Ever since I can remember music has been part of my life, I remember listening to the radio on a Sunday morning while my Mom was cooking the Sunday roast, I can even smell the beef and roast tatties as I write. My Dad would be busy in the garden or messing about in the garage with the car. My big sister Tricia was still in bed, being a teenager is hard. I was about 8 or 9 years old and wouldn’t even buy my first album or single for quite a few years but what I did have apart from the radio was Tricia’s record collection and also some of my Mom and Dads. It was in fact a Jim Reeves (Moms collection) track that my Dad had asked me to learn to play on my vintage Wonder guitar on the promise of getting me a better one, he then went on to buy me a classical Spanish guitar. I did in fact have my eye on something rather more grand thanks to a photo on the cover of a Chet Atkins Winter Wonderland album. It was a red Gretsch propped up in the snow and it would be 20 more years before I got my hands on one of those beauties, a 1962 Chet Atkins made one year after I was born. I still have it and I’ve stuck with them ever since, mainly my 1970’s White Falcon, but I’ve also got a Gretsch 1950’s Electromatic acoustic and a 2016 Gretsch Black Falcon acoustic.