I’ve always had a love-hate relationship with accordions, largely due to my forehead-slapping reaction to being forced to watch the Lawrence Welk Champagne Hour as a kid.  Well, “forced” is probably strong, but back then you only had one TV if you were lucky enough to have one at all.  So, smiling accordion players it was if that’s what your parents wanted.  At least the Lennon Sisters were hot.  On the other hand, I’ve also heard solo accordionists playing on street corners of Society Hill in Philly and I confess it was awfully romantic.  In either case, the fact is, you just can’t seem to avoid accordions if you’re going to talk about Italian guitars.

Modern piano accordions were invented in Germany in around 1863 and almost immediately one showed up in Castelfidardo, Italy, on the northwest coast of the Adriatic near the mouth of the Po River.  Castelfidardo has been the accordion capital of the world ever since.  Piano accordions showed up in the U.S. in the early 20^th Century and, like most things, had several waves of popularity.  The biggest came in the early 1950s when young Baby Boomers—my sister was one—caught the accordion bug.  The sudden rage for accordions was huge and Italian Americans who played accordions and were in the music business went nuts starting music schools and ordering accordions from Italian factories that ramped up production big time.  There were huge accordion orchestras of smiling children.  

Then, after a couple of great years, people lost interest, overnight.  My sister’s accordion went into the closet.  Most of the Italian-American accordion concerns entered a period of depression.  Long story short, at the end of the 1950s along came Folk Music and a thirst for guitars.  Italy had a long tradition of guitar-making inherited from Spanish rule for centuries.  A few accordion manufacturers threw their hats into the ring and opened up guitar operations. Oliviero Pigini (EKO guitars) was one.  Other accordion makers partnered with people who knew how to make guitars and exploited their American export relationships to supply guitars where once it was all accordions.

Picture: 1974 JG 300

JG guitars fell into the former bucket.  Finding out about European-made guitars—especially Italian guitars—is not easy if you’re in North America.  Many of the people who were active importing these in the late ‘50s and early ‘60s are no longer with us.  I was fortunate enough to talk with folks at LoDuca Bros. in Milwaukee, who imported EKOs, but by the time I figured the other connections out, the opportunities to recover at least the American side of the story were lost.  Still, not all is hopeless.  If you’re interested in European (especially Italian) guitars, you should bookmark fetishguitars.com.  Run by Jack Marchal and Stefano Aria, this site has been digging into European guitars for some years now.  This site began more like an Italian version of Dan Forte’s old Teisco Del Rey columns in Guitar Player back in the 1970s, viewing these sometimes fruity artifacts with tongue in cheek.  However, as time has passed and they learned more, the approach has become more serious and they now provide some of the best information available on these curiosities.

I always knew that JG guitars were made in Europe, but I also thought they were also sold primarily in Europe.  Turns out I was wrong on the latter point.  According to Fetishguitars.com JG guitars were made for Giulietti & Son Accordion Co. of New York City.  The company had been founded by the accordionist Luigi Giulietti in 1923 sourcing his accordions from the Serranelli factory in Italy.  Upon Luigi’s passing in 1950, the shop was taken over his son Julio, who changes accordion supplier to Zerosette.  Zerosette had been founded after World War II by 7 partners with experience in making accordions and remains a major accordion manufacturer.  With the rise of the guitar beginning in the late 1950s, Zerosette decided to open a guitar-making arm.

I don’t know if Zerosette ever made acoustic guitars, like Pigini/EKO did.  However, when the demand for electric guitar began to pick up in the early 1960s, Zerosette became a major Italian supplier.  Brands produced at Zerosette you may know include Goya (for Hershman), Contessa (Höhner), and Sano, among others.  

Zerosette produced JG and Juliett guitars for Julio Giulietti’s shop in New York.  The JG 300 seen here has no serial number and is impossible to date.  However, during the 1960s most Italian guitars looked like 1960s guitars.  This has the smack of being a Les Paul copy.  By the end of the 1960s most European guitars had been eclipsed by Japanese guitars, so not many were being sold in North America.  The copying of American guitar designs by Japanese makers didn’t begin until 1969.  European guitar-makers also indulged in copying American designs, but their copies tended to be more in the nature of “inspirations” rather than attempts to make close reproductions, as the Japanese did.  

I suspect that this is an early 1970s guitar.  It still has the ‘60s-style Van Ghent tuners.  Overall, the workmanships is quite good and this plays and sounds very nicely.  Controls are two volumes and two tones run through a master volume, with is a little odd.  It’s not a professional instrument like a Les Paul, but it looks very cool.  As far as I can tell, these probably did not receive very wide distribution, probably about as much as Giulietti accordions!  Still, it’s orange and pretty unusual!  I think I’m going to strap it on, put on my widest, toothiest smile…and think about the Lennon Sisters.

By Michael Wright

The Different Strummer

Mama’s Got a Squeezebox (Again): the 1974 JG 300 from MyRareGuitars.com

Peavey T-15 guitar – sunburst

I was talking to my buddy – a professional blues player – a great player who has an impeccable ear for tone, telling him about my new (well, used…but new to me) really outstanding amp, a Peavey Delta Blues. He said to me, “you lost me when you used Peavey and Blues in the same sentence.” And while I could have gone on about some of the southern blues players that, in fact, did and still do use Peaveys (both guitars and amps), I kept my mouth shut. I could have even gone into a minor history lesson about Lynyrd Skynyrd using the very powerful and tuneful competition for the 70’s Fender Twin Reverbs – the Peavey Mace (with SIX 6L6 power tubes inspiring all those Zippos to flame up every night during “Free Bird”).

