Res-O-Glas Nick Page Strich-2

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I regularly check what's going on at Berliner luthier Nick Page (I evoked here a couple of time his Baron model and mentioned his metal front or paisley ultra-cool telecasters), and I'm never disappointed. Today I want to show the res-o-glas body Strich-2, again a perfect combination of old school design and contemporary spirit. The shape is reminiscent of Rickenbacker Combo 600 or Gretsch Astro Jet, with its big upper horn and German carve, but more rounded, probably to increase the resonance of a bigger hollow body made of the res-o-glas you find in 60s original Airline guitars. 

This model has Filtertron pickups, but other ones are equipped with Nick Page custom ones, that is not so common amongst small luthiers. Gear and headstock are also original, and all this confirms that German guitars legacy is still alive, and that small companies keep the spirit high, where fat ones just manage to stay fat.

Bertram

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

1955 Gibson Les Paul Custom

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This  Gibson Les Paul Custom (aka the Black Beauty, aka the Tuxedo since Mister Les Paul himself allegedly requested a black guitar that could be played wearing a tuxedo - that were other times) is some serious vintage stuff since it's a 1955 model - just 3 years after the Les Paul was first released...

And as you can see it has lived a long and active life and grew old honestly and harmoniously, not like these stupid sandpaper relicked fakes that some soulless ignoramuses think are cool.

It's a pre-humbucker model - the Gibson PAF humbucker is from 1955 also - with a bridge P90 and a neck Alnico V. Like the Custom models of the time, it's a full mahogany body, without the usual maple archtop - it makes it lighter with a darker tone.

I always enjoyed showing some ultraclassic guitars here sometimes, hard to do better than this one, isn't it?

Bertram

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

Marma hollow body guitar, from GDR with love

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Due to popular demand, here is another East-German beauty, a Marma hollow-body guitar about which - like usually with Marma - I have no information... But look at it, Marma had the sweetest electric guitars designs in the Eastern-European communist countries, combining elegance, simplicity and creativity.

This one doesn't have the massive aspect that jazz guitars had in West-Germany at the time - though their often extraordinary design, they were so huge! - but a sexy thin waist line, and combines classic F-holes with white binding - beautiful with the subtle sunburst finish - with an art-deco pickguard. You can also recognize the typical stop-tail shared buy all the hollow-body guitars in GDR!

Bertram

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

Italia Maranello (lefty)

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Whenever I see an Italia guitar, I have the feeling that Trev Wilkinson who conceived them really did it for his own pleasure, and that it's kind of him to share...

Not a fan of sparkle finish but I have to admit that this lefty Italia Maranello has the chic of vintage Italian guitars from the 60s (even if this one is actually based of an Hagström model) plus for sure the qualities of modern guitar making (plus the innovative contribution of Mr Wilkinson's hardware...)

Or how to be both tinsel and elegant at the same time...

Bertram

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

A late 30's Harmony made 'Ball McIntire' slide guitar

First of all I want to make an UNRESERVED APOLOGY to Gavin for turning his blog into a circus with an ill considered and childish remark which upset quite a few people.
I feel like the guy who gets invited to someone's party and proceeds to pee in the plant pot.
I hope this entry goes some way to make up for the stress I caused and restores some harmony to these pages. Sorry Gavin.

guitarz.blogspot.com:

Talking of harmony: This very nice looking Ball McIntire guitar on ebay caught my eye as much for it's own intrinsic beauty as for the lengthy and detailed description, not to mention almost enough photos to crash eBay's servers. The seller of this instrument obviously has a great deal of knowledge and interest in guitars. Definitely not one of those who are "selling it for a friend and don't have anything to plug it in to so can't say if works or not". Did I mention the sound clips? Seven (count em) nicely recorded little pieces which showcase the great tone of this, more than seventy year old, guitar. It's worth checking the listing just to read his description while listening to him play.

David in Barcelona

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

the misused Nick Page's Eiserne Baron (what an enigmatic title, isn't it?)

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This week, on my way to rehearsals, I've been passing everyday in the metro by some ugly poster for I don't know which discount shop trying to convince suckers that their lives will be more complete if they watch TV on a flat screen. For some reason there was on this poster a photo of a caricature rock musician holding a engraved metal front guitar with a bizarre headstock...

I managed to not really see it for three days but this morning I realized that, beside the fact that it's quite exceptional to see on a mainstream media an electric guitar that is not Fender or Gibson, I knew this guitar, and I even love it!

It is actually a new version of Nick Page's Baron, a guitar I presented on this very blog last year, and if at that time you didn't check this Berliner luthier's website, I recommend to have a look there; I really appreciate what they do (and I don't say this because their workshop is in my neighborhood  or because they gave me a hand with some of my projects!). They have some cool guitars - original models and standards - and are particularly good with finishes, including aluminium fronts and better paisley Telecasters than Fender ever released!

Let me add here a more dignified picture of the 'Iron Baron', a real beauty with its Rickenbacker-inspired 'crest wave' horns, sober floral pattern engraved aluminium front, sophisticated binding, big stoptail and acoustic guitar-like headstock. Honestly, if I ever get to buy a luthier's guitar, it would be this one!

Bertram

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

More Marma - a pure beauty

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Once again, I have very little to tell about this Marma solid body, but that it has one of the most astonishing designs I've ever seen in a guitar. And it's not only original, it's beautiful, dynamic, elegant, joyful...

I stated this several times already, but I do wish someone would revive this kind of extremely cool European vintage guitars, not only American or Japanese ones like Eastwood does!

bertram

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

Marma hollow body guitar

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Another brand about which I have very little to tell (in these times of vintage worship, I wish someone would seriously write the ultimate book about unknown electric guitars), this time from East-germany. This Marma is not as exuberant as the guitars from West-Germany of the time, but it's very elegant with its classic shape, curved pickguard, sound holes, control plate and tail, and its long tremolo arm.

