Jackson USA Custom Shop King V doubleneck

guitarz.blogspot.com:

This Jackson USA Custom Shop King V doubleneck is an exercise in excess with its over-sized quilted maple topped body, dual through-necks, reverse pointy headstocks, gold hardware, mother of pearl sharkfin inlays, etc. I have to confess that I'm not a fan. I never did like the Jackson pointy headstock design - it just looks totally incongruous on just about any body design, and quilted maple I'm sure is supposed to imply opulence but to me it just seems like an unimaginative short-cut to tarting up a guitar's appearance. Many would be impressed, but I have to stifle a yawn.

Flying V? Flying W more like!

Currently being offered for sale on eBay with a Buy It Now price of $9,999.99.

G L Wilson

© 2011, Guitarz - The Original Guitar Blog - now in its 10th year!

Gordon Smith GS1 doubleneck

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Doublenecks can be ungainly, cumbersome beasts. They can be seen by some as a little ridiculous, displaying all the excesses of the pretentious prog rock era. You didn't see too many punk bands playing doublenecks, did you?

But if you have to have one, how about this beautiful Gordon Smith GS1 12+6 doubleneck with set necks and an understated natural satin finish on mahogany, and with two pairs of coil-tappable humbuckers for a wide range of tones? This auction is finishing in two days time; it has a starting price of £550 and no-one has bid yet.

Gordon Smith guitars, handcrafted in the UK, have a solid reputation for producing high quality instruments at very reasonable prices. The designs are, in the main, reminiscent of those of Gibson with the GS series having a LP Jr influence. They have the feel of bespoke handmade guitars, whilst also making excellent workhorse instuments.

G L Wilson

Edit: Looks like it sold for the starting price of £550. Someone got a bargain!

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

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!

Happy New Year and a vintage Dano Doubleneck!

guitarz.blogspot.com:

Happy New Year to all our readers! And congratulations to ourselves for with this post we enter our 10th year of blogging! For this occasion I am showing you this vintage Danelectro doubleneck guitar and bass in copperburst finish, and the necks of which conveniently form a figurative 11 - very handy for the occasion!

Seeing as Danelectros were produced as strictly budget instruments using the cheapest of materials (with bodies of hardboard on a pine frame), the idea of a doubleneck instument does seem slightly incongruous. Note how both the guitar and bass necks are the same length. However, this is still a short-scale bass rather than ultra-short. Most short scale basses have the bridge mounted further into the body; here it is as far back as it will go. It's the neck that is shorter than usual.

This particular instrument was owned and played by George Worthmore who has regularly used it for the last 30 years with such artists as Rick Derringer and the Jack Cassidy Band.

G L Wilson

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

Self-playing doubleneck Telecaster - The Doppelcaster

guitarz.blogspot.com:



Bertram is, I guess, one of those people that balks at blowing his trumpet so I guess it's up to me. There is a whole bunch of interesting musical things going on over at Dhellemmes Towers. Not only has he finished making his Dopplecaster but he has now featured it as an artwork/installation at the Akademie Schloss Solitude in Stuttgart. Beautiful it looks and beautiful it sounds, as you can see below.



David in Barcelona

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!

MOJO magazine ask you to name Dengue Fever's doubleneck

guitarz.blogspot.com:

L.A.'s Dengue Fever - described by MOJO as playing "Cambodian party pop from the pre-Khmer Rouge swinging '60s" - are inviting readers to bestow a name upon the unique instrument pictured here. The strange amalgam of Fender Jazzmaster and Chapei Dong Veng (a traditional Cambodian two-stringed guitar) was created by friend of the band Mel Bergman and it now needs a name.

The reader who submits the best name will take home signed vinyl copies of DF's Escape and Venus albums, while a runner-up will win all four of the band's LPs on CD. The band will choose the winners.

Enter here

(Thanks to Mark Bannister for bringing this to my attention).

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

Julian Cope and The Beast

guitarz.blogspot.com:

Julian Cope is one of my all-time favourite artists and is also quite the guitar collector. One time at a gig I attended in Oxford, between songs he swapped a white Gibson SG Junior for another almost identical just because he fancied changing guitars.

Anyway, I've always wondered about his doublenecked non-reverse Firebird/Thunderbird nicknamed "The Beast" (not that I've personally seen it in action) and whether or not it was an actual Gibson or a custom build.

Earlier I stumbled upon this interview in which Cope reveals that "The guitar was made by Valdez in Los Angeles in 1971, from a 1967 non reverse Thunderbird IV and a 1968 non reverse Firebird."

Just thought I'd share that with you.