But if you think many guitar players’ reaction to Peavey amps is dismissive, just try selling them on the brilliant (Yes. Brilliant. There. I said it.) T-Series of Peavey guitars (many made from the late 70’s-mid 80’s, though most dying a quiet death in the early 80’s). At best, you may get a chuckle that suggests you know nothing. Or a comment about how ugly they are (not an uncommon thought…and actually, with some models, perhaps the most valid criticism of the series). Or even an incredulous reaction: “Are you kidding? Peavey? Peavey guitars? Please.”

But why this reaction to Peavey guitar equipment? Especially the guitars themselves. So long as we’re not talking about an abomination like the pink Adrian Vandenberg signature model of the late 80’s…ouch. Yes…Peavey deserved all mocking and humiliation for that clunker.

One of my main theories for why Peavey is taken most seriously for their PA’s and audio equipment, and at times very seriously for their amps, and almost not seriously at all for their guitars (especially, paradoxically and oddly, for what is their classic period when they were making as good or better guitars than either Fender or Gibson) is for one unfortunate reason: they had almost no recognition at the time as a guitar builder. And they committed a cardinal sin in the guitar business: they were (and still are, for many players) pretty uncool and, at best, aesthetically boring. No way to get a new line of guitars off the ground.

Peavey T-15 and some better-known models

And while we guitar players tend to think we are somewhat radical and hardly conservative, consumers in the guitar market are like consumers in most other markets – they go with brand names they know other people think highly of. And in the late 70’s, that meant—more or less—Fender and Gibson. Even if those companies were producing, it is now widely agreed, some of the worst instruments they have ever made.

Of course, this is an oversimplification—the very existence of Eastwood Guitars points to the fact that there is a market for guitar players who want to stand out from the Strat, Tele, and Les Paul crowd. But, I’d argue, that market was pretty much absent in the late 70’s. It’s only over the last 15-20 years that we have seen a steady growth of interest in some of the most interesting and wild guitars of the 60’s.

The Rare Guitars Revival

The (steadily over the last fifteen/twenty years) increasing interest in Harmonys, Danos, Valcos, some of the best Kays, and others has been caused, I’d argue, by a two-prong desire among guitar players:

1. As vintage Fenders and Gibsons—and brands Guild, Gretsch, and Epiphones and others—started to skyrocket in price, players on a limited budget still wanted to get their hands on a piece of guitar history and vintage gear. And,
2. Players discovered (or rediscovered, as many baby boomers first instruments were affordable 60’s models) that a lot of these budget/catalog guitars from the garage boom of the mid 60’s just happened to be pretty great guitars.

And they were—and this is not to be minimized—cool. In 1979, just about everyone was playing a guitar by a major company. And many of these were the traditional, yet boring designs that hadn’t changed much from the 1950’s.

Even before players such as Jack White brought his radical, funky red resolglass Airline to the masses, you’d had a quiet, yet growing groundswell of underground 80’s and 90’s bands playing inexpensive guitars that are now classics—but were, at the time—simply affordable, weird guitars that set them apart from mainstream bands. Hey, if your band wasn’t mainstream, why play a mainstream guitar? This was even true of some of the higher profile players/bands, with people like Elvis Costello and Tom Verlaine and Steve Wynn dusting off Jazzmasters—which, by the late 70’s, were considered pawn shop crud. Or, if not crud, hardly a guitar that had been by far Fender’s most expensive guitar in the 1963 catalog. By comparison, Strat was very fairly priced (by comparison…it was still pricey for the day), and Teles and Esquires (not to mention, later, Mustangs) were positively relatively cheap.

But even lower on the food chain were the Airlines, the Silvertones, the Harmonys, the Danos. In the early 80’s, Karl Precoda used a Silvertone-branded Harmony H78 (with a missing middle goldfoil) on the Dream Syndicate’s classic The Days of Wine and Roses, an album that was widely praised at the time for bringing back long and aggressive duel guitar to underground rock—with a band that owed more to, say, Quicksilver Messenger Service and the Velvet Underground than to any South Bay Hardcore. All of this with Precoda’s feedback-laden killer tone out of his Harmony.  East Bay Ray, from the Dead Kennedys, was famous for using off-brand guitars, often seen with then forgotten/unknown various Valco/Airline resoglass models over a decade before Jack White hit the national stage. No one was like him in bands of the time.

And then perhaps the band who perhaps most single-handedly showed their audience a plethora of cool 1960’s rare and funky and (at the time) forgotten guitars: Anton Newcome’s hollowbody Vox Cheetah he uses this day…over the years, he’s also used a Silvertone 1454L (the Silvertone model number for the Harmony/Airline H78—one of Eastwood great Airline reissues), Vox 12 strings…while brilliant former lead guitar player Jeff Davies was seen on stage with Hagstroms and Harmonys, and sometime bassist/sometime guitarist Matt Hollywood was often seen with a two pickup Rocket.

Brian Jonestown Massacre, dusting off vintage guitars…

Peavey T-Series

But, back to the Peaveys of the early 80’s. In some ways, picking a guitar (at least in part…no one plays a piece of crap just because it looks radical and unique) because it looks cool seems like a pretty shallow reason for picking you main/stage guitar. Because it is.

