Rattlebrained

You can find most of this review, as well as other reviews of this product, over at the Clanky Dog Bottle Cap Washboard Gloves page at Bone Dry Music, where you can buy them too if you are so inclined. I admit to not being completely neutral to these gloves since I designed the Clanky Dog Logo and so of course would like to see him everywhere, but rest assured that the washboard player has priority in opinion.

The Good:

• The gloves are comfortable and lightweight.
• They seem well built and strong.
• The airmesh material seems well suited to keep your hands from sweating.
• The bottle caps are well attached and fit snugly on my finger tips.
• The bottle caps are more interesting then expected. They offer a surprising number of sounds depending on how you angle them while playing.
• They are not too loud – good for situations where a washboard could easily be overbearing.
• Recycled bottle caps.
• The bottle caps are easy to remove if you don’t want to have them on all your fingers. (They are not that easy to put back on so think before taking action – see end of post)

The Less Good:

• One bottle cap was attached in a way that prevented putting the glove on that finger.
• With an old washboard with dry wood, the airmesh material catches all the small splinters from the wood’s surface if you rub against it. I sometimes use my palm against the wood, but with no finger contact to keep my hand motion going…a bad idea with these gloves on some of my older boards.
• Strangely enough (when taking into account the above comment), the airmesh can be very slippery and make it hard to simultaneously hold a nicely polished drumstick (for instance) to use on the washboard or a cymbal. (Probably not much of an issue for most people.)
• The bottle caps aren’t very loud.
• The bottle caps are a bit clanky when it comes to hitting bells and stuff.
• The edges of the bottle caps can catch each other when you play. It doesn’t really get in the way or prevent good playing, but it does take some getting use to.

All in all, these are good washboard gloves and will certainly be useful to many players. I will be happy to use them when I play “just” a washboard. But I am very disappointed that they don’t suit my own playing style for when I mix washboard and drum playing. For that I would need the leather to cover the inner (palm) side of the glove of my index finger; likewise my thumb and between; and would also probably want the leather to cover the rest of the thumb as well.

I’m looking forward to the thimble version!

PS: After trying these out for a few days I removed the bottle caps off both pinkies and thumbs, but then found what seems an interesting scratching sound that I got by holding the first finger’s bottle cap between it and the thumb like you would a guitar pick. This made me attempt to put the thumb bottle caps back on to see if it improves the effect, which it does if improves means that you get the same scratchy sound rubbing both ways (up & down). However with just pliers underhand to proceed the bottle cap is not pinched evenly all around (hopefully a bit of hammering will solve that!), so don’t be too hasty about removing them.

Updated Sep 2013 to add: Bone Dry Music has just added Bottle Cap Washboard Gloves made out of deluxe leather. I will review these too once I get a hold of a pair..