I had a great day today with Eugene Moles in Nashville, interviewing him for the Mosrite book!
Eugene is a highly respected guitar repairman and a truly amazing guitar player with a great history of his own (he played guitar for Merle Haggard and the Strangers for a brief time in the 1970s, and spent about ten years playing guitar for Del Reeves on the Grand Ole Opry after he moved to Nashville).
Eugene’s father was Gene Moles, one of the great Bakersfield guitar legends and a very prominent figure in Mosrite guitar history. Gene Moles played for both Buck Owens and Merle Haggard (he’s on a lot of the earliest Merle Haggard records) and laid down some of the coolest country guitar licks ever as a session musician on records by Red Simpson and many others.
Gene Moles knew Semie Moseley of Mosrite, and ordered a custom guitar around 1962. It was this guitar that Gene showed his friend Nokie Edwards of the Ventures, which led to the Ventures investing in Mosrite to build their own Ventures-model guitar, which achieved great fame and financial success in the 1960s. During the boom in the 1960s, Gene Moles also worked at the Mosrite factory as their “quality control” man, inspecting all guitars before they went out the door.
After Mosrite went bankrupt in 1968, Gene Moles bought a bunch of Mosrite bodies, necks, and parts at the factory auction. Over the next couple of decades, he built a lot of “Parts-Rite” guitars, some of which were labeled “GM Custom.”
Today I interviewed Eugene about his dad, growing up in Bakersfield when it was Guitar Town USA, and his own experience working at the revived Mosrite factory in the mid-1970s. We dug out tons of old Mosrite bodies, necks, and parts. He showed me one of the Mosrite pickup winders from the 1970s era when he worked at the factory. He showed me pedals and guitar oddities, and let me scan some great historic photos for the book.
In case you’re wondering, none of the Mosrite parts are for sale. Don’t ask. And if you ever have a chance to hear Eugene play, don’t miss out. He is a mind-bendingly great picker. Thanks so much for your time today, Eugene! I had fun! The Mosrite Book mobile research lab is off and running!