Still, I can understand why players might have shied away from the T-Series at first. The flagship and top of the line, the T-60, is a pretty unattractive guitar. While some people who LOVE them tend to say things on forums like, “it’s so ugly, it’s beautiful.” And while there are some people who do actually think the T-60 is a good looking guitar, they are in the vast minority. And remember, these are on forums for people who absolutely love these guitars. The general guitar playing public, if they are at all familiar with the T-60, tend to think of them as pretty uninspired designs at best, and pretty damn ugly at worst.

Peavey T-60: ugly, or so-ugly-it’s-beautiful?

But the T-Series was built in a way that revolutionized the guitar making industry. Peavey was the first to construct necks with a computerized copy lathe. By using computers, every neck came out exactly the same for the first time in guitar making history. This is now used throughout the guitar industry. This technology also allowed Peavey to produce guitars that were at least the equal to the quality of Fender and Gibson, yet significantly lower their production costs.

In 1978 (the first year of the T-60’s production), these were the prices of Fender’s Strat, Gibson’s Les Paul, and Peavey’s T-60:

Les Paul: Nearly $1,000

Stratocaster: $790

T-60: $375

And maybe that was another problem for Peavey. Maybe guitarists had the perception that a guitar that sold for so much less couldn’t possibly be the equal of the big names. But that simply wasn’t true (even if they weren’t nearly as good looking).

But the best—or most compelling and surprising—guitar in the T Series may be the T-15. This was a guitar that Peavey marketed as a beginner’s guitar, or a professional guitar for “players with smaller hands.” It’s become known over the years as the “Mississippi Mustang”—a reference, obviously, to Fender’s much more famous short scale classic—the Mustang.

Peavey T-15 in sunburst

The Fender Mustang had/has a 24” scale and a fast, comfortable neck that not only makes single note runs easy to speed up, but also offers a comfortable reach for more complex chords than many longer scale guitars allow and, lastly, makes bending easier up and down the neck. 

If you’re a player who enjoys playing the Mustang’s 24” scale, you might well love the T-15’s 23.5” scale. This, combined with a thin, flat, very fast neck, makes for an ease of playing that’s hard to describe. I’ve never player another guitar quite like it. It not only allows all of the benefits I mention above with the Mustang, but it makes double country bends enormously easy once you get used to the effortlessness of the bends. It may be why the guitar found early popularity with country players—with its ability to lend itself to complex country pedal steel-like bends. I have fallen in love with the 23.5” scale—which happens to be very rare and the same scale as the Gibson Byrdland (a short scale that’s also a favorite of Ted Nugent, which I pray is the only thing he and I have in common with the exception that we are both carbon based life forms).

Though, while the whole T Series of Peaveys first found the majority of their players in the country field, the T-15 is becoming more and more popular in indie rock. Some of the big reasons for this could be the one of a kind Peavey Super Ferrite pickups, which sound like a powerful cross between P90’s and some of the twang of a bridge Tele. But they have a sound all their own. Peavey also has the nice feature of there being no treble loss when you roll off the volume knob—the guitar keeps its tone no matter how low you roll off the volume.

Peavey T-15 in natural

Other features of the guitar are a three way pickup switch and a single tone and volume knob that controls both pickups. There’s a metal nut much like some of the classic Danelectros, which is nice because they never seem to wear down like many of the plastic ones that need to be replaced after many years of work. And while some of the higher end models, like the T-60, are famous for their excessive weight (some are reported to weigh more than a Les Paul—though the colored and sunburst ones supposedly weigh less than the more common natural wood finish), the T-15 is a very light and comfortable instrument. It, too, came most often in a natural wood finish, with much more rare versions made in both sunburst and walnut. According to Peavey’s literature at the time, the T-15’s body is made of “southern hardwood” whatever that might exactly be. The radius is 12”. And the neck is made of hard rock maple. It all adds up to a first-rate guitar. A Mississippi Mustang, indeed.

Lastly, while most of the T-15’s came with Peavey’s custom fit plastic cases, some (hardly all, but some) came with a 10 watt solid state amplifier in/with the case—harkening back to the classic Silvertone (made by Dano) Amp-in-Case of the 60’s.  The better one, of course, being the one that came with the two pickup 1457. Complete with a deep tremolo and a great tube sound driven by a single 6V6. While the T-15’s Peavey solid state amplifier hardly comes close to the greatness of the Silvertone Amp-in-Case, it does have some beautiful cleans and serviceable overdrive. But it’s hardly the same, even if it’s a cool and nostalgic feature.

For now, the T-15’s are still pretty affordable for such a great, professional grade guitar. They play like butter, and they have pickups like you’ve never heard, but will want to her a lot more once you do. Grab one before the price starts going up. The T-60’s have already been discovered. Grab the T-15 while you can.   

– guest article by Rob Roberge.

WATCH: PEAVEY T-15 DEMO 

Peavey T-15: the “Mississippi Mustang” from MyRareGuitars.com

Vintage 1976 Burns Flyte Electric Guitar

Now, the Burns Flyte is definitely a step up from the Tux-master, but not such a very big one. James Ormston Burns (1925-1998) began designing guitars in around 1958 when he made a short scale Supersound guitar for the musician Ike Isaacs. In 1959 Burns teamed up with Henry Weill to form the Burns-Weill company, producing the rather ungainly forebears of last month’s featured Tux-master. Burns and Weills apparently weren’t a match made in heaven and they had parted ways before the year was out. In 1960 Burns struck out on his own, founding Burns London Ltd. And putting out what’s now a legendary line of soldibody electric guitars.

