You can never have too many necks

guitarz.blogspot.com:


I bet you thought was going to be about one of those Rick Nielson multi-neck Cheap Shot guitars eh? I should coco! This is something I haven't come across too often before. Fender is a company I don't readily associate with doubleneck guitars. In fact I don't think I've knowingly seen any before - not that I've been looking, I have to add. The only Fenderish doubleneck I've happened across recently is the handsome, though not actually from Fender per se, creation from the skilful hands of young Bertram (with a little help from one of his woodworking associates). We have a fondness for the Fender Bass VI here in Guitarzland so it's an even bigger delight to find one Siametically co-joined to another of our favourites - the Fender Jazzmaster.

It's on the Austrian eBay site and I don't speak German. Maybe Bertram can help out with some of the details. As far as I can make out, it's a newish - 2010 - model, one-off, masterbuilt by Dennis Galuska (who's probably famous - sorry Den, not terrible au fait with the world of Lutherie) for the Frankfurt Musicmesse 2010 (that's a bit unfortunate isn't it, Musicmesse? Not really encouraging, eh? Probably means fair, exhibition or show or something similar. Maybe we should let them know. Might improve attendance a bit).

By the way, the body is lightweight ash with maple necks and rosewood fingerboards with Nitrocellulose lacquer - NOS (I thought that meant New Old Stock. Probably something else in German).

Amazingly enough (to me at least) it seems Yngwie Malmsteen also played a Fender double-neck 12/6 (probably very fast and very proficiently). That sounded a bit sarcastic didn't it? At least he's not Steve Vai. No, I didn't mean it. OK, YM isn't really my cup of tea, I'll admit, but until this week I'd have said the same about Steve Vai. Until... I Youtubed some of his performances and was a little surprised. Maybe it's a big act, I don't know, but he seems a nice guy, a great showman, a big ham, doesn't take himself too seriously (for a rock star) and plays with a ferocious passion. I'm not gonna rush out and buy his back catalogue but I don't mind anyone knowing I now have one of his tracks on my iPod - the Crazy Horses/Edgar Winter tinged-one-riff-all-the-way-through "Bad Horsie". It's only Rock N Roll etc... Stupid faces and all.

Anyway, Happy New Year to all. Taken my own sweet time to get back into second gear this year, sorry all.

David in Barcelona where the weather isn't too bad although it's a bit soon for the beach.

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

ESP Custom Shop XJ-12

guitarz.blogspot.com:

I started the month with a series of Electric 12-string guitars, and today would like to show you yet another example from more recent years. It's an ESP XJ-12 built in ESP's Japanese custom shop circa 2003 for the Japanese market. According to the listing on eBay, these guitars were sold in Japan at 200,000 Yen in 2003 (about $2,400).

The style is obviously Jazzmaster/Jaguar influenced; in fact it reminds me of Hohner's professional Hollywood series of several years ago. The headstock with its 4+8 tuner arrangement is an unusual but attractive feature.

This seller has several of these in different finishes; I found the gold sparkle edition, pictured above, particularly eye-catching. In the photo of the translucent green XJ-12 below we can see another interesting little detail in the Strat-type output socket inset into the edge of the guitar - especially useful if you like to have your guitar lead angled upwards and tucked behind your guitar strap.

G L Wilson

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

Left-handed Telemaster

guitarz.blogspot.com:

I like to post blog entries about interesting left-handed guitars - as and when I find them. After all, left-handed people deserve to have a better choice of interesting guitars. The off-the-shelf choices are so limited that some southpaws end up seeking out custom instruments.

This oil-finished left-handed Telemaster looks to be one such instrument, a self-build perhaps. The Telemaster - as its name suggests - is a hybrid of a Telecaster and a Jazzmaster. That is, a Telecaster with a Jazzmaster body. Or is that a Jazzmaster with Telecaster routing and hardware? It's actually a guitar with a bit of a cult following amongst self-builders, guitar projecteers and custom builders. A quick Google search will turn up loads of them!

This auction finishes in just a couple of hours, so if any interested lefties are reading, you might want to snap it up quickly.

