My name is Tom Boyles. I'm 24, live in Streator, IL and I teach high school Spanish for a living.  I've been playing guitar since 2002 and finally jumped into the world of electric guitars around Thanksgiving, 2007. Since I played acoustic guitars exclusively for the first five years, most of my influences are acoustic players/finger pickers (James Taylor, Tommy Emmanuel, Jackson Browne, etc). However, electric rockers/blues players such as SRV, Page, Clapton, Beck, and many other electric gunslingers have influenced my style. As a Spanish teacher, I'm a sucker for anything with a latino flavor, so my style has also been influenced by the likes of Santana & Henry Garza.
On the guitar: I purchased a Lite Ash Tele and named her Ardiana--a play on the Spanish "ardiente" which means "passionate". She has a natural stain to show off the beautiful wood grain, a bird's-eye maple neck and maple fretboard. A pair of Seymour-Duncan pickups came stock and they sound great. The bridge pickup has a nice, thick tone that works well with some distortion and the neck pickup gives that signature Tele twang. Aside from the SD pickups instead of Fenders, this guitar really doesn't have a lot of flair. All of the hardware (tuners, neck pickup cover, bridge, control plate, knobs, strap buttons) are chrome. I think this adds to the simplistic charm of the natural finish, though.
On to the mods: I've just gotten started in this. To date, my
modifications are purely cosmetic/aesthetic. I purchased an ashtray bridge cover on eBay and a clear pickguard from Stewart-MacDonald. I think that the ashtray adds to the simplicity of the guitar's look, but I do a lot of palm muting, so I find myself leaving it off often so as to avoid picking or strumming over the neck pickup. As far as the pickguard is concerned, I have been blessed with some very artistically inclined friends who have lent their time, talents and efforts to create some wonderful designs to put underneath the guard.
You can see several pictures of the guitar with different pickguard designs here. Also of note, I affixed a pick holder to the back of the headstock by the Low-E tuner head.
Photo at top right: GodOfRockicaster sans ashtray - one of my students drew this one for me.
Photo above, left: Wisconsicaster with ashtray--I had no idea that my girlfriend was so talented until she gave this to me!
Photo above, right: Extra Lifecaster (1-Up Mushroom from the Mario Bros. universe) with ashtray.
Photo at bottom of page: As it came. No ashtray, black pickguard with chrome screws.
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