Probably the most famous feature on Burns guitars of the 1960s was the setting called “Wild Dog” on the Bison and some other models. I can remember not being able to wait to plug in mine when I got it. Wild Dog!! A snarl? Growl? Sharp bark? Imagine my disappointment when I learned that Wild Dog was simply a somewhat weak phase-reversal effect like you get in-between pickups on a Strat! Now there was the marketing department run amok!

Burns guitars quickly won the hearts of British guitar players…there were, indeed, few other quality options. Plus, they arrived at just about the time that teenagers were trading in their Skiffle washboards for their first electric guitars in order to play that new music from the Colonies.

Vintage 1976 Burns Flyte Electric Guitar

Meanwhile, in the former Colonies, guitars—especially electrics—had become hot commodities among the young. And there were lots of young folks, the Post-War Baby Boomers, hitting the right age to become a “market.” Savvy businessmen wanted in on the gold mine. Companies as diverse as Norlin (a brewing conglomerate) and CBS (TV, movies, and records) started buying guitar companies (Gibson and Fender, respectively).

Into the corporate feeding frenzy jumped the Baldwin Piano and Organ Company. At least it was in the musical instrument business to begin with! Initially Baldwin was a bidder for Fender, but lost out to CBS. On the rebound, Baldwin set its eyes on Burns of London and in 1965 began importing Baldwin-badged versions of Jim Burns’ guitars.

However, Baldwin’s affair with Burns was relatively short-lived. In 1966 Baldwin struck a deal to purchase Gretsch and they proved to be much better sellers in the U.S. marketplace. Baldwin held on to the Burns property until closing it down in 1970.

Vintage 1976 Burns Flyte Electric Guitar

Burns wasn’t through with guitars yet. From 1969 to 1973 Burns manufactured Hayman guitars for the music distributor Dallas-Arbiter. As part of the agreement, Jim Burns couldn’t use the Burns of London name, but somehow Burns UK was acceptable and Burns resumed making guitar in Newcastle upon Tyne in 1974. Which brings us to the Flyte.

The Flyte—originally supposed to be the Concorde (or Conchorde)—coincided with the debut of supersonic aviation. Hence the swept-wing appearance. If you appreciated weird guitarflesh, this should tickle your fancy. I keep looking at it it just keeps getting weirder, and in an especially good way! Those pickups are called Mach One Humbusters. The Dynamic Tension bridge is pretty interesting…well, no, it’s not. It’s just weird. Indeed, much like Hayman guitars before it, Flytes were well made and pretty unremarkable except for the eccentric appearance.

Vintage 1976 Burns Flyte Electric Guitar

Apparently, Burns UK Flytes were played by so-called Glam Rockers like the band Slade and Mark Bolan (who made a career of eccentric guitars, among other things). Wikipedia lists other Flyte players, but I’ve never heard of any of them, not that that signifies anything. But, you have to stretch to find Flyte fans; they never did take off.

This guitar is #172. I have no idea how many Flytes were produced, but I suspect production quantities were not enormous. They were only made for about 2 years. In around 1977 Burns UK introduced the Mirage to replace the Flyte, with re-designed Mach Two pickups. Burns UK then bit the dust.

Jim Burns gave guitars one more go with the oddly named enterprise “Jim Burns Actualizers Ltd.” From 1979-83, but that met with even less success than Burns UK and the Flyte.

Still, you have to give Burns high marks for chutzpah and if your taste, like mine, runs to the unusual, you should be sure to catch a Flyte the next time one come your way!

Ugly Mugs No. 2: Under the Radar (Vintage 1976 Burns Flyte Electric Guitar) from MyRareGuitars.com

Vintage 1983 Jolana Diamant I Electric Guitar

The short story, of course, is that Russia became Communist after the Russian Revolution of 1917. Fast forward to 1941 and the German Nazi army invades Russia, get’s stalled at Leningrad (St. Petersburg), and the Russian counter-assault commences. The Allies invade Sicily and Normandy. In 1945 everyone meets up in Berlin and Hitler eats a bullet. The victors divide the spoils, with Russia getting control of the Eastern half of Germany (and Berlin), as well as pretty much everything to the east of that. The Soviet Union, the Eastern Bloc, and the Iron Curtain are created and more than 30 years of Communist rule ensues in those areas. Can you say “Cold War?”

Now, you could probably construct an argument about how the Cold War ultimately affected American popular music, but I won’t try. What I find more interesting is that a whole bunch of traditionally guitar-making regions in Europe ended up under Communist rule. Markneukirchen, probably the greatest center of German lutherie, ended up just a few miles over the border in East Germany. Similar areas in nearby Czechoslovakia also ended up in Communist hands, including that where the Jolana company that made the Diamant I seen here was located.

I don’t know about you but I didn’t grow up withCommunist Guitars on my mind. I just knew they wanted to drop an A-bomb on us. As with all of history, reality and geo-politics operate in totally separate realms! Thank goodness.