Photo: Promo shot of Julian Cope wielding the doubleneck Firebird / Thunderbird for his CORNUCOPEA festival at the South Bank Centre, April 2000.

G L Wilson

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

What the?????? The Destroyer

guitarz.blogspot.com:

While we are on an art theme, lets talk about art... and guitars. From the previous sorry attempt to something altogether much more interesting and I believe, more artistic on every level. If a guitar can be a work of art, I think this is one that deserves the tag.

This Guitar, The Destroyer, was built by luthier Mark Dalzell for the 2007 Jersey City Studio Artists Tour, which seems to be an "open studios" not a music tour.

Firstly, it looks amazing and secondly it looks like it was built by someone who knows what he's doing. He certainly does.

I'm going to list the features in Marks own words:

- Double neck 6-string guitar, 4-string mandolin
- Onboard digital effects Distortion, Chorus and Flanger
- Onboard analog "Theremaniacs" theremin
- Onboard chromatic tuner
- Scalloped brass nut on guitar and mandolin
- LED fret markers
- LED pickup indicators
- 1/4 scalloped neck on guitar
- 6-bolt neck
- Matching amplifier
- 60's styled chrome accents

It is well worth spending a little time checking out his Flickr stream to see some of his other creations, not to mention some spiffing shots of his Vermont 2009 golfing holiday. And don't miss the opportunity to check out his "Incredible Stupephone" on Youtube. It made my day and I hope it has the same effect on you.

David in Barcelona

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

Kenneth Lawrence doubleneck Explorer

guitarz.blogspot.com:
Instruments like this Kenneth Lawrence doubleneck Explorer - with two six-string necks, 24.75" and 27.75" (baritone) respectively - are certainly very impressive looking creations. This particular guitar is currently being offered for sale on eBay with a Buy It Now price of $18,250.00. The body is made from mahogany topped with premium Hawaiian Koa, and accented here and there with the same plus snakewood for the knobs and pickup rings. It certainly makes for a very eye-catching instrument.

And yet...

Apart from the almost certain likelihood that it's quite an impractical guitar (how often would you need both necks on the same song?) and is almost certainly monolithically heavy, there's something about the guitar that positively screams "Do not touch!" And at that price I think I'd be scared to touch it. I get the feeling that it's not so much a guitar but more a very expensive work of art or else a showpiece demonstrating the luthier's craft. One can imagine that here is one guitar destined to spend its life inside a glass display cabinet - and that's a shame.

G L Wilson

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

Not just RARE but EXTRA RARE. Soviet rare doubleneck guitar YEREVAN #089 double neck

This is one of my favourite eBay sellers. Not because I've ever bought anything from him (yet) but simply because of the wonderful instruments he digs up. AND THIS BEAUTY IS NO EXCEPTION.

Those Soviet manufacturers were no slackers when it came to souping up the humble six string. This one even has an extra neck. Not to mention enough wood in the body to make three normal guitars. I've not heard of Yeravan until now but this is certainly an eye opener and I will be researching this brand in the not too distant future.

To be perfectly honest, it's not really my cup of tea but it does have a decidedly WTF aspect to it that would be hard to ignore. The solid black colour is pretty restrained considering the shape of the body and the pick ups are nicely understated but the single horn and the strange shape of the rear edge, the mismatched headstocks, the apparently cheese cutter action all conspire to make this hard to justify it's $500 (plus shipping) price tag. To me, the word "rare" is bandied about a bit too much in the vicinity of odd guitars. And don't get me started on "extra rare". That should only be applied to steaks, according to my missus. It may well be extra rare but in this instance, I'd say there was a very good reason.

David in Barcelona

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Teddybears play Bo Diddley-esque Gibsons

guitarz.blogspot.com:
I'm not sure if you've ever heard of the band Teddybears STHLM, or as they are nowadays known as The Teddybears. It's a Swedish band starting out as a hardcore/grindcore band back in the early 90s, but have since then changed their music in a completely different direction. Nowadays they are a lot more electro-influenced, etc, and outside of Sweden they are probably most know for their songs featured in Heineken beer commercials and such, or that they have been working with Iggy Pop a bit.

Anyways, Last night I went to one of their shows in Malmö, Sweden, and I just couldn't happen to notice the two guitars they were playing during the show. One of the guitars was a double neck (Bass+Guitar), and the other one a bass, and they were both wearing the Gibson headstock and logo.

One thing that I noticed was that the "guitar neck" of the double neck had the famous "SG" stamped on the truss rod cover.

Another very obvious thing about these guitars and basses is that they have the bo diddley-shoe box shaped bodies, with a mirror/disco ball finish.

I've tried to contact them via emails and telephone, but I've not gotten any response from them.

