1980 Lane Moller Custom Double Neck 6 and 12 string Natural

No sales tax for customers outside California.

This incredible Lane Moller doubleneck was owned by Joseph Anthony Spry of Felony, the American new wave and rock band formed in Los Angeles, California, in the early 1970s.

During the developmental stage of Felony, Jeffrey Spry (Joseph's brother) left the band briefly to be the singer with Detroit Proto-Punk/Hard rock legends, Ron Asheton (of Iggy & The Stooges) and Dennis "Machine Gun" Thompson (of The MC5) in a short lived super-group (based in Los Angeles) that was called "The New Order" (preceding the English new wave group of the same name). He quickly returned to Felony and continued working with his brother Joe and the other members of the band.

Felony went into the studio and emerged with single "The Fanatic," which became a hit on Los Angeles radio station KROQ-FM with help from program director Rick Carroll. The song peaked at No. 42 on the Billboard Hot 100 in early 1983. It became a key track in the development of the Modern Rock radio format. "The Fanatic" was included in the influential 1983 Valley Girl soundtrack, which also featured Modern English's "I Melt With You".

Felony also performed the track on American Bandstand. A video was made from "The Fanatic" "The Fanatic" video was shot in Hollywood, California, in 1983 and aired on MTV. The Fanatic video includes a cameo of Jeffrey Spry with his first wife, SAG actress, Lucrecia Sarita Russo. 

The band, which now included Jeffrey on lead vocals, Joe on guitar, Danny Sands on piano/keyboards, Louis Ruiz on bass and Arty Blea on drums, recorded their first full-length album, also called The Fanatic, which was released in 1983 on Scotti Brothers Records with distribution by CBS Records. It included the single and nine other tracks that helped define the trendy-but-never-huge power-pop new wave sound of the early 1980s.

The guitar was built by the very talented, however notorious, Lane Moller.  He worked right here where we operate, in Chico, CA.  His main claim to fame was the unique acoustic guitar he built for Lindsay Buckingham, which Lindsay used regularly and eventually donated to a charity auction.  David Crosby also owned a Moller acoustic.

A 1978 issue of the former Chico weekly newspaper, the Chico News and Review wrote a piece on Lane:
"Moller builds guitars in much the way that artists create paintings. Each instrument is a masterpiece that represents hundreds of hours of labor and careful thought. He considers each guitar a carefully balanced whole created by the subtle interworkings of its individual parts, and spends meticulous hours on the details of each part to make certain that the total instrument is at least a Mona Lisa. Lane is also a very persistent, outgoing person, and knows how to contact the people he needs to in developing his knowledge as a luthier (guitar maker) and as a musician. 

Lane found himself backstage jamming with Carlos Santana for almost half an hour at the concert at the CSUC football stadium earlier this year. Santana later ordered one of Moller's custom made acoustic guitars.

He has already sold instruments to big names like John McVie (of Fleetwood Mac) and Rory Kaplan (who has played with the likes of Chick Corea, Al Dimeola and Herbie Hancock). George Harrison used a Moller guitar owned by a band named "Jiva” on his album titled 33& l /z, and Lane has jammed with, or discussed guitar design with dozens of other big names, including Jackson Brown and David Lindley, Elvin Bishop, James Taylor and Lyndsey Buckingham."

Lane's artistry is shown in every aspect on this truly wild and unique guitar.  It looks a lot like Rex Bogue's doubleneck build that John McLaughlin made famous, with incredible woods, ornamentation and attention to detail. The inlay work is pretty spectacular, depicting guns and money - all you need now, according to Warren Zevon, are lawyers!

The woods are stunning - walnut over maple, and the neck through body construction is amazing.

The guitar also sports electronic options like a Bogue, with a multitude of switches.  Joe Spry must have had some issues with the switching at some point as a few of the switches have been wired out of the circuit.  The output jack is now stereo, so a Y cable is needed to get both necks to output.  The switch that presumably used to change between the two necks is disabled.  

You might think that the guitar looks incredibly heavy, but it weighs just a hair over 15 pounds.  I figured it would weigh well over 20 pounds that when I first saw it! 

Joe owned the guitar until his passing.  He did have the work done on the electronics, and he also had a Kahler tremolo added on the 6 string side, including the accompanying locking nut.  The work did require a route in the body.  The bridge isn't ideal, but it does work and we were able to get the guitar set up well.

There appears to be some slight damage in the middle of the control area.  We can't see the other side as there is a shielding plate under the pots and switches, but the area is stable.  This may have happened through use, when the bridge route was performed, or simply due to the figured character of the walnut.  I've worked with walnut in some projects at home - the highly figured grain can show fissures in places but remain stable, particularly when laminated to other woods as it is here.  One of the wings of the body appears to have been re-glued a bit, the treble side of the 6 string neck.

The guitar must have been refretted at some point.  This was clearly Joe's main performing guitar, and the frets are in excellent shape.

If the guitar were mine, I would probably completely start over on the wiring.  I'm not sure what I'd use all of those mini switches for aside from coil tapping and phase reversing, but I would definitely get a selector switch going that would allow me to choose one neck, the other, or both.  Since this is a customer guitar that the original owner has altered already, the decision is yours.  I did do just a little cleaning up in the cavity, shrink wrapping a couple of leads and snipping some long, exposed conductors that might give someone some trouble later on.

Included with the guitar is what has to be the original Anvil hard case, emblazoned with the FELONY band name and some relic stickers from their journeys on the road.

What a wild piece of music history!

The case is large and heavy.  Shipping will be expensive.

Color: Natural
Weight: 15lbs .2ozs
Body: Maple/Walnut/Mahogany
Neck: Maple/Walnut/Mahogany
Neck Profiles: See pictures
Fretboard: Ebony (both necks)
Inlays 12 string neck: Mother of pearl machine guns
Inlays 6 string neck: Mother of pearl $ dollar signs
Frets: Original (both necks)
Fret count: 24 (both necks)
Nut: Original (both necks)
Nut width 12 string neck: 
Nut width 6 string neck:
Scale: 24 3/4" (both necks)
Radius: 10" (both necks)
12 String neck thickness at 1st fret: 0.965"
6 String neck thickness at 1st fret: 0.825"
12 string neck thickness at 12th fret: 0.965"
6 string neck thickness at 12th fret: 0.90"
Action 1st String at 12th Fret: 2/32" (both necks)
Action 6th String at 12th Fret: 2/32" (both necks)
Total length: 39 1/4"
Lower bout: 16 5/8"
Waist: 11 3/8"
Upper bout: 13 1/2"
Body depth/thickness outside edge: 1 9/16"
String gauge: .010-.046" (both necks)
Hardware Color: Gold
12 string bridge: Original
6 string bridge: Replaced with a Kahler tremolo, original "Wrap Around Bridge" in the case
Tuners: Original (both necks)
Switches: Originals
Pots codes: 164 8803
Case: OHSC
Notes:

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