The story of Rob Loonhouse: Air-guitar pioneer & the undisputed king of cardboard guitars

07.05.2019
12:59 pm
Topics:
Amusing
Music
Tags:
1980s
Iron Maiden
Judas Priest
air guitar
Rob Loonhouse
Robin Yeatman

Rob Loonhouse on stage with Iron Maiden at the Music Machine with his trusty homemade cardboard guitar.

“Oh no, I don’t bother with frets…It’s supposed to look like a guitar, but it’s not really supposed to look like a real guitar.”

—Rob Loonhouse on his handmade cardboard guitars in 1981

When Rob Loonhouse (born Robin Yeatman) started rubbing shoulders and banging heads with bands like Iron Maiden and Judas Priest, he was gainfully employed as a wedding photographer. The photographer-by-day had a not-so-secret life which made him somewhat of a minor celebrity, or at least oddity. Loonhouse would frequent pubs and clubs in London including NWOBHM (New Wave of British Heavy Metal) haven, The Soundhouse, and its sister backroom club The Bandwagon, where he would bust out his best air guitar routine. His pioneering performances would eventually become like competitions featuring “homemade imitation guitars” made of cardboard (or “hardboard” as coined by Loonhouse). His claim-to-fame is backed up further by two UK journalists, Pippa Lang and author Garry Bushell in his 2010 book Hollies: True Stories of Britain’s Biggest Street Battles, where he also identifies Loonhouse as the originator of the “new circle of hell that is air-guitar playing.”

According to Loonhouse, the idea to make his cardboard guitars was the result of a throw-down which would decide who the “Headbanger of the Year” was. At the time, Loonhouse was still air-guitaring it when he was approached by another local who had made his own Gibson-style guitar, and wanted a chance to compete. Loonhouse knew he had to up his game and went home to make his first cardboard guitar, described as “very rough.” In Loonhouse’s own words, his guitars were only supposed to look “like” guitars, not actually look like “real” guitars, and if your head is spinning like mine, the faux guitarist went into a bit more detail regarding the evolution of his DIY cardboard guitar collection:

“I’ve got three at home right now, a (Flying) V, a twin-neck (Flying) V, and an inverted (Flying) V which I made especially, which is a bit of a flop really. In all, I’ve made about a half a dozen, getting progressively better all the time.”

Rob Loonhouse and former Iron Maiden vocalist Paul DiAnno.

Former Iron Maiden guitarist Dennis Stratton remembers Rob’s air-guitar competitions before he started making his cardboard axes and was widely photographed with the band during the early 80s, on stage with his trusty fake guitar in full headbanging mode. He was also featured on an episode of UK pop culture television show, 20th Century Box that, in part, attempted to define the NWOBHM as anti-woman with some help from comments by Loonhouse, such as:

“You find very few women down in the front actually headbanging. They are actually quite content to stand in the back and listen to the music.”

Later in his rather extensive interview, Loonhouse was asked another leading question by the BBC as to whether women make “good headbangers.” This time, Loonhouse lived up to his last name a little bit more with his puzzling answer—an analogy involving manual labor:

“It’s difficult really, you know because many women just don’t have it in them, you know. There’s very few women digging holes in the road. Maybe that’s one of the reasons there’s very few women headbangers.”

Now before we tear into Loonhouse’s words of wisdom, which I’m sure got him laid all the time, it’s safe to say he is merely equating true heavy metal fans to tough, (mostly) manly roadmenders, or ditch-diggers. Of course, Lemmy Kilmister’s gal-pal Wendy O. Williams would probably have a few choice words for Loonhouse, as would the members of Girlschool, Betsy Bitch, Doro Pesch, and others. However, Loonhouse has historically been recalled not as a headbanging misogynist, but as a fun-loving goofball who managed to air-guitar his way into the good graces of Iron Maiden and Judas Priest. And again, to be fair to Loonhouse, one of the goals of the piece was to perpetuate the myth that heavy metal lyrics were anti-woman and that heavy metal shows were no place for a girl.

Loonhouse’s first claim-to-fame (after his air-guitar accomplishments of course) was a photograph he took of Iron Maiden on the band’s first album, with vocalist Paul DiAnno, The Soundhouse Tapes. Loonhouse’s next big break would be his appearance in Judas Priest’s 1980 video for “Living After Midnight” directed by Julien Temple. In the video, there are several nods to air-guitar playing and even drummer Dave Holland has some fun hitting an imaginary drum kit hard during the thundering opening to the song. People in the audience are seen holding up cardboard guitars. Loonhouse wraps up the video by thrashing his cardboard Flying V” outside Priest’s tour bus. Later in 1980 Loonhouse’s inverted Flying V would appear on its own in another video directed by Temple, “Breaking the Law,” where it is played in a bizarre scene by a bank security guard. Previously, Loonhouse had been credited with the role of the bank security guard, but it clearly isn’t the cardboard guitar god, though the inverted Flying V is undoubtedly Loonhouse’s unique weapon of choice.

Loonhouse shredding the shit out of his cardboard Flying V.

Loonhouse was just 23 at the time of the 20th Century Box show, and described himself as not having the time to become a “really good guitarist.” But this wasn’t a bad thing in Loonhouse’s mind, as later in 20th Century Box, he happily mused being a headbanger was a “lifelong thing” and he was going to make a business out of being a “headbanger” because that was what he was “good at.” Bless him. This sadly didn’t happen, as it appears after the 20th Century Box piece aired, Loonhouse was subjected to some public backlash and “retired” from the public eye. To this day air-guitar competitions are still incredibly popular and culminate with the Air Guitar World Championships held in Oulu, Finland. And all because of Robin Yeatman, a young wedding photographer; a kind of heavy metal version of Peter Pan, who, without a doubt, embodied the true spirit of DIY.