Anyways, I know the music is not really for everybody, but their shows are awesome, and I think you should check them out.

Well, I hope I've given you something that you'd might feature on the blog. If you don't find the info I've given you so far blog-worthy enough, I would suggest that you would check them out further. I've been to a few of their shows, and they are always improving more and more.

Sorry to bother you! Take care, and thank you tons and tons for this great blog!

Pelle Rydstern

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

Ron Marr's doubleneck CBG

guitarz.blogspot.com:
Hi.

Since an electric cigar box guitar wasn't quite ridiculous enough, I decided I should build myself a double-neck. Thought you might get a kick out of this.

The bottom neck is a 2-string, longneck slide bass (ala Stig Pederson). The custom nut is a hunk of bolt I hacksawed and spray painted. The tailpiece is a chunk of angle iron.

The top neck is a 3-stringer with a low action ... better for me as I do a lot of finger picking (it really is fast ... and for once I even nailed the intonation). Note the fancy-schmancy tailpiece that began its life as a pie spatula.

The homemade necks (steel reinforced ... and rounded with a bastard file) are bolt ons using helicoil inserts and gobs of JB Weld. Oh ... and lets not forget those hand-carved headstocks. Last but not least, in order to take overkill to new heights, I covered the Punch cigar box with a lacewood veneer

I'm thinking my next project may be an electric harp guitar with a 1-gallon oil can for a body.

Great blog ... I check it out most every day.

Ron Marr


Thanks Ron. As ever we are always pleased to receive photos of readers' self-builds. Funnily enough, only last night I was watching a few YouTube clips of The Presidents of the United States of America, a band known for their minimalistic 2- and 3-string guitars (dubbed the basitar and the guitbass respectively). In one clip, Chris Ballew is seen playing a doubleneck basitar/guitbass with a total of 5 strings on it.

G L Wilson

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!

Greg Lake's Zemaitis doubleneck

guitarz.blogspot.com:

Greg Lake used to feel a bit shortchanged next to his colleagues in Emerson, Lake and Palmer. Carl Palmer had a huge battery of drums and Keith Emerson was surrounded on all sides by keyboards. Meanwhile Greg Lake is standing there with just a guitar. Not only did he try to re-dress the balance of things by marking his territory on stage with a large antique Persian rug, but he also got himself this simply enormous doublenecked guitar/bass.

Apparently it was one of only two doublenecks built by the now legendary Tony Zemaitis. Unfortuantely it was also extremely heavy, and so Lake was unable to play it onstage for more than a couple of songs. Deciding it was too impractical, he eventually gave it away. Considering the value of original Zemaitis guitars (as opposed to the recent Japanese tributes - and they are costly enough!), he must be kicking himself now.

I wonder where it is now?

G L Wilson

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

Gibson EDS1250 doublenecked bass

guitarz.blogspot.com:
We've all seen Gibson doubleneck guitars before - indeed the Gibson must be the best known exponent of this particular type of instrument - but I, for one, have certainly never set eyes before on a Gibson doubleneck bass with four-string and six-string necks.

Made in 1970, this is allegedly one of only eight such instruments built. Note that the seller insists on referring to the 6-string neck as a "baritone", but it was much more likely conceived as a 6-string bass especially given the date.

G L Wilson

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

Gordon Giltrap's doubleneck electric/acoustic 12/6-string

guitarz.blogspot.com:

Hello again.

See the attachment. I found out that this photo of 12/6 strings acoustic/electric gtr is from Visionary album cover but what is this model?

Thanks.

-Latvis

Ah yes, I remember watching a TV programme back in the day, on which Gordon Giltrap was a guest and was showing some of his guitars including this very doubleneck. I remember this like it was yesterday, because I was at my grandmother's house and her sister was also there, and they were saying "Oooh, I've never seen one like that before!", and I was like "Yeah, I've seen doublenecks."

Anyway, you didn't ask for my family reminiscences. The guitar is, I believe, a one-off by the luthier John Bailey. If you do a Google search for "Gordon Giltrap doubleneck", John Bailey is the name that keeps cropping up, so I'm pretty sure that's what this one is.

If any Giltrap fans know otherwise, then please let us know!

G L Wilson


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

August Carlstedt Ideal Harp Guitar

guitarz.blogspot.com:

This harp guitar by August Carlstedt is not the kind of instrument that turns up very often on eBay. The seller has listed it as a "double neck" and I suppose that is not an innaccurate description of it, but you'll notice from the closeness of the upper neck carrying the sub-bass strings to the main neck that the sub-bass strings are not meant to be fingered (I won't say "fretted" for obvious reasons). The sub-basses are intended to be plucked as open strings - the neck is there merely to support these strings. The designs of harp guitar vary wildly; many other brands employed winged extensions to the body where this guitar has the extra neck. I assume that the fretless fingerboard on this example is there for aesthetic purpose only.

