OMG! I just won Billy Sheehan's POD!

[line6man]

Well guys, you all know how big a Sheehan fan I am, and also how big of a Line6 gear fan I am. (Those of you that are not, please, let's not argue about it in this thread.)
Hachikid IM'd me this morning with the bizarre news that Billy Sheehan is no longer with Ampeg and is selling some gear.

I saw this POD on eBay and just had to have it. I ended up in a bid war and spent way more than I wanted it, especially considering that I really don't even have this kind of money lying around in the budget for squandering on stuff, but I just had to do it. :icon_biggrin:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=180531937967

The seller is going to have Billy autograph it for me and sign a certificate of authenticity. :icon_biggrin: :icon_biggrin:

I'm just hoping that this is real!
I figured that it should be legitimate considering the seller's reputation, and the fact that he is selling other gear with Billy's name stenciled on it.

What do you guys think?

 

[imminentG]

AWESOME
real excited for you, I've always pined after Danny Gatton's gear (seen a lot of it for sale) and this is a real special moment

congrats :guitaristgif:

 

[JaySwear]

thats really cool! are you close enough for local pickup? i seriously doubt he'd be the one to hand it to you, but if you're close it seems like it would be worth the drive to grab it :icon_biggrin: you don't want them damaging something so cool in shipping, and i thought you had said you were in the LA area. could be making that up though.

 

[AutoBat]

cool

i was expecting something closer to:

 

[Cagey]

Good for you! I'm sure his ownership will have enhanced the sound of the thing tremendously <grin>

 

[line6man]

thats really cool! are you close enough for local pickup? i seriously doubt he'd be the one to hand it to you, but if you're close it seems like it would be worth the drive to grab it :icon_biggrin: you don't want them damaging something so cool in shipping, and i thought you had said you were in the LA area. could be making that up though.

I thought about that, but North Hollywood is like an hour and a half drive each way from where I live, so I would rather just pay the $7.65 to ship it.

That would be totally awesome if I could arrange to be there when he signs it, but that's probably a ridiculous scenario to envision.

 

[line6man]

Good for you! I'm sure his ownership will have enhanced the sound of the thing tremendously <grin>

I probably won't ever use it, I have a POD Pro in the rack, and a few pods that I don't use. :doh:
I just wanted it for the coolness factor. :blob7:

Billy owned it, which is different from just putting a random item in front of him that he's never seen before and having him scribble a pen on it. I don't care for autographs like that, they aren't meaningful.

I'm hoping that perhaps he might have used it a couple of times. Imagine that!
I'm guessing he probably never used it though. :sad:

 

[Cagey]

I've sometimes thought that owning something that Joe Satriani or Eric Johnson used would be cool, but I've never been much of a collector. If I'm not using something, it generally goes on the auction block or I give it away or something before it becomes too much of a collector of its own - of dust or storage space. Although, I do have some things I haven't used in a while that I'm not getting rid of. It was just pointed out to me the other day that my Taylor acoustic is just rotting in its case so I ought to dump it, but that ain't happening.

 

[line6man]

I just got an email from Billy Sheehan!

Hi Joseph,
Yes--that was my original Pod. It's first generation w/ a replacement chip (it was an upgrade to that unit). I used it on a zillion recordings. If I can, I'll take a photo--but I'm in the middle of tons of writing/recording. It would be tough to coordinate. Would a letter of authenticity suffice? Let me know. Either way--its a great device that served me well for many years. If you get it, I hope it does the same for you.
Very kind of you to say that about my playing--thanks Joseph! Jaco was very special for me as well.
  Take care!
  Yours,
  Billy Sheehan

:icon_biggrin: :icon_biggrin: :icon_biggrin:

 

[DangerousR6]

I just got an email from Billy Sheehan!

Hi Joseph,
Yes--that was my original Pod. It's first generation w/ a replacement chip (it was an upgrade to that unit). I used it on a zillion recordings. If I can, I'll take a photo--but I'm in the middle of tons of writing/recording. It would be tough to coordinate. Would a letter of authenticity suffice? Let me know. Either way--its a great device that served me well for many years. If you get it, I hope it does the same for you.
Very kind of you to say that about my playing--thanks Joseph! Jaco was very special for me as well.
  Take care!
  Yours,
   Billy Sheehan

:icon_biggrin: :icon_biggrin: :icon_biggrin:

That's pretty awesome....Nice find..... :icon_thumright:

 

[JaySwear]

thats so ridiculously cool! i'm really jealous.

 

[Cagey]

That was good of him to do. Did you get a usable return address off the email header? Might want to file that somewhere if you did. As I'm sure you know, it's generally not what you know but who you know when it comes to getting anywhere.