Vintage 1983 Jolana Diamant I Electric Guitar

Definitive information on Jolana guitars is hard to obtain, even though the brand was one of the most successful in the Eastern Bloc. If you search online, you will actually learn that Jolana guitars represent a pretty heroic story of a man, Josef Ruzicka (1928-2004), who bucked the official Communist dictum that electric guitars represented rock and roll and the decadent Capitalism that music stood for. In around 1953 Ruzicka built his first electric Hawaiian guitar (about as decadent a Capitalistic rock and roll tool as I can imagine, eh?). Thereafter followed some Strat-style guitars, eventually leading to a guitar factory which ended up in Horavice and guitars named for—if Google Translate can be properly translated!—Josef’s daughter Jolana.

Just when the Diamant Les Paul version appeared is a bit murky. If you asked me, I’d say around 1972, but other sources online claim that the Diamant appeared in 1979, with the upscale Diamant I, as seen here, debuting in 1983. This may be true. One curious phenomenon you’ll encounter in online accounts of Jolana and other Soviet-era guitars is a profound inferiority complex that disparages the quality of these instruments. Indeed, as someone with no youthful experience (and an awful lot of aged experience!) with these guitar, I find this surprising. I have not found Eastern European guitars to be particularly different from guitars produced in Western Europe, and the workmanship is generally speaking quite good. Would this hold its own head-to-head with a Gibson Les Paul? No. But neither would a Crucianelli or a Framus or a Hagstrom.

That said, I have noticed that I consistently date Eastern Bloc guitars as being much earlier than they actually were. I’ll eye-ball a guitar and say “1968” when it turns out to be 1979. What appears to be the situation is that Soviet-era guitars aren’t so much badly made as they are really out of date, anachronisms! As if the makers are all at least 10 years behind their Western counterparts! Anachronism shouldn’t be confused with shoddy quality. But then again, if you’re 15 and those were the only guitars you could get, you might see “old fashioned” as a “quality” issue.

Vintage 1983 Jolana Diamant I Electric Guitar

In any case, this is a well made little Les Paul copy. The body is maple with a thick, about ¾” thick carved European spruce top. There’s binding and the fit and finish aren’t bad. These humbuckers ain’t DiMarzios, but they’re serviceable. If online sources are to be believed, this particular guitar is quite rare based on the finish. The vast majority (“90%”) are supposed to have been black, with the rest finished in red, and only a very few done in sunburst, as seen here. It would be hard to judge here in the Western Hemisphere because as far as I know none were ever exported to these parts and you almost never see any—black, red, or sunburst—on vintage guitar dealer lists.

According to some online sources, the Jolana factory produced some guitars branded as Futurama and exported to the UK, where they were played by the likes of George Harrison, Jimmy Page, and Eric Clapton, presumably before they could afford more expensive guitars. Most sources have Jolana shutting down in 1989, about the time that the Iron Curtain came crashing down to end the Cold War, though one source claims to have a 1991 Jolana.

But just when you think the Cold War and Jolana guitars are gone for good, Vladimir Putin chomps off a bit of Ukraine and the NBE Corp. in the Czech Republic announced the return of Jolana guitars. I don’t know if the Cold War has returned (I hope not), and I haven’t seen any new Jolana guitars, but these old ones, Communist overtones and anachronisms included, are pretty interesting artifacts of a time when a guitar like this Diamant I was unknown to those of us raised under Capitalistic Decadance!

Communist Guitars (Vintage 1983 Jolana Diamant I Electric Guitar) from MyRareGuitars.com

Vintage 1972 Veleno Standard Electric Guitar

I kind of missed contemporary pop music during the 1970s, with my eyes glued to classical guitar books and my stereo playing old 78 rpm records I found in thrift shops. So, I also missed Veleno guitars, although I did read Guitar Player magazine and thus had a kind of literary idea of what was going on. I probably first learned about Velenos in those pages and, later, when I started building a collection, a Veleno went on my wish list.

I finally located a pair for sale listed in the “want ads” of Vintage Guitar Magazine. I was on the phone two minutes later. A minty gold one was already gone, but this chrome beauty was still available, so I paid what was back then a lot of money to get it.

Vintage 1972 Veleno Standard Electric Guitar

The fellow who sold it to me knew where John Veleno was living and I was able to track him down in Florida. That resulted in some interviews that yielded an article in Vintage Guitar Magazine, the chapter in my book Guitar Stories Vol. 2 and subsequent entry in Electric Guitars, The Illustrated Encyclopedia.

John was an amiable fellow who gave me a bunch of great anecdotes. These days I might be a little more critical of some of the facts, but it’s pretty hard to get corroborating data on a small guitar-maker from Florida!

Vintage 1972 Veleno Standard Electric Guitar

John Veleno (b. 1934) was a machinist who grew up in Massachusetts. He started taking guitar lessons in around 1958 and by 1961 he’d become a teacher. If you’ve ever taught guitar, you know it ain’t exactly the most dependable living. Married with children, he became a machinist and relocated to St. Petersburg, Florida, in 1963 and got a job in a machine shop that made aluminum parts for use by NASA at then Cape Canaveral. Veleno augmented his day-job income by giving guitar lessons at home after work. You see where this is going!

Actually, the Veleno guitar originated from some advertising for his teaching sideline. To attract attention to his lessons, John fashioned a guitar-shaped aluminum mailbox for his house. Intrigued by the design, friends urged him to build a real guitar out of aluminum. John bit and Veleno guitars were born.

