If there was a prize for the most requested effects unit of 1983, it would go to the mythical E-Bow.

Stuart Adamson of Big Country, Steve Askew of Kajagoogoo, A. N. Punter of Lewisham, they've all been in here trying to find out if anyone still sells the things. Big Country once commandeered the office 'phones for 15 minutes following a hot tip without success.

The E or 'Energy' Bow is a creature of the Seventies — a hand held device containing a PP3 battery, an electromagnet and a minimum of circuitry, producing a pulsing magnetic field.

When a string is slotted between the poles of the magnet, it is "plucked" by the field. The plucking goes on for as long as the E-Bow is in position, but since there's no physical contact with the string — no plectrum in perpetual motion — the resulting sound is a smooth, infinite sustain, similar to the effect of a violin bow being drawn across the strings.

We asked, but nobody knew. They'd vanished from the face of the earth, as usual, just about the time when people started demanding them in wagon loads.

Then, in early January, we stumbled across an advert for the new E-Bow being sold by Rhodes Music in Denmark Street, London WC1. We toddled along, smiled charmingly at the man behind the counter, and he lent us one which we promptly posted off to hero of the Energy Bow, a certain Mr Bill Nelson. This is his story...

Quite some time ago, now, I became disenchanted with the vocabulary of the electric guitar. A somewhat foolish thing to do considering that I'd built whatever musical reputation I then possessed, on being an enthusiastic exponent of the instrument.

Despite the arguments of others to the contrary, I couldn't help feeling that guitar playing had become a devalued currency, probably due to over-familiarity and public abuse. It was like the end of an affair, although I admit, I hadn't always felt that way.

Back in the day-glo Sixties, the development of powerful amplification had brought about a dramatic expansion of the guitar's language, principally through the dynamic use of feedback to create sustain.

For most guitarists at that time, the discovery of this simple by-product of high power was a revelation akin to a religious experience.

Soon, Jimi Hendrix would singlehandedly liberate the guitar from its orthodox confines and transform it into a veritable catalogue of noise, capable of the most extreme expression. At last the truly electric guitar had arrived.

I was, like most guitarists, overwhelmed by the possibilities and experimented enthusiastically with the new tools of this expanded language. Music shops were suddenly knee deep in fuzz tones, wah-wah pedals, phasers and flangers. Everyone wanted at least one Marshall 100 Watt stack. For a while it really was a wondrous crusade. But...

Not only did every other guitarist learn to speak the new language, but they all began to repeat the same sentence. There are hundreds of you out there still doing it years after the event (you know who I mean). It seemed that the guitar had become nothing more than a safe and sure way of eliciting a given response from a pre-conditioned audience... an audience prepared to accept a demonstration of blind fury as a declaration of true passion.

Where once noise had liberated, now it chained. What had promised to be progressive and open, became narrow and fixed.

The Heavy Metal Opiate had arrived: an unforgivable, grim cavalcade of mindless and hysterical riffs, perpetrated by the kind of people who saw nothing more challenging in the instrument than a socially acceptable means of pointing their willies at an audience.

For me, then, not only did the guitar begin to sound boring but it also became a symbol of the commonplace, a musical badge of cowardice. My problem was I had no solution of my own to offer, so for a while I relegated the guitar to a minor role in my scheme of things, exploring, instead, the new avenues opened up by the synthesiser.

After a time, though, the synthesiser also began to slip into fixed and recognisable modes, and so I turned back to the guitar. I had rediscovered a device for the guitar that I had used briefly during my career with Be-Bop Deluxe. American in origin, it possessed no footswitches, pedals, knobs or dials of any kind. The only moving part was the hinge on the battery cover. It resembled nothing more glamorous than a tiny but futuristic electric iron.

This was the Energy Bow, or E-Bow, created by an enterprising Californian called Greg Heet. In use, the device is held in the right hand over a desired string, close to the corresponding pole-piece of the guitar's pickups. The left hand is free to finger the required notes in the normal way. In response to this simple gesture, the E-Bow will set up a field of pulsating magnetic energy around the string, causing it to vibrate, and therefore sustain a note.

In fact it will keep on sustaining the note until the end of the world, or until the onboard 9 volt battery runs out, whichever comes first. By sliding the E-Bow on and off the hot spot of the guitar's pickup, a slow attack is achieved, simulating the bowing effect of a violin or cello. The nature of the sustain achieved is different, though. You are hearing the actual string sustaining, not the sound of the string being filtered through some transistorised fuzz box.

The notes produced are very rich in natural harmonics, and very subtle tonal effects can be produced by shifting the right hand position slightly.

Very soon I was E-Bowing all over the place. I seemed to be the only person using the thing to that extent, but people didn't really hear it as a guitar, as such. I remember one particular interview in New York when I was asked why there was no guitar on my "Love That Whirls" album. I told the surprised journalist that there was more guitar on that album than anything I'd done since Be-Bop Deluxe... but that the guitar was played using the E-Bow. He thought he'd heard nothing but synthesisers.

In time I needed to replace my, by now, somewhat battered E-Bow, and set out to try to purchase a new one. This proved extremely difficult as I was informed that they were no longer being manufactured due to lack of interest. Panic! Phone calls were made to several music shops around the country, and eventually I found myself a stock of four. My sound was safe. As a result of this, you can imagine how pleased I was to discover recently that Greg Heet has put his company back into action and is producing a new improved E-Bow... hence this article.

There are two major differences in design from the earlier model. One involves a change in finish from the chrome plated version of the original E-Bow to the high-tech matt-black plastic of the new one. Along with this cosmetic update comes the welcome addition of an on/off switch. The earlier model turned itself on automatically when brought near to a suitable magnetic field (ie a guitar pickup) and switched itself off a few seconds after withdrawal from that field. Unfortunately, it also turned itself on if I laid it on top of my amp, thereby creating a tremendous drain on the battery. The inclusion of an on/off switch is a sensible development.

In use, the new E-Bow is exactly the same as the original model, producing an effortless, harmonically rich sustain. The little red LED has been retained, which not only informs you of battery status, but shines light onto the string being used. Great fun in the dark. The device comes complete with a little book of instructions and a demonstration tape showing both visibly and audibly the various techniques to create the sounds of violas, violins, cellos, flutes, etc.

But what I like most about this wonderful little gadget is its sheer expressiveness. It works with the musician and not against you. While anyone can make the E-Bow work, intuitive players will find their own voice with the device. The ultimate nature of the tone produced using the E-Bow is dependent on the ear, mind and touch of each individual musician, and not on a cleverly constructed box of digital tricks. (Not that I'm averse to using digital tricks, by any means.)

So as you can see, I'm still full of enthusiasm for the E-Bow, even after all these years, and I can heartily recommend it to those of you suffering from guitar fatigue. But don't all rush out and buy it at once, or I might be forced to take up the harmonica again, and that would be unpleasant for everyone.

£65