The Resurrection of My God-Given Guitar
- Jay EuDaly
- Jun 23
- 6 min read
Updated: Jun 24
My God-Given Guitar: Backstory
In PRS McCarty Hollowbody II: My God-Given Guitar, I told the story of how, in 2003, I was given a PRS McCarty by a student who said God told him to give it to me. Later on the gig I told the band the story and was subsequently introduced to the crowd as, “Ladies and gentlemen, Jay EuDaly with his God-given guitar!” - and the appellation stuck.
That blog also tells the story of the many modifications I made to that guitar, and why.
In PRS SE Hollowbody II I relate that in the Fall of 2023 I purchased an SE Hollowbody as a backup for the McCarty after a scare that had me facing the possibility the McCarty had been stolen. It wasn't. Whew!
In The Demise of My God-Given Guitar, I told the story of how I destroyed my McCarty Hollowbody by accidentally running over it! 😡 Date of death: June 22, 2024.
I related that after a disappointing conversation at Fountain City GuitarWorks about what it would take to fix it, I decided to total out the McCarty and use its parts to make the same mods to the SE Hollowbody as I had originally done to the McCarty; so the pickups, tuners, a second volume control and strap lock pins were removed from the McCarty and installed in the SE. That work was done by Grant at Fountain City.
I was very happy with the result, and have used the SE in the subsequent year since I obliterated my McCarty.
What’s left of the McCarty has remained in the case like an entombed corpse after organ donations; I couldn’t bring myself to just toss it in a dumpster. I’ve held onto the hope that it could be revived, in spite of the fact that in the months following the disaster I had three different luthiers decline the job!
Things were not looking good for my God-Given Guitar.
The KC Guitar Show
On March 16, 2025, my wife Andrea and I attended the KC Guitar Show.
Guitar Shows are events where you can see rare and vintage instruments. Also, you can buy, sell or trade your guitars and guitar-related stuff.
The KC Guitar Show is sponsored by Big Dude’s (a local music store) and put on by Mark Valentine.
Mark is a musician, singer, songwriter, comedian, frontman, promoter and way more. I have never had any idea of everything he's got going; he's a big picture kind of guy. Unlike most big picture guys, he can also manage the nuts and bolts of what it takes to make things happen. He’s been active in the Kansas City music and entertainment scene since the early seventies.
Mark and I began working together in bands and various projects in 1993. I consider him a good friend as well as a great business associate - with integrity - something that’s a rare combination in the music biz.
He’s the creator and host of Every Guitar Has A Story; a TV series modeled on “Antiques Roadshow” - only guitar-specific. As a matter-of-fact, I believe “2003 Paul Reed Smith McCarty Jay EuDaly” was Episode 1. I'm a guinea-pig for Mark's ideas now and then.
So…I’m at the KC Guitar Show and I see that Matt Bennett is one of the guys with a space there, showing a bunch of his guitars that he’d built and collected.
I’d met Matt back in 2022 when he and his wife were added to one of the bands Mark and I have, “Woodstock Flashback,” for a show where we opened for the Ozark Mountain Daredevils.
Matt had dressed the part and played it to the hilt! Ya baby! Livin’ the dream!
We spent 15 or 20 minutes just talking and catching up. As we were walking away, Andrea said,
“You should ask him if he could fix your guitar; he builds guitars you know.”
I wasn’t even thinking about my guitar. I had kind of resigned myself to the idea that it wasn’t fixable since I’d had 3 different guys decline the job. This is just one example of why I married this woman; she's benefited my life in more ways than I can count!
So we went back to Matt and I showed him the picture:
“Do you think you could fix this?”
“Yeah, I can fix it.”
“3 other luthiers have declined this job.”
“I don’t know why they would; I can fix it.”
“Dude! If you can actually fix this guitar I will feature you in my blog - it’ll be called, “The Resurrection of My God-Given Guitar” - and make you famous in the tri-county region!”
“Ok, now it’s personal! I will fix this guitar!”
I was still skeptical; I considered it a possibility that when he looked at the damage in person he would find things that weren’t evident in the picture.
Resurrection - Scars and All
A week later, Andrea and I took the guitar to his shop. He inspected the corpse and said,
“Yep, I can fix this.”
I said, “I got this guitar for free so I’m willing to put 12 or 15 hundred dollars into it.”
“I can do it for less than half that.”
“Sold! Go for it.”
We spent some time talking about what pickups and tuners I wanted since the McCarty hardware had been swapped into the SE Hollowbody. I didn’t want to undo that.
I don't like PRS pickups; Matt said he had a pair of pickups from an old Epiphone 335. I said those will probably work, and I want locking tuners.
We left and I told my wife, "We'll see."
Over the course of the following weeks Matt would text me with updates and questions.
April 8: "The resurrection has begun!"
April 23: "We are getting there!"
April 29: "Hey. Do you approve of these tuners? They are locking. The PRS keys are pricey!?"
On May the 4th - "May the 4th be with you!" - I received this text from Matt:
“Let it be written, that on this day a guitar has risen from the ashes."
So besides May the 4th being Star Wars Day, it just so happened to be National Lemonade Day, which is what Matt made out of the lemon of my destroyed guitar.
On May 6th Andrea and I went over to pick up the guitar:
Test drive:
The Gospel of Saint Matthew
I took the guitar, and Matt was as good as his word; it was less than half of what I was willing to spend. Pickups, tuners, new pots and switch, completely new wiring harness, as well as fret dress, setup and wood/finish work.
Where Matt glued the neck, you can't tell - look at the pics from April 23. If you hold it up to the light just so, you can see a very slight difference in the shade of the finish. He said if I was concerned about cosmetics (I'm not) he would've refinished the entire neck, but I don't care about that. It works; that's the main thing.
Speaking of cosmetics; the guitar had all kinds of chips and dings from 20 years of relentless gigging. That only adds character as far as I'm concerned. In addition to snapping the neck off when I ran over it, there was a major crack in the back. Matt said he epoxyed it and it's good and stable but, considering I didn't care about aesthetics he decided to leave it and not refinish.
I said I don't care about cosmetics. I do care about aesthetics - there's a difference.
Chicks dig scars.
And fortunately for me, Andrea loves old and broken things.
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