Using the technology with which he was familiar, Veleno guitars were carved out of aluminum, which was either chromed or anodized—I’m not sure I understand the difference. Most were chrome, but a few were gold, and fewer yet were done in red or blue. Or at least those were offered.

Vintage 1972 Veleno Standard Electric Guitar

If you read my accounts, you’ll find an estimate of around 185 Veleno Originals being made, plus another 10 or so other odd models. That was based on Veleno’s recollection. You’ll find other numbers on the Internet, but they’re all in the same ball-park. Apparently there were some forgeries made, but it’s not clear when that happened; it seems like there was an issue with eBay in the early 2000s. At this writing Veleno was still offering to make you an upgraded version for around $8,000, but, by his own accounting, he’s only made around 10, if that, so Veleno guitars are still relatively rare.

Truth about Velenos is sometimes elusive. Plus John’s accounts were not always crystal clear. He has a massive, rambling “autobiography” you can find with a little searching on the Web. He talks about me in it, accusing me of claiming that he made 3 guitars with bird-shaped heads, wondering where I got that wrong information. Well, guess what? That’s what he told me. He forgot to mention that they were just necks and after Jorge Santana bought a guitar with one, he cut those other heads off. He also claims I got “fired” from my job around 2002, implying some connection that questions my credibility. Actually, I have been fired a couple of times during my advertising career! But, for the record I was laid off at that time and started a very successful agency shortly thereafter which I ran for more than a decade. In any case, it’s all very amusing!

Vintage 1972 Veleno Standard Electric Guitar

This guitar is #90 and features the original Guild humbuckers. The fellow who sold it claimed it had formerly belonged to Frank Hannon of the band Tesla, but there’s no way to verify that. Hannon is on the list of Veleno owners. This guitar was part of the Dangerous Curves exhibition at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston and it’s in Acoustic Guitars and a host of other books because the photos were subsequently licensed to other publishers (not by me).

Veleno Originals are actually pretty good guitars. They’re light-weight and easy to play. And, if you have one, you’re part of a fairly exclusive club. Like I said, cult objects!

Great Shiny Birds (Vintage 1972 Veleno Standard Electric Guitar) from MyRareGuitars.com

Vintage Ampeg Super Stud GE-500 Electric Guitar

Ok, it was the early 1970s so Ampeg can be forgiven for being well behind the curve in the politically correct category (I’m not even sure that political correctness had been fully invented yet at that time). Still, you gotta admire the chutzpah and it’s hard not to like any line of guitars called Stud. Sounds like it should be a Paul Newman movie.

Anyhow, all the yuks aside, the use of the Stud name was kind of eerily appropriate. These guitars were loosely speaking what we’d today call “copy guitars” in that they are based on American guitar designs popular at the time. They appeared just as the whole copy strategy was unfolding. Importers/distributors were producing copies mainly of Gibson guitars, since they yielded the most profit, but also of Fender and occasionally Guild guitars and basses. Even American guitar companies themselves hopped on the copy bandwagon. Gibson itself imported Japanese “copies” of some of its Epiphone models, and both Martin and Guild marketed lines of copy guitars until they wised up to the potential threats to their business.

Vintage Ampeg Super Stud GE-500 Electric Guitar

The Ampeg Studs were part of this whole copy scene, but they were aptly named because, unlike many of their competitors—the Ibanezes and Arias of the world—these were really over the top. They really were Studs!

Ampeg has always been better known as an amplifier company, although the very name refers to an amplifying “peg” or leg for a doghouse bass fiddle. Indeed, Ampeg’s first stringed instruments were electric Baby Basses in the 1960s. In 1969 Ampeg struck a deal with then hot guitar designer Dan Armstrong, who came up with the idea for those wonderful Plexiglas “See-through” guitars and basses. These were made into 1971 when Armstrong left the arrangement over a financial disagreement.

While rough copies of Rickenbackers and Mosrites appeared in Japan as early as 1968, followed by some somewhat crude Les Pauls, it was really the Plexiglas Ampegs that the Japanese manufacturers pounced on, producing near and pretty exact copies by 1970. That kick-started the whole copy movement.

Vintage Ampeg Super Stud GE-500 Electric Guitar

Around the time that the Plexiglas guitars and basses disappeared, Ampeg was sold to Selmer Band Instruments in Elkhart, IN. It was the Selmer incarnation of Ampeg that decided in 1973 to bring in the Studs.

The Ampeg Studs included 5 guitars and 2 basses. Three guitars, including this model, were based off of the twin humbucker Gibson SG: the Stud GE-100 with a stoptail, the Stud GET-100 with a vibrato, and this Super Stud GE-500. Two guitars were based off of the Fender Telecaster, the Heavy Stud GE-150 with two single-coil pickups and the GEH-150 with ‘buckers. Two Fender-style basses included the Little Stud GEB-101 with one single-coil pickup and the Big Stud GEB-750 with a single and mini-humbucker. Except for the Super Stud seen here, most of these had laminated bodies with either grained cedar, grained cherry, or a black finish.

This Super Stud has a one-piece maple body. It might have been better named as Heavy Stud because this is one hefty axe. The neck is bolted on rather than set in like a real SG, but, as much as I love set-neck guitars, you have to admit that it sure is easy to get a great set-up on a bolt-neck guitar, especially if it’s not premium grade. That said, this is a pretty darned good guitar. The abalonoid inlays look great on stage but are kind of cheesy up close, unless you’re like me and love any kind of bling. These ain’t DiMarzio pickups, but they’re quite adequate, especially if you’re going to pump this through a nifty Maestro effect pedal or two, and why wouldn’t you? And a little (or big) Ampeg amp.

