Unknown Teardrop guitar - not a Vox as far as we know

guitarz.blogspot.com:

Here's yet another one for all you guitar detectives:

Hi Gavin,

I bought a lovely vintage teardrop guitar off of ebay, but am struggling to find the manufacturer of it... It's likely Kawai or Teisco, but I can't find a similar/same one online in Google searches. Usually the selector switches/plate are what doesn't match. Any ideas?

Cheers,
Bobby

Hey Bobby, any chance of a look at the headstock? Also, is there any indication of where it was made, like a stamped neckplate saying "Made in Japan"?

My guess would be it was made in Japan, and I think I'd incline more towards Kawai than Teisco, but I have to confess that I really don't know. Perhaps other readers may have some better ideas.

G L Wilson

Guitarz - The Original Guitar Blog - now in its 10th year!

Kawai Aquarius in Cellophane Red

guitarz.blogspot.com:

I know that Bertram is a fan of the Kawai Aquarius, but am not too sure if this example with all-over Cellophane Red finish would appeal to him.

We've seen a couple of cellophane red DiMarzio Strats on here before, including one that I own. (We've also looked at a similarly finished Ibanez DT-250 X series). I'm wondering if this Kawai guitar might have been made in the same Harayama factory that supplied the Strat parts to DiMarzio, or could this have been a finish that more than one Japanese manufacturer were specialising in?

G L Wilson

Guitarz - The Original Guitar Blog - now in its 10th year!

Saturn Violin Guitar by Kawai, Teisco or maybe Guyatone - you choose

guitarz.blogspot.com

After Gavin's post of the Guyatone Saturn, this is my Kawai Saturn Violin shaped guitar which I picked up on eBay about four years ago for the princely sum of £149, which may have also been made by Guyatone. It seems it was made for just one year during 1968 then discontinued. I'm sure it's the same story for many "odd" guitars from this period. I've mentioned this before and it's hard to believe but the guitar industry was in decline at the end of the 60s and there were a lot of novelty instruments produced to try and catch the imagination of buyers. I guess, if they didn't sell, they were discontinued pretty sharply.

The logo is raised but is under the varnish - some kind of raised print, I guess - the one in the CrazyDave video (see below) has no logo so I supposed they were pretty slap-dash with some of the details and may have also made them under a different name for other distributers. Mine is in great condition and has hardly a mark on it. It's all original except I changed the pickups for some NOS ones from eBay. The originals were quite corroded and although they sounded fine, the NOS ones just look that bit better. Like many cheap pick ups from this time, they are quite microphonic but not distractingly so.

They only thing that's suffered over the years is the tremolo arm. The thread has stripped completely and now I use a slightly bigger nut to fill the old hole. Despite being a real cheapie, this guitar has a neck as straight as a die, a great action and even after some pretty strenuous wanging, it stays in tune.

The Presidents of The United States of America (the band not the wikileaks fearing politicians) used (ABUSED or TRASHED to be more accurate) one in their official video for their one and only hit "Lump" . After what they did to it, I guess there's one less Saturn in the world today.

For a slightly more respectful video go and see CrazyDave play his. Not me, the other crazy Dave. Yeah Dave. Crazy man! Yeah!

There are scans of a 1968 catalogue from the Canadian company Eatons (as Gavin mentioned the other day) at http://www.vintaxe.com but you have to pay to see them. I did manage to get access to them a while ago (I guess there site was having problems) and was disappointed to find it didn't include my guitar. Actually I checked them this morning and they didn't include Gavin's find either. I put pics of the covers in the comments so you can get an idea of their overall cheesiness.




By the way, the second picture is the wall in my studio. I am rather fond of violin (or viola to be pedantic) shaped guitars. The Epiphone is new. Compared to the boxy-ness of the Univox it's a little dull but, with tape wound strings and using the neck pickup, it has a satisfying thump and a beefy ooomph that almost gets you into sub bass land. Which is why I wanted it. The Univox was a dog when I got it. I had to ditch the neck as it was seriously warped and the truss rod was broken and I've since replaced it with a NOS Hofner bass neck and extra light wound strings. A VERY different "twangier" sound than the Epiphone.

David in Barcelona

Guitarz - The Original Guitar Blog - now in its 9th year!

1960s Japanese 4-pickup solidbody

guitarz.blogspot.com:
Here's another "unknown" guitar from 1960s Japan. With the plethora of brandnames applied to the same guitars coming out of the same factories, it's very hard to identify guitars like this. The seller comments that it:

"...looks like a Bison copy. The headstock design looks like Bruno. The pickups are the same as the Kent 720 series - their topline guitars. I suspect this came out of the Kawai factory because they produced Bruno, Kent and Teisco guitars."

Interesting features include the two plates on the headstock matching the plate the pickups are sitting on; separate plates for pickups and controls; the German carve around the top of the instrument's body; and, of course, the four pickups and attendant switches (my guess is that the switch near the volume and tone pots selects between the front and rear pair of pickups, whilst the two toggles near the lower horn are 3-way selectors for each pair).

Anyway, a very interesting instrument.

G L Wilson

Guitarz - The Original Guitar Blog - now in its 9th year!

Kawai Aquarius AQ 305

guitarz.blogspot.com

On eBay, this rarely seen Kawai Aquarius AQ 305 guitar is sold as a rare 60s custom model, that is utterly absurd and obviously untrue if you just look at the one uncovered humbucker in bridge position, typical of shredding guitars of the 80s. They also mention the switch that is of course useless on a one pickup guitar, unless it's a splitable humbucker like it is the case on Aquarius guitars.