G L Wilson

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

Jim Hevesy's Hembry "Hevy" doubleneck

guitarz.blogspot.com:

Guitarz reader and guitar enthusiast Jim Hevesy tells us about his Hembry doubleneck:

The double neck was built by Scott Hembry in Washington state. I live in Maryland near Washington DC and I found Scott through another guy on E-bay. I sent Scott what I was looking for and he built it for me. When I would play at church, I never knew what other players I might have so I wanted a 4x6. I was on a Telecaster kick so I wanted to see if he could incorporate a ‘fat’ Tele and a Fender P. I used to have a 1968 Plymouth Barracuda muscle car when I was growing up and I always like the plumb crazy color they had. After talking with Scott we decided on "flip/flop" paint that changes from green to purple depending on the light. He also painted a racing stripe on it for me changing the original "Hemi" to "Hevy" which is what most people call me. I sold a bunch of old stuff I had on e-bay and had this made. It is the fattest Tele I have ever heard (add all that wood and metal and what do you expect?) and plays like a dream. Here are some pics of it. One cool one you will see is the back with a reflection of a giant pine tree from the pacific northwest where it was built.

Thanks for sharing this with us, Jim.

We've previously looked at another Hembry doubleneck, this one a double fretted/fretless Jazz Bass style. For more Hembry guitars see www.hembryguitars.com.

G L Wilson

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

Fender Custom Shop Strat/Tele hybrid

guitarz.blogspot.com:

This is a Fender Custom Shop Stratocaster/Telecaster hybrid masterbuilt by Yuriy Shishkov, and is one of only 10 guitars of this design. This stunning example, finished in emerald green on body, neck and fingerboard, is currently being offered for sale on eBay in the UK with a Buy It Now price of £3,200.

A similar example, with not quite such a stunning finish, is also being offered for sale with slightly less hefty Buy It Now price of £2,600.

G L Wilson

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

Dia De Los Muertos - Day Of The Dead

guitarz.blogspot.com:

Today in the Spanish speaking world, is the Day of The Dead. To celebrate that, we have a suitably bone coloured, skull encrusted, coffin topped instrument. On paper, the final design of this custom built guitar could, in some hands, have ended up very differently and lot less tasteful. We've seen on several occasions, here on Guitarz, the fruits of the unrestrained and unfettered creativity of some instrument builders which have not always raised the luthiers art to the highest of aesthetic pinnacles.

In my humble opinion, Jimmy Messer's DOTD guitar built by First Act is a rather beautiful and elegant instrument. Best known as guitarist for Texas band Goudie and guitarist/co-composer with Kelly Clarkson (American Idol winner), Jimmy has commission several guitars from First Act so he must be pretty pleased with them.

OK, I know there must an American reader or two falling his chair right now. First Act are best known for the their kid's starter guitar packs from Target/Walmart in the US. I've never heard of them but it seems they are also available in Blighty. So if anyone has tried their budget guitars, I'd love to know what you think.

Quite apart from their nicely designed custom guitars, their web site has a lot of interesting things going on that take it beyond the realms of other guitar makers. I'm a big fan of businesses that get out into the community and encourage kids to be creative and there are some bigger manufacturers that could do worse than to take a leaf out of First Act's book. Worth spending some time there. Guitar business of the day!

PS Happy DOTD to one and all.

David in Barcelona

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

Duesenberg chrome custom by Zinc

guitarz.blogspot.com

This gleaming artifact is - according to its eBay seller - a Duesenberg-based custom work by French luthier Zinc (about which I couldn't find any information by the way).

It has for sure the characteristic humbucker/P90 configuration of hollow-body Duesenbergs, also the Duesenberg knobs and switch (plus one extra that might be a killswitch), but the body doesn't really fit to any Duesenberg model I can identify: the F-hole is too wide, the cutaway too pointy and the body too round to be a Starplayer - the closest model to it... Also the neck is for sure no Duesenberg, but a strat copy (carrying a Zinc logo) - so it could be that only the gear made it to this custom - then the body is a mystery... Love the chrome finish though!

Bertram

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

ESP Japan Custom Shop Ultratone as played by Arnold Schwarzenegger

guitarz.blogspot.com:

OK, let's do a caption contest on this one!

This guitar, as played by Arnie himself whilst campainging for Governor at a rally at the California State Capitol October 5, 2003 in Sacramento, California, is currently up for grabs on Gumtree.

It's an ESP Japan Custom Shop Ultratone in black relic finish with a set maple neck topped off with a rosewood fingerboard inlaid with skull and cross bones position markers and with 22 extra jumbo frets. It is equipped with a single EMG 81 humbucker in the bridge position and a single volume control, and also features Tone Pros hardware, Sperzel tuners, and comes with a ESP Custom Shop case.

Thanks to Bill for this one.

G L Wilson

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

Red Rocket Charlie Christian Thinline Tele

guitarz.blogspot.com:

Matt Nowicki of Red Rocket Guitars in the USA custom builds retro boutique guitars such as this Thinline Tele in Heritate Orange, equipped with Fralin Blues Special Tele bridge and a Vintage Vibe "Charlie Christian" in the neck. It also comes with an optional set of magnets and it is wired for volume and tone controls with a premium paper-in-oil tone capacitor on a 4 way switch, which provides for a range of tones from vintage jazzy to hard and bright, and the hum-cancelling position where the sound gets big.

