I build guitars. I like to think they're like kids. Spend a long time thinking about them, leap into action making them, and groom them into something fairly presentable, then send them off into the world to make noise or music mayhem.

I borrow, steal, and in general try to innovate enough to feel that what I make is morphed into something that's got my own signature look. I ripped a lot from Leo Fender's tool kit. I toss in a bit of Danelectro, a few things from the Martin and Gibson acoustic approach (minus the factory mentality), and try to induce my own curious mojo.

I don't try to make perfect guitars, not as perfection is normally defined. They bore me. A skilled and patient craftsman who is a complete artistic idiot can still make a reasonable clone of somebody else's guitar. Without the inflection of art and energy and a one of a kind approach, all you've done is made the equivalent of another McDonald's cheeseburger... I don't think the world needs another StratoLesPaulReedSmith clone, even if it is "boutique custom".

I don't like the tyranny of flamed wood either. I use it where it feels like it's part of a bigger aspect -- but too often wood figure is used as a substitute for doing the work of making the whole guitar something more interesting. I'm so tired of things like burl top Les Paul clones, or any kind of flame maple stained blue or red.

I make them lightweight, whenever I can. I think tone comes from your fingers, and the way the pickups interact with the resonance of the wood; and I feel that solid, heavy guitars lack a lively flutter. Besides, your shoulders and neck have to fight more... Living at the bottom of a big ol' gravity well is hard enough already.

I wind and build my own preamps and pickups. One of my favorite patterns is to combine an undersaddle piezo pickup with electric guitar pickups, so that I can get a lap steel and acoustic guitar with an extra value meal kind of crunch.

It may be a limiting viewpoint to have, but if one of my guitars isn't something that makes me want to bash on it all night long, if it doesn't have a vibe or feel or something about it that sneaks in under the radar and lights up my desire to play, I usually salvage the hardware parts and have a nice little campfire with the body. (OK, guitars aren't entirely like kids...)

To me, perfection isn't about a glossy finish, or what kind of name brand pickups you have,or how you can make it look just like a Gibson or Fender. It's not about duplicating the precision of a computer controlled factory made instrument.

Perfection is about inspiration, sweat, cussing and designing on the fly, and cranking out funky guitars that, either in a loud and snorky or quiet and near nirvana like way, make you want to beat on, wear out, and in general play till your fingers bleed because it's so damn good to have a great tool for connecting with the cosmic throb.

If I can make these things in a way that inspires that, I will truly be working happily until I'm dead. Since I have to be somewhere until then, I can't think of a better thing to be doing.