Show Notes
Zoe’s path into guitar building is a pretty fascinating one. She grew up surrounded by artists, started out as a drummer, dove deep into piano and composition, and at one point thought she might pursue film scoring. Eventually, though, she realized she missed actually making physical things with her hands.
A random guitar-building job listing sent her down the rabbit hole, which eventually led to an apprenticeship with Barry Grzebik of Grez Guitars and a job at LMI. From there, she spent years learning the craft before developing her own very distinctive instrument, the Model Z.
We get into the surprisingly difficult process of designing a guitar that looks genuinely different without looking completely ridiculous, building prototypes, neck shapes, the influence of Strats and offset guitars, and why funk and Khruangbin ended up finding their way into the Model Z’s DNA.
We also talk about the less glamorous side of being a creative person: selling your work, social media, learning to market yourself when you’d rather stay in the shop, and figuring out what kind of career actually works for the way your brain is wired.
Plus…John Bonham, Bulgarian women’s choirs, big guitar necks, magical guitar-player fairy dust, BOSS pedals, and an extremely specific pizza recommendation.
Check out more of Zoe's work HERE https://www.zoejetguitars.com/
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