Norman, with his Reeve Headless Bass and Desmond Decker.

Another contact, Norman, with a great story about his Reeve Bass and two Reeve Guitars.

The story in his own words. 😎

In 1984, lived in Tooting London and wanted a new bass guitar.  I have no idea how it all came about but a mate of mine from Clapham and another from Putney decided we were going to have guitars made from scratch.  Two guitars with loads of switches and beautiful woodwork and a black headless bass.  We set off to Luton to a lovely cottage and was greeted by a very lovely woman named Val.  So warm, so friendly an accommodating.  From memory, Ges was quiet but absolutely loved what he doing.  Mick was very energetic and full of loads of wonderful ideas.  After our first meet, they packed us off to go away and come back with our designs.  I drew the body shape of my bass on the back of wallpaper.

I think we were all back within a week with our various shapes, sizes, colours and pickup positions and active controls which I think was still relatively new back then.  There would be mad discussions mainly directed by Mick while Val filled us up with tea and biscuits.  Ges and Mick were so excited about making these three guitars, almost even more than we were.  Two of us were touring with Desmond Dekker at the time.  One of my mates used his guitar in a band called Screaming Target, who later became Big Audio Dynamite, who later became Dreadzone.  I remember him selling his guitar to a music shop to buy a Gibson or something.  They were absolutely raving about it, and couldn’t get it out his hands fast enough.  I think he later regretted it.

We made a few trips the check on the progress and watch our babies grow and grow into full maturity.  All three were a work of art.  I can’t remember how much I paid but I could not believe how inexpensive it was for the time effort and care they put in.  Unbelievable.

I still have my bass, it stands in the corner of my living room, so I’m actually looking at it every day.  I  It’s very similar to your black headless bass except the back of the top edge runs longer than the bottom creating a kind of shark appearance without a top fin.

Happy days J

 There is another image with Norman and Desmond Decker, playing a Peavey T-40, which he also loved. 

"I know what you mean, Norman" 😉

Cheers. 😎

Violin Bass and Double Neck Bass. More from Reeve Guitars.

 Reeve fans or just fans of unusual custom guitars and basses. . .  Hi. 😎

These images were sent to me by another Reeve owner who I lost touch with for a while (my fault) but I was in touch again, a few weeks ago.

A fretted and fretless bass, with a signature Reeve look about it and a very nice looking Violin Bass. 

More quality work from Ges and Mick.

The more I come across, the more I marvel at the output and quality that came out if a brick garage, at the side of the house. Amazing!!

Cheers. 😉

100 Best Guitar Blogs and Websites in 2025

 Hi to all out there 😀

After all these years - fame, at last. LOL. 😁

It seems I am listed under number 50, in The Best 100 Guitar Blogs and Websites 2025. WOW!

100 Best Guitar Blogs and Websites in 2025

Well worth a look, there are some great Blogs and Websites that I have never come across before.

Back with more images of Reeve instruments.

Cheers. 😊😊

Geddy Lee Twin Neck Tribute, Reeve Guitars and the original owner.

 Mr Lee is a 4 and 6 twin neck and has been featured on here several times.

Mr Lee also inspired me to do research on Reeve Guitars and I went on to post several articles about Reeve and the instruments they made.

I have been lucky enough to be contacted by the original owner, who being a big Rush and Geddy Lee fan, commissioned his tribute twin neck.

Over several emails, he sent me this image. 

As he explains below, this is Mr Lee, on stage, many years ago - I just love the four necks being played at the same time - as my mate often says. . . . Progtastic!

 Here’s something from ancient history… a student band competition from 1986, both twins were mine at the time. We had a 20 minute slot and as a reaction to all the other bands playing six three minute pop ditties we performed one 20 minute epic. We didn’t win 😊

I’m still a huge Rush fan of course, I was at the last ever show in LA and was lucky enough to chat to Geddy at his (fairly) recent book signing events. After enduring no end of nagging from various friends who had heard some of my stories, I’ve even written a book about my various travels over the years to see them (andyfaulkner.net if you’re curious enough to take a look).

