The moment you decided to play the guitar

[Wizard of Wailing]

      This topic doesn't apply to me, but I'm sure some people out there had an epiphany where they decided, "I want to play the guitar."  I thought of this because I took the day of work and was jamming out in my garage to Zeppelin's "Since I've Been Loving You" (amongst many other tunes) all this afternoon.  There's a brief shot in the movie "The Song Remains the Same" where, at the conclusion of Slim Jim Page's solo for that song, they show an NYC cop looking on in amazement at the stage.  I've always believed that cop went out and bought a guitar that very night.
      I just started playing the guitar because I loved The Beatles and Zeppelin, and I was a skinny, nonathletic dude with no discernable talent.  There was no one singular moment.  So I was wondering if anyone out there had such a moment?
    By the way, skip about 5:00 if you want to see the NYC cop amazed by Jimmy Page.

[youtube]_ZiN_NqT-Us[/youtube]

 

[anorakDan]

It was the day I saw a vision hanging in the window of a small music store in a local mall near my hometown. A Lyle, single gold-foil neck pickup, solid body. Shaped like an SG, it was transparent red with black burst edges.

Yeah, I fell in love.

Very soon thereafter I got my first "job." My best friend's mom came from the family that ran a pretty large landscaping business and they landed the contract for a brand new local, big-time mall. They needed kids to weed the berms between the parking lots for a summer.

I took my first paycheck ($40) and bought that Lyle. Sure, it was really a POS, but it was mine! Even took her home in the cardboard shipping carton. After a friend showed me how to tune it and even diagrammed a few open chords, I played my finger-callouses thick that first year.

First riffs? Smoke On The Water and Chicago's Twenty-Five or Six Two Four.

Eventually I needed a "real guitar" for my band and I scored a lovely SG Jr.

The Junior is, sadly, long out of my grasp.

But I still got that Lyle.

 

[Verne Bunsen]

Good story, Dan!

 

[musicispeace]

As a second time around player who never thought he would take it up again what got me was the combination of having a period in life with some rare additional time on my hands and randomly discovering Jesus Just Left Chicago by ZZ Top. It was like being hit by lightning.

 

[Timmsie95]

Through the muscle of science, they managed to capture the exact moment that i decided i would play guitar.
(See attached photo)

But seriously, my uncle was a big 80's metal and classic rock guitarist, and i was always around him, and my dad always has an acoustic laying around the house, so I've been playing around on a guitar since i could walk. I got a plastic one that had real strings (and a built in synth) when i was 2, and my dad had a junior acoustic that i would play on, but i got my first real one when i was 6, it was a Peavey Raptor Plus. I've loved it ever since!

 

[MikeW]

... (See attached photo) ...

:laughing11:
Classic!

My Dad had an old acoustic laying around the house from back when he was in the Navy. He'd take that along in the planes (he navigated C-130s during Vietnam) to have something to do during his downtime between flights. I started playing around with it. Later, he taught me to tune it. After I heard Eruption and Highway to Hell I was hooked. Got my first electric, a Squier Bullet, that Christmas along with a Gorilla amp. I've been playing ever since.

 

[DocNrock]

Great stories, so far.

I was a senior in high school, washing my mini truck on a weekend.  I had the radio on to keep me entertained during this menial task.  This was in 1982.

Iron Maiden's "The Trooper" came on the radio.  I had never heard it before.  I stopped washing and listened intently with my jaw dropping as the solo came on. 

At that moment, I wanted to pick up the guitar.

 

[TBurst Std]

I was already playing instruments, but 1977 was the year for me.  1st was watching Jackson Browne on Austin City Limits.  Yep I want to play piano and sing. But I had already worked at both and was not that good. 

While I was already a Skynyrd fan,  10/18/77 did it for me.  And I took up guitar. It was their 2nd to last show before the crash it turned out.