does anyone else not touch their guitar when playing it?

[coloradoman]

As the question asks - does anyone else not touch their guitar when playing it? Let me explain.

I suspend my guitar in the air while playing. I got an old air hockey table - significantly increased the air pressure (XR7 pumps from between 1933-7 are the best). Put in special microcontrollers so I can individually adjust each airflow from each hole. By making fine adjustments I am able to "float" the guitar in the air.

The guitar is then suspended in the air column so I don't have to touch it at all. I have a set of titanium tuning forks - one for each note on the guitar. These are VERY powerful tuning forks. I strike a fork and put it near the note I want (BUT never touch the guitar or strings which might mar the guitar or accidentally misalign some of the wood fibers thereby robbing the guitar of vital TONE). The fork causes a sympathetic vibration and the note plays. Because nothing is touching the guitar I am able to get PURE TONE! Nothing robs the TONE!

Oh I almost forgot about the air. I buy canisters of compressed air harvested in the Himalayas. The air above 20,000 feet is completely pure. I've found that "ordinary" air has small impurities that can subtly knock the TONE out of alignment. Besides why would want to use "ordinary" air on a $8,000 dollar guitar?

Obviously, you can't breathe while playing because the air in your breathing mixes with the TONE causing the TONE to get knocked around and distorted (this is simple physics people!). Yes, it is subtle but very noticeable to those of us with well trained ears - really night and day.

My baby seal skin gloves are super soft and comfy and the only thing I would ever consider using to touch the tuning forks with. And while I like the titanium tuning forks they can be a bit metallic sounding. I'm thinking of swapping them out for elephant ivory with tortoise shell handles to get a sweeter TONE.

I have only two problems, you guys can maybe help me with.

First, I have to phyiscally touch the guitar to get it out of its case and place it in the air column. This is really unacceptable but I don't know how to get around it. I shudder to think about how much damage I have caused the guitar by touching it.

Second, When you are in the room playing, obviously some of the TONE goes in your ears and gets captured there - robbing the TONE of some TONE. I'm thinking if there were only a way to play it remotely so that no one (including myself) could hear it (and thereby steal TONE). Maybe a robot?

BTW That is why I NEVER listen to other guitars. The TONE tends to pile up in your ears blocking access to tone receptors. So you only hear a percentage of the TRUE TONE because it has to make its way through all the built up TONE stuck in your ears.

And that is why I can't recommend highly enough TONE-Tips. TONE-Tips are specially designed Q-Tips that have special acoustic absorption properties. As the ad says, "Swab out all that nasty acoustic buildup with TONE-Tips!".

Thanks for all the help in advance!

One last thing. I'd like to start doing some coffeeshop gigs. Obviously, I can't bring the guitar. (What is up with people who abuse their guitars by taking them places?) I was thinking that I could just describe to people how great it sounds?

But by descring how it sounds could I be subtly robbing some of the TONE? I know some of you will dismiss this but I've heard changes in the TONE caused by my THINKING about my guitar. Oh I know you have your "science" but I hear what I hear.

I've actually found this to be a useful tool in my toolset. If a song is sounding too happy - I will think sad thoughts thereby diminishing the overly happy TONE. One note of warning - I became sucidal once when I thought sad thoughts while playing a sad song. Be forewarned!

Thanks again.

[HHP]

Yet again, comedy proves to be much harder than it looks.

[ukejon]

I don't touch the guitar either but do touch the pickguard to add scratches.....can't help myself.

[DesolationAngel]

Hilarious...

[GHS]

See what happens when weed gets legal in a state?

[Pheof]

I never play my guitars. I only look at them from across the room. It's just the best way to keep them pure and unadulterated.

[mc1]

[robj144]

I don't touch it while playing it.

[coloradoman]

Originally Posted by HHP

Yet again, comedy proves to be much harder than it looks.

Wow, tough crowd. Of course, I have to compete against actual threads.

[pjroberts]

Colorado Man! Thanks for the laughs, that was perfect forum banter ... If there was an SNL for guitar players, this would be the sketch to end all sketches.

Now, I await the poor soul who misses the humor and asks where he can buy this contraption, or better yet, contests your use of sacred Himalayan air.

[d2jp]

..brings a whole to meaning to "Colorado Rocky Mountain High" that's for sure

But...what about the lack of humidity in the air from the Himalaya's? That has to keep you up worried at night.....

[Malty]

So, one could theorize that tone build up in the ear would change at a rate directly proportional to ear wax build up, correct?

Ergo, TONE-Tips used by heavy metal guitarists overdriving their Marshall stacks to the point of destruction necessarily would be larger, or used in greater numbers, than those used by acoustic guitarists.

[Guitarfish]

Originally Posted by HHP

Yet again, comedy proves to be much harder than it looks.

Actually I laughed out loud at your post. Timing is everything.

[cke]

Originally Posted by Pheof

I never play my guitars. I only look at them from across the room. It's just the best way to keep them pure and unadulterated.

Yes. At first I thought the OP had found the perfect way to fulfill the ideals of the AGF, but Pheof 'sees' the true perfect AGF ideal of the guitar qua guitar as visual art - untouched unblemished unsmudged. The Himilayan air could indeed impart ideal tone, but then vibration of any sort may lead to catastrophic "breaking in"

How about encased in a hemitically sealed vacuum chamber in sundued light?!

Ah, the ecstasy of guitar nirvana!!

[stringjunky]

Originally Posted by Guitarfish

Actually I laughed out loud at your post. Timing is everything.

Yes I laughed too just seeing the title; knowing what it referred too. A nice antidote to an increasingly mardy conversation.