I note that currently the guitar has only two of its four sub-bass strings present. Possibly, in its current condition with cracked body top it would not be wise to string it up with the full complement of strings. I am curious as to the presence of four additional bridge pins on the treble-side of the guitar's bridge, which would suggest that the guitar may have had even more extra strings. However, there are no tuners present on the treble side of the body, nor marks to indicate where they may once have been. Could the four extra bridge pins be merely an aesthetic touch so as give provide visual balance to the whole bridge design?

August Carlstedt, by the way, lived from 1861 to 1928 and was a Swedish immigrant who ran a shop in Chicago during the early 20th century, building instruments under the Ideal brand.

This beautiful antique guitar is, as already mentioned, in need of some restoration. No doubt it will appeal to a collector of harp guitars; hopefully someone who will lavish some attention on it.

For more on harp guitars, see the excellent www.harpguitars.net website.

G L Wilson

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

Jerry Jones Danelectro Longhorn Baritone Doubleneck

guitarz.blogspot.com

Yes, this guitar is everything the title of this post says: a Danelectro model reissued by Jerry Jones Guitars (who started to build Danelectro models when the brand had disappeared for almost 3 decades - with the claim of actually upgrading them) in 1987, a longhorn guitar - one of the coolest design ever, and quite interesting in term of ergonomics (I'm a longhorn player myself) - and a doubleneck guitar with a baritone neck (only Danelectro and Gretsch do that if I'm not wrong), that is to me the sensible thing to have for a doubleneck guitar...

For those who never played a Danelectro, it's quite an minimalist experience when you're used to heavy body heavy gear guitars, and the lipstick pickups have an unique sound... This is an instrument I'd definitly play, if I could find it with a regular black finish and not this hideous 'copperburst' disaster...

Why, but why do they spoil guitars with these ugly finishes (this applies to several earlier posts too)?

bertram

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!

Two become one: Tiago's modular doubleneck

guitarz.blogspot.com:
Doublenecks always look impressive on stage and are a sure temptation to any guitarist afflicted with GAS (Guitar Aquisition Syndrome), but in use they can be quite cumbersome and unwieldy.

If you've got to have a doubleneck the best option would be to have a modular instrument that can be split into two individual single-necked guitars when desired. That way you have two guitars for the studio and a doubleneck for live performances.

The guitar(s) pictured here belong(s) to Guitarz reader Tiago Sarmento from Brazil. Here's what he has to say about it/them [note: a modular doubleneck plays merry havoc with semantics - is it a single object or two?]... Anyway:

Mahogany body with two (now you can help me in english terms) ipê-tobacco stringers. Is that the right term, with those stripes on the back with different woods? Anyway, ipê is a national tree from Brazil, and it adds sort of a higher vibrations to compensate the dense mahogany body. The neck is brazilian rosewood.

The 12 string part has a "12/6" F-hole. Is that after the Mad Hatter sign on his top hat, since I'm a big fan of Alice in Wonderland book. In the book, the hat says "10/6", but I added a "poetic license" there and put the 12 instead. Quite obviously why. The "In this style" adhesive - was supposed to be a pirograph - is complementary to the tag on Hatter's hat.

The inlay is slightly different from the 6 strings part, and has tha Fleur-de-Lis and a roman numeral "II" in mother-of-pearl and the branches in abalone. The pickups are a custom made from Brazil called Stelfner and they are built after the burstbuckers. It has a piezo pick up. The mini toggles are on for the piezzo (position 1= only piezzo; 2= piezzo plus electric and 3= only electric). The f-hole has a blue led light inside, and looks quite psychedelic in the dark. The second mini-toggle splits the pick ups into single.

The 6 string is quite the same, but when they're together, the lower part controls all the electronics. So it has 9 knobs. Each different so it facilitates the know which is which. The leds now are blue and likewise the 12, is on the top of each knob and on the scale, side-by-side with those white dots. The pick ups here are all gibson: 490t, p-94 and busrtbucker II. Mini toggles works the same way.

Each, of course, has its complementary parts. The luthier signs as KIAN GUITARS and these is my personal brand, Lizzie. In the back of the headstock there's a drawing. 12 = a mad hatter caricature and the 6 of mine, in a artistic design similar to my project's logo.

I've not edited the above because I'd prefer to leave it in Tiago's voice, as it were. However, I think it's all quite clear what he's talking about, and I'd like to thank him for sharing this with us.

Keep those interesting pictures and stories of your guitars coming in, guys!

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!