The body is Chambered Ash, double bound with ivoroid and checker purfling, with the controls being rear mounted with exotic wood covers, and also features Red Rocket's very attractive own design f-hole.

The flame maple neck is finished in a vintage tint nitro and has a Paduak fingerboard - real mother of pearl position markers and side dots, '59 LP (.89-.98) profile, 1 11/16” graph-tech nut, 22 medium jumbo stainless frets, machine bolts with threaded inserts, double acting truss rod in heel, 9.5" radius, and a Custom Paduak truss rod head plug.

The vintage style tele bridge has compensated brass barrels, fingerpicker's cutout, 2 extra mounting screws to increase stability and extra thick chrome, the best. Other Hardware includes Electrosocket, Sperzel Trim-lok tuners, and chrome barrel knobs.

G L Wilson

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

The Crucifixion Tele

guitarz.blogspot.com:

Let me begin this post by saying that I really am not trying to offend anyone here. Although I'm not a religious person I would never mock another's faith. However, I found myself totally flabbergasted when I saw this Fender Custom Shop Telecaster complete with crucifixion artwork. I can't imagine that even the most devout Christian would consider that an appropriate scene with which to decorate the front of a guitar. But maybe, I'm wrong. Still, it's little wonder really that the seller describes this guitar as being "in immaculate condition and has not been played."

Thanks for this one, Bill!

G L Wilson

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

Robert Smith's custom Fender Jazzmaster

guitarz.blogspot.com

Robert Smith is famous (amongst guitarists) for his versatility in his guitar choices: for about twenty years - until he finally got his signature guitar by Schecter in 2004, the very appealing Ultracure - he's been changing guitar regularly (Gibson, Fender, Gretsch, National, Hopf, Ovation, Guild, Vox, Mosrite..., all of them black or refinished in black), and from one tour to the next you can see him changing his sound sometimes radically with a different instrument - also in one set he could switch from solid body to semi-hollow to acoustic to 12-string... He's been faithful though to the Fender bass VI that have been essential to the Cure's early sound, but it seems (I'm not sure and I'd like to know more about this) that he's been using lately a one-off Ultracure baritone instead.

But I've been interested lately in his early sound and I realized that his best music (I belong to the people who think that the Cure's best drummer was Lol Tolhurst but this makes sense only for Cure's old school fans) has been composed and played on a customized 1965 Fender Jazzmaster - with the addition in middle position of the neck pickup teared off a plywood cheapo - the Silvertone 313 sold by Woolsworth as the Top 20 (Smith's guitar until 1979, on the picture on the right). I really love this kind of spirit, and laugh at all these tone fetishists who would purchase high-end pickups to upgrade already expensive guitars just to reproduce a vintage sound heard a million times, when one of the most influential musicians of our time created his sound with the lowest grade material!

Originally there's been two of these custom Jazzmasters, the backing one was beige and became the main one, refinished first in white, then in black, and used to record Seventeen Seconds, Faith, Pornography and The Top... I could tell several anecdotes, like Smith chose the Jazzmaster because he saw Elvis Costello playing one on TV, or that he paid his first one 100£ after his producer claimed that he couldn't record an album with his Top 20, or that the guitar was used again for the Trilogy concert in 2003 to play Pornography extensively with its original sound - but if you want this kind of details, you can pick them on impressionofsounds.com or wikicure.com (in French).

Bertram

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

Gibson Flying V limited edition

guitarz.blogspot.com

You won't see this every day! 

Here is a limited edition by Gibson of Rudolf Schenker's trademarck black and white Flying V dedicated by the members of Scorpions, on an east-german flag background, it's unique and it's on the Guitarz blog!

bertram

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

Tele-Galaxy Höfner custom

guitarz.blogspot.com

A smart and discreet mod makes this Tele-Galaxy (I made up the moniker) a very elegant guitar. 

Based on the classic Höfner Galaxie reissue - that originally has 3 mini-humbuckers in a strat-like body -, this hybrid has now a Duesenberg P90 in bridge position and a neck Telecaster single coil (the pickguard has been completely redone and the knobs positioned lower). This - together with the vintage  Hofner trem - looks very good though a little bit strange, and I'm very curious about the sound...

bertram



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

50s Premier/Multivox Custom doubleneck guitar in gold sparkle finish

guitarz.blogspot.com

This Premier doubleneck guitar is one of the craziest looking one I ever saw, and by crazy I don't mean just bizarre for the sake of it, but joyful and eccentric. And it definitely predates the glam era since it's from the 50s - though probably just one of its kind - only the Bigsby and the stoptail have been recently changed. 

