"I first owned this guitar in the mid 1960's, I bought it from my uncle for £5. Some years later, and never progressing beyond Bobby Shaftoe in Bert Weedon's 'Play In A Day', I sold it to a friend's father, also for £5 ( I moved on to drums by the way). Many years later, the guitar having passed to my friend, I bought it back, along with the shell of a Club 40 and a Harmony Galaxy, all in need of some loving care. Steve's father had screwed a monster of a pickup directly to the front of the guitar leaving two screw holes. Local guitar builder Andy Crockett agreed to repair the holes but had to strip and refinish the front to do so. At the same time I replaced the tail piece, bridge and scratch plate, all from Music Ground. The result is a great looking, but sadly unoriginal guitar."
BARRY EXPLAINS ABOUT HIS HOFNER CLUB 40:
"I first came across this guitar in 1969/70 when a friend bought it as a shell, neck and body only, with the intention of restoring it (the same guy who's father bought my 455). The restoration never happened and I bought it from Steve in the same job lot as my 455 in the mid 1990's. The body had holes where an additional pickup had been fitted but the cut out for the control panel had never been altered to accommodate the larger plate. As I couldn't put it back to original Club 40 spec I decided to convert to club 50 spec but try to make it as playable as possible. I came across a control plate in bottom of a box of spares in Andy's Guitars in London. Replacement pickups were impossible to find so Kent Armstrong made me a pair (his son is still making these if anyone is interested). Placing the pickups on the body highlighted another problem. The neck had been removed and the angle lowered, too low for strings to pass over them. This did explain the two large brass dot markers at the 14th fret, they hid two large wood screws holding the neck on! Restoration now was beyond my talents so off I went to guitar builder Andy Crockett. He agreed to remove the neck and re-glue at the correct angle and to cut in a piece of rosewood to hide the screw holes. At the same time we decided to renew the tail piece, fit a tunomatic bridge and Gotoh tuners, all in the name of playability. He also manufactured a scratchplate. The result is, I believe, a sympathetically restored guitar with a great sound (the Kent Armstrong's knock spots off original Hofner pickups) and a surprisingly playable neck. Steve borrowed it not long after the restoration and I've not seen it since!"