Jun Kung - one of the rawest and most talented musicians in the industry. Working with Jun is always a pleasure. Not only is he constantly chasing tone in a practical world, he also brings great ideas to the discussion table, which bear amazing fruit.
Custom Soundhole Cover
A few weeks before Jun's "Alive On Stage" live show, he came to us with a problem. His beloved Martin OM, which he plans to use on stage, recently had a tuner installed along the soundhole, but he wanted a soundhole cover that would be able to accommodate it, to help with feedback problems on stage. After a long discussion, we decided on making a custom soundhole cover using some nice rosewood to give it a unique look. The holding base of the cover was made of plywood to give it stability and strength. The cover was then inlaid with cocobolo and maple strips for a simple yet elegant aesthetic, all in good time for the show.
Fender ’76-’77 Fretless P-Bass
Jun picked up this bass during an overseas trip. When he brought it in, it had quite a few problems with it. The radius of the fretboard had been modified, and the electronics were barely working. The neck also had this severe bow that couldn't be worked out with the adjustable truss rod. So we sanded the fretboard to the correct radius, while sanding to correct the bow on the fretboard playing surface. After replacing all the electronics and doing a setup, the bass was playing and sounding better than ever
Gibson Custom Shop ES-339
Jun got this 339 on another overseas trip. He was so excited about it that the first thing he did when he got back into town from his trip late at night, was to call Gavin up to see if he was still at the shop. Next thing we knew, Jun was knocking on our door asking us to do a quick setup on his new guitar so he could bring it home and have it play the way he likes it.
Fender Eric Clapton "Blackie" Strat
This Strat has been one of Jun's go-to guitars in the studio for recordings for a long time. Despite having played it for years, he wanted to have the neck slightly reshaped and wanted a raw feeling to the neck. We focused most of the reshaping in the areas of the neck that Jun plays the most. After all the sanding was done, we dyed the exposed maple with a dark brown stain and finished it with a few light coats of oil to really give it that fast, raw feel. After all the work on the neck was done, we also replaced the exisiting pickups for a set of Lindy Fralins while still keeping the original mid-boost circuit and TBX control.
Custom Overdrive Pedal
This pedal was not originally made for Jun. It was a prototype of a Bluesbreaker-style pedal that we were still working on. One day Jun stopped by the shop, saw it lying around and asked to try it. He instantly fell in love with it as it worked perfectly for his 'clean but dirty' tones. We lent the pedal to him to use on his album recording and to give us feedback. As time went on, we completely forgot about the pedal as we had already proceeded with the next prototypes, until we were at Jun's "Alive On Stage" show and noticed it being one of a very few pedals in front of him on stage!