And anyway the Aquarius is an early 80s model (the AQ305 is a later version of 1984 with a modified really 80s headstock design), something you can check on the ultimate Kawai Aquarius blog (this blog would be a little more ultimate with the always expected contributions of Aquarius lovers - and the blog is mine of course!).

Anyway this guitar is beautiful and modest, and the absence of the neck pickup changes a lot its line and makes it look super dynamic - I love it!

bertram

Guitarz - The Original Guitar Blog - now in its 9th year!

Kawai Moonsault with gigbag

guitarz.blogspot.com:
We've previously looked at the Kawai Moonsault on this blog (see here), but I think it's well worth another look because it's one of my all-time favourite designs and is one that is rarely seen outside of Japan. This particular blue-burst example is available for sale on eBay right now, priced at $3995, so as much as I love this design I'm not going to be buying one any time soon.

Furthermore, I had to show you the above photo, because it's rare enough to see a Moonsault itself, let alone its oddly-shaped gigbag. I bet you'd get a few stares carrying one of those.

G L Wilson

NB: Please make sure you are reading this Guitarz post at guitarz.blogspot.com and not on a Scraper blog that copies posts without permission (and steals bandwidth) so as to profit from advertising. Please support original bloggers!

Winston teardrop guitar

guitarz.blogspot.com:

This may not be a Vox original, but it's still quite a beauty. Made in Japan in the 1960s, this vintage Kawai teardrop copy carries the Winston brandname. This particular example has the rarer blonde finish as opposed to the more usual sunburst.

Apologies guys (or should I say "dudes"? I think there's an unwritten rule that guitarists have to address one another as "dude". But I digress...), I was meaning to show you this guitar before the eBay auction finished.

The guitar eventually sold for $537.77 (approximately £334.40) which is probably a fair price for such an instrument. I wonder how much a genuine Vox badged instrument (many of which were made by Eko in Italy) would fetch? Probably at least double that price. But would it be a better quality instrument? I doubt it.

The auction says the guitar is labelled as "Winston Brian Jones Original", but surely Brian Jones played a solid-bodied Vox teardrop finished in white. The only player who immediately springs to mind as someone who played a hollowbodied teardrop 6-string guitar was Drooper from The Banana Splits!

G L Wilson

NB: There are a lot of blogs STEALING content and bandwidth. If you read this anywhere else but on guitarz.blogspot.com then you are reading a blog that STEALS content. Please support original bloggers!

Kawai Aquarius, blogs and stuff

Hi, this is Bertram.

As GLW pointed out in the previous post, I've been posting regularly here in the last weeks and it's been a very interesting experience, full of learning, sharing, exchange and - well - discipline; finding something interesting to post everyday is not always easy!

Anyway, I will keep posting once in a while when I find something worthwhile...

But I also have my own blogs, and I take the opportunity to advertise them to the Guitarz many readers.

First (and you will now understand why there is this bizarre picture on the right), I just started a blog about Kawai Aquarius guitars. This is not the greatest or most famous guitar, but I have a soft spot for it and it's very difficult to find information about it on the Web. So I call for contribution and invite players and owners of Kawai Aquarius guitars (and bass) to send me pictures, stories, tracks, videos... to feed this blog.

But my main blog stays gUitarREN (it's a mix of German, French and English for guitar - of course), a blog about guitar design and projects. From my background as a musician and a visual artist, I started one year ago to study thoroughly about guitars, first to master new aspects of guitar playing, then in the idea that I want to make guitars myself, then I got really involved (I mean even more than before) and went into drawing guitars every day as a creative design process and post them on my blog. I also started building my projects, but I have to learn everything while doing it, and have not so much time and will never have enough to actualize all my ideas...

So I'd love to meet a guitar maker who needs a designer and try a collaboration, if you are interested you can contact me via my profile (you know what? I contacted some companies already and Fender answered, they do have an office to receive suggestions from people like me, interesting, isn't it?).

Thank you for your attention.

unidentified 60s Kawai

Hello, I'm Bertram from gUitarREN, I was invited to post on Guitarz, and I'm honored to answer to this invitation.

There is a German eBay shop that offers some good vintage guitars, mainly East-european and Japanese ones. For now I selected this beautiful Kawai from the 60s - there is no more information about it, but just from its look you can see it's special (and also it's in a very good state for such an old lady). Kawai is an unfairly underestimated guitar brand, probably because they stopped making guitars before Japanese production was rehabilitated and Japan acknowledged as a great guitar nation - now Kawai is a respected piano company.

I like everything on this guitar, the one neck pick-up (mini humbucker?), the bridge cover, the solid neck joint, the strong headstock, the metal pick-guard, the shape that is classic without cloning any famous design... I wish I could hear its sound! (I also like the typically Berlin wooden floor on which the guitar is photographed).

Japanese Vintage: Kawai Moonsault Guitar

It might sport a totally impractical body shape, but to my eyes this 1980s Japanese Kawai Moonsault is a thing of beauty. Despite the obvious shape difference, it has a Les Paul quality to it. Look at that binding, the pearloid inlays, and my favourite feature: the phase of the moon fingerboard inlays. I also love the silverburst finish, which is infinitely preferable to yellow which makes the guitar resemble a banana.

On another topic, I'm taking a break over the next week or so, so don't expect a plethora of new posts. I may try to post something whilst I'm away - it all depends on how busy I am. Regular blog posts should begin again on 14 April.