Marma produced also solid bodies, banjos and some guitar devices that I will present soon here (and all information about Marma is welcome).

bertram

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

Gretsch Historic G3156 Streamliner

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The Gretsch Historic G3156 Streamliner is not Gretsch's most famous hollow body but its discretion is part of its elegance - and the cat's eye sound-holes are beautiful. It's a guitar that doesn't to belong to any musical style, neither with the look or the sound (based on the reviews I read), with its typically Gretsch fat single coils that sound like nothing else.

bertram

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

Rickenbacker 330/12 White

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Not a weirdo, not a one-off, not a rarity, not a vintage guitar, just a Rickenbacker 330/12 - because I love Rickies, 12-string guitars and white finish with a black pickguard... 

It's both classic and surprising with its unique crescent moon double cutaway, the famous R-shaped stoptail, the 3+3+3+3 headstock and the trade mark slash soundhole. Though it's been played by the greatests, it kept un-hackneyed over the last 50 years. 

It's my birthday-and-half today, I will heartily accept this guitar as a present.

bertram

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

Tele-Galaxy Höfner custom

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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!

Prototype Eastman El Rey ER-F

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This Eastman El Rey is exactly the kind of guitar I love: an ultra-classic archtop jazz guitar design smartly distorted to personalize and update its line in an extremely elegant way, and a few killing details, like the round cutaway and the ebony tailpiece and pickguard on a white finish...

For some reason Eastman never released this F-holes version of their El Rey series designed by Otto d'Ambosio, so this prototype is a one-off so far...

bertram

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

Gretsch G6196T Country Club reissue

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And another classy one with a venetian cutaway: this is the ultra-classic Gretsch Country Club G6196T, a hollow-body electric archtop guitar with two pickups and the longest lasting model from Gretsch, this one in Cadillac Green finish, with a Bigsby trem and DeArmond singlecoils.

It's supposed to be noticeable for being played my Mister Bono but if there is a band of which I couldn't ever listen to a single note, it's U2 (except a few bars from an intro of one song used in Pillow Book of Peter Greenaway in the catwalk scene - but Greenaway is a man of good taste who cut the song after 10 seconds).

bertram

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

Godin 5th Avenue Kingpin

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Another archtop/F-holes acoustic guitar, the Godin 5th Avenue Kingpin is one of the coolest recent guitars - the Kingpin being the electrified version, with a P90 in neck position. 

It's just perfect, and Godin rules!

On the top of my GAS list!

bertram


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

1985 Rickenbacker 620 limited edition white

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My main reason to show here a white Rickenbacker 620 is that I love this guitar ever since I bought one more than 20 years ago - I spent more time with this guitar than without, and it's been my first serious guitar.

The 620 is a brilliant guitar, the 6-string equivalent of the legendary 4001 bass, but the 80s short lived white finish/black hardware emphasize perfectly the supreme elegance of its line, the ultimate expression of the historical modernity that exists in a few human productions of the 20th century... And I don't even talk of the sound.

bertram

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

Höfner Jazzica Custom

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I've posted about several incredible vintage German jazz guitars here, but the German touch is not lost, and Höfner for example still releases similar guitars, such as this Jazzica Custom.

This beauty is handmade in Germany and combines a great tradition with contemporary technology and ergonomics... But since I'm not paid to make advertisement for Höfner, I let you check their website if you want to know more...

And even my girlfriend who is completely hermetic to guitars unless they make a lot of noise finds it gorgeous, this tells a lot!

bertram

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

70s Ovation Preacher Deluxe 12-String

guitarz.blogspot.com

Sorry for the small and low quality picture, but an Ovation Preacher Deluxe 12-string 1285 is not a guitar you find on eBay everyday. Anyway, you will get better pics here and here.

You just look at this guitar and you see that the people who built it knew what they were doing!

Ovation solid body guitars were amongst the finest electric guitars ever (in my opinion), and this one is on the top, together with the Breadwinner.

It's always a mystery to me how the whole guitar business ended up revolving around a few brands, independently of the quality of the instruments, so that some companies had to give up excellent products for lack of sales. 

bertram

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

Jolana Tornado

guitarz.blogspot.com

This early 60s Jolana Tornado is a pure beauty, and has a good reputation as a player too, compared to average east-European communist era electric guitars.

I like the wide pickguard - unusual on a semi-hollow body -, the headstock is perfect in his simplicity and originality, the tremolo (at least aesthetically) could have become a standard, and above all I love the chrome switches - this is better than any Italian vintage guitar!

Would anybody buy my right kidney so I can buy this guitar?

bertram

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

Ibanez Les Paul Custom Agent 2405

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Like the people who sell this Ibanez Les Paul Custom on eBay say, this guitar is more than a very good copy of a Gibson (from the lawsuit era), it's a real homage to the brand, combining the body of the LP with the headstock of their mandolin models.

Add to that the mother-of-pearl inlays, and you have a remarkable, beautifully classic and slightly bizarre instrument... (and it's the first time that I like a sunburst finish, isn't it weird!)

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!

Duesenberg Starplayer TV Outlaw

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A couple of weeks ago I posted about Duesenberg guitars and I said I would post soon about my favorite Duesenberg model, the Starplayer TV Outlaw.

Here it is with its beautiful/kitsch black alligator finish, thinline body, neck P90 PU and bridge humbucker, chrome art deco pickguard, the famous upgraded Bigsby-like tremolo...

Here again, the photo is too nice and the guitar brand new, I still wish I'd see how this guitar looks after a few years of stage!

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!