There’s an illusion that 1970s Japanese copy guitars were legion. Twasn’t so. Most came in in relatively small batches and are nowhere as plentiful as some think. The Ampeg Studs don’t come around all that often, so they’re probably pretty rare. There’s no way to date these precisely because before 1975-76 most Japanese guitars did not have serial numbers, related to my previous point. They weren’t numerous enough to worry about returns and warranties. The Ampeg Stud line was only available from 1973-75, so you have a less than 2-year window to date with.

Linda Ronstadt’s “cowboys” certainly didn’t play Ampeg Studs, however apropos they might have been on that tour bus. Nevertheless, all of us who play guitar have a little bit of stud in our DNA and deserve to play a Super Stud! Plus, you getcher money fer nothing and yer chicks for free!

1973 Ampeg Guitars Ad (Stud Series)

1973 Ampeg Guitars Ad (Stud Series)

Getcher Money Fer Nothing & Yer Chicks For Free! (Vintage Ampeg Super Stud GE-500 Electric Guitar) from MyRareGuitars.com

Vintage 1970’s Epiphone ET Series Crestwood Electric Guitar

Here are two examples of the Japanese made EPI Crestwood from the early 1970’s. The Epiphone ET Series guitars were solidbody guitars produced from 1970-1978 at the Matsumoku plant in Japan. In 1970, the decision was made to close down Kalamazoo production of Epiphones in favor of building them overseas in Japan. Epiphone decided to offer a new line of Japanese-built Epiphones that had more in common with other Japanese copies than previous Epiphone products.

Often confused with the Crestwood, Coronet, Olympic and Wilshire, the ET-275, 276, 278, 290 & 290N were a Japanese-made amalgamation of a few older Epiphone body shapes and designs. And unlike the USA originals, these Japanese models featured a bolt-on neck.

Additional Details:

• 1974-1978
• Two humbuckers
• Maple body
• Gold hardware
• Bolt-on Maple neck
• Rosewood fingerboard with pearl block inlays
• Bound neck and headstock
• Tune-o-matic bridge with stopbar tailpiece
• 2 Vol. 2 Tone controls
• 3-way selector switch
• 24.75″ scale
• 1.68″ nut width

Back Catalog Memories: Epiphone ET Series Crestwood Electric Guitar from MyRareGuitars.com

Something I’ve always found curious was the discrepancy between “correct” and “incorrect” technique on the guitar. If you ever study classical guitar, you’ll get schooled on proper positioning of the left (and right, for that matter) hand, with the thumb in the middle of the back of the neck and the fingers coming down perpendicular to the strings. This helps maximize your reach and make it easier to fret the often complex harmonic line movements. It works. But then along comes Jimi who plays left-handed upside down and backwards with his darned thumb looped over the edge of the fingerboard and creates genius. Go figure.

Vintage 1973 Rickenbacker 481 Electric Guitar with Slanted Frets

In any case, periodically guitar designers turn their attention to the ergonomics of the guitar fingerboard and implement improvements to the traditional parallel fret layout. In modern times Oregon luthier Ralph Novak employs his patented “fanned fret” concept—with lower frets angled toward the bass side of the head, gradually migrating in a fan-like shape so that higher frets are angled toward the bass side of the body—on his Novax guitars.

Of course, somebody has always done something before, and in this case, conceptually if not actually, at least, it was Rickenbacker who came up with the slanted frets idea in 1973 with its Model 481. Or actually they reportedly did the slanted frets as a custom option as early as 1969. Rickenbacker had a tradition of trying to improve the ergonomics of guitar necks. Back in 1961 Rickenbacker designer Peter Sceusa filed a patent for a parabolic neck profile that was narrower at the top of the back to make it easier for ladies and people with smaller hands to fret the guitar (granted 1963). Who came up with the idea of slanting the frets I don’t know, but the idea was that if you’re resting the neck in the crook of your thumb, the fingers naturally curve forward. Thus, if you angle the frets slightly forward on the bass side, it’s more comfortable to fret, more natural.

Vintage 1973 Rickenbacker 481 Electric Guitar with Slanted Frets

The notion must have been at least somewhat popular because the concept got its own guitar model with the 481 introduced in 1973. Basically this is a solidbody with what’s called the “cresting wave” shape derived from Rickenbacker’s distinctive 4001 bass guitars. Rickenbacker even came up with a pair of high-output humbuckers with 12—count ‘em—adjustable pole pieces each for the 481 which only ever appeared on this guitar. One of the toggles is a threeway select and the other is a nifty phase reversal switch.

Vintage 1973 Rickenbacker 481 Electric Guitar with Slanted Frets

Hard information on the 481 is difficult to come by. The slant-fretted Model 481 was offered for 10 years from 1973-1983, but online references suggest that these are relatively scarce. There was a sort of companion Model 480 which had a similar shape, but different electronics and no slanted frets. Apparently, the Model 481 is favored by a guitarist named Serge Pizzorno of the contemporary band Kasabian, but I confess I don’t know their music (reflective of someone like me advancing on in age).

