Well. Art, I guess you're right. If your brother was there, he was there. I wasn't. All I know is, It's one hellofa good album. I have a signed LP. (Art-who is CK? Your brothers girlfriend? And who is LB?)

MERLIN BANJOS:
When I went to work at Merlin, I was friends with Bill Malloy, who is mentioned earlier. I also became friendly with Jay Smith the inventer. (He is mentioned earlier.) In fact, Jay taught me how to drive. The second time I went to work at Merlin, things had become deteriated and more hectic and desperate. They were making many kinds of banjos hoping to cash in on present trends. Banjo bands were kind of happening.

The problems, though, were several: First: the whole idea of the banjo was that it would be easy to mass produce. Mold them out of aluminum and snap them together. Easy! The fiberglass rims were drilled with holes to give them tone. No aged wood to deal with. Jay had invented a saw with as many blades as frets to simultaneously cut the fret grooves as you slowly crank the blades through the ebony. It was all supposed to be a piece of cake.

The molding of the aluminum was pretty much a failure. Turns out, each neck had to be hand worked and messed with, therefore requiring a lot of time with each one. Also the necks, being made of aluminum, were never to warp. All I can say is mine did. The glue that held the fingerboard to the neck, on mine, came undone. All the foam in my case turned to dust. Yuk.

The other BIG problem, as I saw it, was stockpile. Bill Malloy did a great job going around the country to music stores selling banjos and taking orders. The problem was, Merlin couldn't fill them. Pure and simple. When I went to work there the second time, the place was in a state of confusion. Leonard McCabe would spend his day going through filing cabinets sorting screws; acting as if he had not a care in the world. I got fairly frustrated and started to make a long list of procedure improvements. It was ignored. I left soon after.

A funny note: I would sometimes go into Jay's or Bill's office to "party". After a while, Jay had to set me straight. He said I could only go in after work hours because the other employees would get jealous.

More later...