!..beautiful playing by the way . .
Pingback from Dave’s Photo Blog » Pete Huttlinger’s Workshop at The Music Emporium
Time March 29, 2009 at 10:37 pm
[...] before, so I had no idea what to expect. But I’ve been to the store many times – I bought my Larrivée there. I also had my Larrivée repaired there as well, but I haven’t had time to tell that [...]
Comment from Raven5387
Time September 3, 2009 at 10:39 am
My LV 09 12RE cracked in almost the exact same place in January of 09! Unbelievable… I reported it to the dealer who sold me the guitar in September 08… told me it was new… turns out, it was manufactured in January of 04… it took me until the end of March to get a Return Authorization (RA#) number from Larrivee for an “Assessment”… I spent $65 to ship it to Larrivee where it sat for a month and a half with no word… apparantly Larrivee can’t afford a customer service telephone line, so I emailed them repeatedly with no response… I let the dealer know and he put me in touch with the national distributer, who must have finally got through… 2 months later, Larrivee denied warranty coverage blaming dehydration (when in doubt claim dehydration)… funny thing, my humidity gauge showed 55%, and none of my other guitars showed any signs of dehydration… however, they said they would fix the crack for $200… well, I figured who better to fix the crack than PaPa Larrivee, right?… wrong!!!… 4 months after I sent it off, and after all the aggravation of countless emails with no answer, I got it back… it now has more problems than when I sent it… the repair sticks out like a sore thumb… they attempted to refinish a 2 inch strip which is now “darker” than the rest of the top, and it has a bunch of surface dimples in the new finish… it looks like they removed the bridge and then crammed it back in, causing finish cracks around the bridge and deforming the top by the ends of the bridge… there is a nice big glop of glue dried to the inside back… the AST pickup doesn’t work now… only hums really loud… must have had the janitor attempt the repair… any way, Matthew Larrivee finally got back to me and graciously offered to remove the dried glue… all I have to do is ship it back to them… right… I found “Someone WHoknows” posting very interesting… I would love to hear more… I for one am disgusted and ready for action… a class action…
Comment from Jon Malone
Time February 11, 2009 at 9:39 am
I am sure you have checked the Larrivee website but this is the link. It is repairable but the most common factor in exacerbating the damage is owner delay, so get it into the re-hydration chamber and pay for it later. Also don’t touch the crack with your bare fingers.
Jon