 

On the last tour Geddy pulled out a couple of Rickenbacker double necks for the first time in decades, and that triggered something in me again, finding your blog again was the final piece slotting into place.

Some more info you might find interesting, the 6/12 doubleneck also came from Reeve. It’s a Japanese something or other (I’ve either forgotten or never knew what!) and was being restored at the same time that Mr Lee was being made. I watched them both coming together and ended up falling for this one too so when the time came to collect Mr Lee I brought them both home. Eventually I sold it to the guitarist in my first proper gigging band (Walking on Ice) but again, this was forever ago, and he passed it on at some point (and now can’t remember what happened to it at all!).

 

You might be interested in this,

https://www.facebook.com/andy.faulkner.3114/posts/pfbid0vn77BCGLpwhzxHNLdARdRpUipJruxVZPCS9LA2Pbhb1Pm2mZZdyMYRoL7WxwaZi1l

Something I posted a few years ago on facebook when I was going through my basses

 

Another of those strange coincidences happened some years ago too. Do you remember me saying that the only other Reeve guitars I had seen belonged to the guys from Twelfth Night? I think you posted a photo of Clive Mitten with his doubleneck at some point. I was a huge Twelfth Night fan in the 80s (still am to be honest), I saw them dozens of times at the Marquee and all around the country. Well, in late 2011 I was introduced to Andy Sears, the Twelfth Night singer, by a mutual friend (Clive Nolan of Pendragon & Arena). Andy was looking for a bass player for a solo album he was working on and Clive kindly recommended me. The album never materialised in the end, but a week or two after we met (and based solely on Clive’s recommendation) Andy contacted me again saying Twelfth Night had been asked to play a festival in America and Clive Mitten was unable to do it, would I be interested?  I didn’t take too long to think about it! So I ended up doing a couple of shows with TN, including a fabulous prog festival in Pennsylvania – no doublenecks involved but it was one of the greatest weekends of my life.

 

https://www.facebook.com/andy.faulkner.3114/posts/pfbid0hESyHChg8tgP1dYMgP6K3V7VaGd4xHXbbqwkmn5ZNW9oJQh4Px3SU1CnSk9CShyyl

 

https://twelfthnight.info/?people=andy-faulkner

 

I’ve since spoken to Clive Mitten about the Reeves, the guitarist Andy Revell still has the explorer (although I believe he’s since passed it on to another mutual friend and it’s been stripped and refinished) but Clive’s doubleneck disappeared somewhere along the years. A real shame as I would have been very tempted to put an offer in for it if he had still owned it!

I’ve rambled on a bit here, but I get the feeling you like some of the background info 😊. Feel free to use whatever you want on the blog, including any of the links and maybe you could mention the book (https://andyfaulkner.net) as it’s kind of Geddy related.

Happy New Year. All the best for 2025.

 Happy New Year to all you Guitar and Bass enthusiasts.

2025 already, how time flies.

Over the festive break I have freed some old friends from their cases and gig bags.

It was more of a reacquaintance with some I haven't seen for a while and some that I haven't seen for some time. Ibanez Musician and SB70, along with RB650 and a later Blazer bass, in festive red. Aria SB 900 and SB404, which is one of the later built basses that I think boxes above it's weight. Gordy headless, so light and comfortable and finally a Peavey Foundation, a gold one, first generation "Line around head". I have three of these, the gold one, a fretless in sunburst and the white one, which is the the one I call Roger, after Roger Glover. Playing the gold one for 10 minutes reminded me of how good these basses are. Slim, fast neck and Super Ferrite pick-ups. Roger, who was known for various mods on basses, left his as stock - as it came from out of the box. Surely a big thumbs up for the early Foundation. 

Peavey Foundation Bass

White and Sunburst

It seems that a lot of you have had a relax over the holiday and been searching for guitars and basses on line, as views/reads increased a lot, just over yesterday.

So, if you were one of them, Welcome Aboard.

All the best for 2025.

Cheers. 😎