 

[line6man]

That was good of him to do. Did you get a usable return address off the email header? Might want to file that somewhere if you did. As I'm sure you know, it's generally not what you know but who you know when it comes to getting anywhere.

Billy's email address is given publicly on his website. It was also given to me by the seller when I asked him how I would know the POD was really Billy's before I started bidding.

 

[whitebison66]

I don't think you overpaid for the POD. You wanted it, and you got it. As you said, you can't put a price on something you want for personal reasons.

I've met Billy a couple times, and he is a sincerely nice guy who appreciates his fans.

I've had Paul Gilbert answer emails, so it helps me remember that they're people too.

Congrats on the score!

 

[jalane]

Wow man, congrats.  That must be really special for you if you're such a big fan. It'd be cool if he left a bunch of his presets stored on there.

 

[m4rk0]

that is fantastic!! congrats!

 

[line6man]

I don't think you overpaid for the POD. You wanted it, and you got it. As you said, you can't put a price on something you want for personal reasons.

I've met Billy a couple times, and he is a sincerely nice guy who appreciates his fans.

I've had Paul Gilbert answer emails, so it helps me remember that they're people too.

Congrats on the score!

Yep, I definitely overpaid for the POD, but it's his ownership, autograph, and now apparently his usage on many recordings that make it special.
It's an original POD, not a 2.0, so it isn't worth very much. Maybe $50 to $75. Billy did say the firmware chip was upgraded, so actually, it's probably a 2.0, and may be worth a tad more, but not much.

It was at around $50 when I first saw it on eBay, and I spent a few hours obsessing over whether or not to drop a $100 bid. I wasn't sure if it was authentic, whether I really wanted it, etc.
I bid $90, and the bid rose to $81. I got a bid paranoid and raised my bid to $105, which was really about as much as I was willing to pay.

I was outbid during the last 45 seconds, and I had time to raise my bid a bunch times before it closed. I really wouldn't have otherwise spent the money, but I have this insane rage about people that try to beat in in bid wars and snipe me at the last second, so I had to raise the bid as high as it needed to go. I kept entering a bid and being outbid and trying again, until at the very end, I saw the green check mark or whatever that meant I'm the high bidder and then a flood of emails hit my inbox, one of which informing me in the subject line  that I have won the item!

Totally awesome, because I NEVER win ebay auctions that people get into bid wars over.
I refuse to use a sniper program, because I hate people that use them, and will not sink to that level myself.

 

[AprioriMark]

I see that my ebay scam pretending to be Billy Sheehan is working.

-Mark

 

[Cagey]

I was outbid during the last 45 seconds, and I had time to raise my bid a bunch times before it closed. I really wouldn't have otherwise spent the money, but I have this insane rage about people that try to beat in in bid wars and snipe me at the last second, so I had to raise the bid as high as it needed to go. I kept entering a bid and being outbid and trying again, until at the very end, I saw the green check mark or whatever that meant I'm the high bidder and then a flood of emails hit my inbox, one of which informing me in the subject line  that I have won the item!

I know what you mean, and I've overspent my artificially-induced budget on a couple items that way. I've since learned to ask myself early on "what is the absolute most you are willing to spend on this?" then make the bid and stick to it. It might mean bidding higher than I hope I'm going to have to pay, but at least I'll either get it, or it'll go for more than I was willing to pay for it. If I lose, no big deal. I look at it as if somebody walked up to me on the street and offered it for sale at that price, would I have bought it? No? Then you didn't really lose. You won the ability to fight again.

I mean, if somebody walked up with a Fender Twin Reverb and set it down where you could look at it, and said "I might be willing to take $200 for this amp." You get all excited, and start thinking of the amp as yours. Of course you'd give him that! Then the price goes up to $300, and you say, "well, that's still an excellent price, so I'll pay it" and the amp is still yours. By the time it gets to the price it's supposed to be, you're defending it as if you already own it. No price is too high. "GET AWAY! IT'S MINE, GOD DAMMIT!" and you end up paying $1,500 for an amp you could get anywhere for $800 <grin>

 

[line6man]

"GET AWAY! IT'S MINE, GOD DAMMIT!"

Precisely.
When I want something on ebay, I damn well better win it! It's mine and I am entitled to own it, because I want it most and I bid on it! All you other people stay the hell away from what is mine!
LOL!

I think I sort of thought that this is a one time chance to get Billy's gear, so I better bid now and ask questions later. (That of course in addition to the fact that when someone tries to steal my high bid from me, I can't let them win! :blob7
If it was any other item, like say if I was in the market to buy a POD just to have a POD, I wouldn't have gone into a bid war. There will always be another deal somewhere, and it's not worth it.  But with this one, there will probably never be another chance to get one, so I better do it.