Kick in the Pants!

Blues rocker Kenny Wayne Shepherd's 1970 Duster

I have fond childhood memories of tooling around town with my grandfather in his mossy green Duster in the mid-'70s, the vinyl seats hot under my legs, the smell of cigarette smoke lingering even though he had quit smoking the year before. His Duster was soon replaced with a more practical pickup truck but I'll never forget that car, the cartoon logo of the dust devil with eyes, or the name: Duster. I was never sure if it meant this car would leave you in the dust, or clean it up for you.



The 1970 Plymouth Duster was advertised much like Oldsmobile is today: this is not your father's Plymouth. (Ironically it was my grandfather's Plymouth, but that's neither here nor there.) It was fast, largely because it was lightweight, with few frills other than a good engine. This was a muscle car for the people, lax on luxury but long on power. It's no wonder then that a car like this should attract people like my grandfather, a humble typewriter repairman, and Kenny Wayne Shepherd, former blues prodigy and successor to the kinds of blues-rock chops that made Hendrix and Clapton so famous.



Wait a minute, what's the connection between my grandfather and world-famous Kenny Wayne Shepherd? Family. Kenny too has fond childhood memories of tooling around town in a Duster, his mother's, so when it came time for him to find a new project car, his mind naturally wandered back to his youth. After searching on Craigslist and eBay, one was found in Burbank, CA. But, as you'd expect of a car made for the masses, this one needed some work: outside, under the hood, and, being that this was for a musician, in the audio department.



The first stop was Ted Moser's Motion Picture Warehouse, which specializes in cleaning up cars for movies, in Los Angeles, CA for a Hollywood-style makeover. The cracked, dark green paint was stripped off and replaced with a combination of dark graphite over Saab frost green metallic. Next, Year One in Braselton, GA, swapped in a Mopar Performance 402 Magnum crate motor (over bored into a 406, as reflected in the hood decal), which replaced the factory 340, an engine that had taken to providing its own unique (but unwanted) percussive sounds. "Bang! Bang!" is not what you want to hear coming from under your hood. Lastly, they added a Bowler Transmission 4L60e, SSBC disc brakes, and suspension components from Addco, KYB shocks, Magnum Force front control arms, Eaton rear leaf springs, and PST polygraphite bushings.



Moving to the interior, you'll no doubt be surprised to hear that the gauges, which appear stock, are actually custom made by Redline Gauge Works. There's even air conditioning, something my grandfather never had access to in his Duster. Henderson's Upholstery in Gainesville, GA did the black leather interior.



The sound system is about what you'd expect for a world-class rock musician: it rocks! Being who he was, the good folks at Kicker jumped at the chance to outfit Kenny's Duster with its top of the line equipment, and to be seen wherever Kenny takes his ride. And speaking of being seen, the brains of the Kicker system, the Eclipse AVN5435 head unit, sits front and center at the junction where the base of the dashboard meets the tranny hump, flush-mounted between the four on the floor and the vents.



For the driver and front passenger, sound is supplied by a set of Kicker SS65.2 components, the highest-end set Kicker manufactured at the time. The speakers are molded into custom, black kickpanels, angled towards the listeners for a proper sound stage. Despite the pain-stakingly maintained cherry appearance of the interior, from the tuck and roll leather to the custom gauges, the front components still manage to blend in. That is, until you hear them.



An additional set of Kicker SS65.2 components is mounted on the rear shelf, inset in a custom-molded housing, made black to match the interior. Between the two speaker sets is a custom-made Plymouth logo, the five-point metallic star rising from a plexiglass oval. Although this part of the car is decidedly not cherry, it's bad-ass enough to work.



Moving to the rear of the car, we have the home of what is colloquially known as "bottom." And for a man known for playing bluesy rock guitar, he sure must like low end. And that's what he got with three Kicker Solo-Baric 10" S10L7 2-ohm subwoofers, set side by side by side, that fire into the trunk from a custom-made enclosure. A spare tire (no donuts here, this is a real fifth wheel) occupies the space directly in the line of fire of the subs. Flanking the tire are two amps, a 1500-watt Kicker ZX1500.1 subwoofer amp and Kicker ZX650.4 four-channel amp, mounted at rising angles from the floor. The entire trunk space is painted black to match the interior and accented with silver metal to complement the spare wheel.





Undoubtedly some people will still question the choice of a Duster, especially for a guy like Kenny Wayne Shepherd, blues prodigy, rock demi-god, car collector, who probably could have had any car he wished. Or should we say that we would wish for him. But he has the car he wants, customized the way he likes. Considering the quality of the finished vehicle, I wouldn't have a problem driving a Duster, that is, this one anyway. And my grandfather wouldn't have either.



Kenny Wayne Shepherd
Hard to believe this talent crashed the blues scene in 1995 at the tender age of 17, blowing away fans and seasoned pros alike with his axe skills. Fast forward 15 years later and Kenny Wayne Shepherd is now himself a seasoned pro, having added vocals to his resume and rock to his list of "Types of Music I Rule." He's also an avid car collector, with a 1969 Dodge Charger (dubbed the Xtreme Lee), a 1972 Dodge Charger, a 2006 SRT-8 Dodge Charger, a 2008 Dodge Challenger SRT-8, and a 1950 Ford Business Coup Hot Rod to keep his 1970 Duster company. In case you haven't noticed, Kenny favors American Steel.

Photography by Carl Edwards