I would write more about it but I'm mesmerized by the gold sparkle finish. I think that the ETs are trying to contact me!

bertram

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

Yamaha Pacifica with mirror fingerboard

guitarz.blogspot.com

This mirror fingerboard guitar  is intriguing - at least for me who know very little about fretless guitars. I crossed just a few on my way (but never played one) and they used either hardwood or metal...

Mirror feels a little fragile to me but I can credit the maker of this customization for being innovative - though I wonder why he would do that on a low-end Yamaha Pacifica (unless it's just a prototype)...

If anybody has extra info, it's welcome!

bertram

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

Baker B3 XT Phoenix 5

guitarz.blogspot.com

I'm into Teles lately, and I'm particularly interested when they are the starting points of smart upgrades, such as this Tele/Firebird hybrid Baker B3 XT Phoenix 5 (sounds like a space ship name from a 50s pulp SF novel). This guitar is remarkable a.o. because of its solid mahogany one piece model - body and neck are cut from the same block, that is quite a rare luxury (so the raised center is not a beam on which the wings are glued, but a recall of the Firebird). 

It has the 3 mini-humbuckers (with metal rings) of the Firebird VII (I wish it had banjo tuners too), a stratesque hybrid pickguard and a quite nice transparent sunburst finish that makes sunburst almost agreeable. 

bertram


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

John Paul Jones's Manson Custom Bass Lapsteel

guitarz.blogspot.com

Addendum to my previous Melobar post:

the first time I noticed a Melobar style lapsteel guitar was in a video of Them Crooked Vultures showing John Paul Jones playing a custom made (by Manson, hence the trademark embedded Kaoss pad) strap-on bass lapsteel (photo) - I actually wrote a post about them, but at the time I was more interested in Homme's Maton guitar and Jones's Manson bass mandolin!

I'm not a fan of Them Crooked Vultures' music but I must admit that they have a very good taste in instruments. Besides Jones's Manson lapsteel, we can see in this video Homme playing his MotorAve BelAir and Johannes who took over bass duty with a violin bass that looks like an original Höfner (couldn't see the brand but the headstock shape fits)(can't tell about Grohl's drums, this is out of my domain!).

bertram

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

P-40 Tour Hawk

guitarz.blogspot.com:
This guitar is a tribute to the United States Army Air Corps' Curtiss P-40 Warhawk/Tomahawk/kittyhawk aircraft. Dubbed the Tour Hawk, it is one of 12 such guitars built by Shada Specialties and Wilkins Guitars in Los Angeles. This particular example is currently for sale on eBay with a Buy It Now price of $1500.

G L Wilson

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

Baritone Telecasters

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Yesterday I was surfing the Web tracking exciting guitars (I don't only do that to feed this blog but I fished also a couple of good ideas for my metal front guitar projects) and I found the Trussart Steelcaster Baritone above, that made me aware of something I never suspected before: there are baritone telecasters out there! At first it felt like a contradiction, since for me who love big semi-hollow bodies, the telecaster is such a small guitar!

So I checked around a little bit more and found out that though there are none produced in series, Warmoth and some other guitar parts companies sell baritone conversion tele necks, and that many guitar lovers make and play their own bari-teles like some call them (BTW it's so refreshing to be around guitar fans who don't care about schredding!)

The Trussart is without doubts a limited edition like all Trussart products, and the only other model that is not a conversion is the Don Grosh Electratone Baritone (on the right) that is actually just a prototype - I don't know how many were issued since I just found one, but the blending of a telecaster and a Danelectro feels right and I love lipstick pickups...

Anyway I'm thrilled by the idea of a baritone telecaster and that would be a cool project, I'm tempted...

bertram

edit: I'm told that the Fender Custom Shop actually issued baritone telecasters under the name Bajo Sexto... A quick Internet search shows no more info (but that there are also some called Subsonics) but I'll do a post about this as soon as I know more.

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

Jolana Vikomt with zebra finish

guitarz.blogspot.com

This Jolana Vikomt is of course familiar to you, not only because of its tele-based design, but because it's a one-pickup / hardtail version of the Jolana Iris that I showed here in February.

But this one has an interesting custom paint, obviously from another cultural era! No skulls and no flames and no fake tribal patterns like it seems obligatory these days, but minimal red and grey stripes, and a little bit of industrial yellow on the bridge and tail...

I prefer this humble proletarian pride to all the cliché show-off evil-macho sh***.

bertram

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