This is my main workhorse and dear friend. This is Big Brother.
Big Brother is a 2012 Passport D/MMe by Breedlove, and was my first guitar as an adult. Before him, I played a red sunburst ¾ sized acoustic, with no pickup, that couldn’t stay in tune if you paid it. It was a great thing to learn on when I was 10, but I had outgrown it.
Big Brother was a timely and generous gift from an ex-girlfriend, and even more amazing, she was my ex when she bought him for me. At the time, we were in a college Christian group together. I was the backup bandleader, and wasn’t often included in the lineup. This was proper, as I owned an out-of-tune guitar and an even more out-of-tune voice at that point in my life. When the bandleader left at the end of my junior year, my ex-girlfriend pooled money between my friends, knowing that I wanted to step into the leadership position but didn’t have the tools to do so. Unbeknownst to her, she purchased the most perfect guitar I’ve ever met.
I spent every week clumsily strumming Big Brother and leading a band onstage. During the week, I’d go onto Youtube and watch other band leaders, copy their mannerisms and live arrangements, and teach those to the band. You can call it plagiarism, if you’d like, but I prefer to think of it as a little kid tracing his first dinosaur onto parchment paper. It gave me something to work from, and it allowed me to build up my chops.
This is where the story gets amazing.
Toward my final months of college, I was pulled aside by my drummer, who told me he felt compelled to give me his music recording equipment. He set me up with ProTools, a Focusrite Sapphire, Blue Spark recording mics, and stands and cables. He told me that he thought I’d get more use out of them. He was right.
In the same month, I reached out to my uncle, asking him if any of his colleagues might have a spare Mac they’d be willing to sell me for cheap. I told him the laptop would be for recording music, and within a week a 2007 MacBook (an up-to-date model at the time) arrived.
After graduating college, I took three weeks off before starting my new job in the tech world. During that time, I worked on my first EP called Conner and His Nice Friends Play Music In A Musty Room. It holds the first seven songs I ever wrote, and, for a guy who never wrote music before, they’re great. Big Brother was all over that EP, as well as on the following four.
This guitar defines my sound, and I imagine all first-ever guitars do. You write with him and you learn how to compliment one another. I completely understand that he’s an inanimate object, and yet I still cried for him the first time he broke. I’ve written over 100 songs on him, and if he were ever stolen, I’d turn into that dad from Taken, and find him.
Practically, here’s what I love about his sound:
- Volume—you can strum or pick this guitar without amplification and be heard in most indoor spaces. I play a lot of weddings where amplification isn’t allowed, so this is a crucial feature.
- Balance—I do a lot of live looping using a Boss RC-30 Loop Station, and a big part of that includes percussive sounds on the guitar. This particular guitar makes a great kick drum sound, and a great snare sound. Not all guitars have such balanced drum ability! Additionally, I’m able to lay down basslines and solo over the top without it sounding too muddy.
- Warmth—This guitar never sounds tinny. I’ve written many a lullaby on it because of how soothing I find it.
As of February 2020, Big Brother has played over 700 gigs with me in the past five years. I sincerely hope you find yourself a guitar you can love as much as I love mine, and I’m looking forward to sharing more of my story—and my gear—with you as Breedlove’s featured artist for February!