I love the idea of this guitar, even if for me the slanted frets don’t work all that well. They’re not a real obstacle to playing—they’re not that slanted—but if you favor classical technique, like I do, they’re no real advantage, and they don’t work all that well if you play a lot of barred chords. Unless maybe you’re Jimi, but who is?

Vintage 1973 Rickenbacker 481 Electric Guitar with Slanted Frets

Certainly the Model 481 is one of the more desirable of Rickenbacker’s 1970s output, probably because it’s so unlike the usual Rickenbacker. I love phase reversal switches and I love crushed pearloid shark’s teeth inlays and even the varnished fingerboard surface. That it’s so unusual is probably why I was so attracted to the Model 481 in the first place. Well, come on. You gotta love any guitar with slanted frets. Whether or not the guitar really fits in with your personality.

The Right Slant on a Rickenbacker (Vintage 1973 Rickenbacker 481 Electric Guitar) from MyRareGuitars.com

1977 Guitorgan B35

The Guitorgan has to be one of the front-runners in the race for weirdest guitar concept ever, and there’s a lot of competition! Yeah, it comes dressed up in pretty normal-looking guitar’s clothing, but after that any resemblance melts away.

I was quite surprised to learn that the Guitorgan concept was around before 1962, when inventor Robert Murrell of Waco, Texas, filed for a patent on the instrument. In a nutshell, Murrell’s idea was simple. Take an electronic organ. You press a key and that makes an electrical connection that sends a signal to whatever tone generator circuit you’ve selected using the frequency location of that key. So, why couldn’t you do the same thing with a guitar? Of course, an electric guitar is just an acoustic guitar with an electro-magnetic pickup that translates the interruption of its magnetic field by vibrating steel strings to generate an electronic signal. That’s actually a far more complex connection, and irrelevant. Suppose we wire the frets so that the electronic connection is made there? The problem is that the fret touches all 6 strings, so you can’t distinguish the frequency or pitch. Solution: cut the frets into 6 segments and wire each segment separately. Then at each touchpoint you get a different, distinct pitch. Run this through some real organ circuitry and you have a Guitorgan!

1977 Guitorgan B35

Well, it’s more complicated than that, but that’s the basic idea. In 1966 or so, Bob Murrell began working with engineers at Baldwin in Cincinnati to figure out how to adapt their organ electronics to fit into a guitar. By 1967 he’d developed a prototype with his partner Bill Mostyn and took it to NAMM in Chicago, where the guitar was played by one Bob Wiley. We don’t know what kind of guitar was used, but they obviously favored hollowbodies. There was enough interest that they went home and began making Guitorgans in the garage, forming a company called MusiConics, opening a factory in 1968, and beginning production in 1969.

Over the years Guitorgan used a number of hollowbody guitars to mount its electronics. Most were Japanese, including a Barnie Kessel model and various ES-335 copies. Online sources say that there were some examples using American guitars produced by Kapa in Maryland, but that would be pretty curious. By the time Guitorgans were produced, Kapas were Japanese hollowbodies with U.S.-made necks that were extraordinarily thin. When you have to mount wires in the neck, thin isn’t better. Besides, Kapas barely made it into the 1970s. Who knows?

1977 Guitorgan B35

What’s even more surprising is that online sources suggest that approximately 3,000 Guitorgans were produced from 1969-1984. I find it really hard to buy that quantity, both because I can’t imagine 3,000 guitarists wanting to play one and because you almost never see them.

1977 Guitorgan B35

And, because the control options are almost mind-boggling. You got flute/accordion/vibes voices, with six register controls for flute mode alone. You got an organ/combo switch with tuning wheel to synchronize guitar and organ. You got a button for open E to tune. You got a button to temporarily activate organ when in guitar mode. You got voice controls for percussive, sustain, tremolo and octave lower. You got a button at the nut to activate the open string while fingering (this may be the weirdest feature of all!). Plus stereo output. And a 5-pin jack to connect to an organ. And a transformer/volume pedal. Not to mention on the guitar side you get standard controls PLUS a 6-position varitone. I don’t know about you, but this is way too much information to process in the middle of Apache. Did I mention a $2,500 to $4,000 price tag?

MusiConics did make Guitorgans from 1969-1984, and on a custom-order basis, including with a MIDI option, into the late 1980s. But three thousand musicians bought these? You decide…

This is a well-made guitar, probably built by FujiGen Gakki, the maker of Ibanez guitars. It’s a B-35 model probably from around 1977.

1977 Guitorgan B35

I love the idea of this guitar—er, organ—but it’s over the top. You might be able to find one, but good luck. If you want to hear what a Guitorgan sounds like, look for Dan Forte’s CD The Many Moods of Teisco Del Rey (Upstart Records, 1992), if you can find that, as well. As for playing at the local rink, I think I’d rather be skating, ankles be darned…

A Guitar for Ice Skating (Vintage 1977 Guitorgan B35) from MyRareGuitars.com

Vintage Domino Spartan Electric Guitar

Who actually built these guitars in Japan is unknown, but these pickups appear to be associated with Kawai guitars, and that’s probably a good guess.

Vintage Domino Spartan Electric Guitar (Ad)

Here is an example of a dual pickup Domino Spartan in Sunburst. It was available in 2 or 3 pickup configuration, and in many different colors. Over the years I have seen olympic white, sunburst, seafoam green, orange and red. This 2P model has volume and tone controls, a 3-way selector switch and a rhythm/solo switch. The quality was pretty solid across the entire Domino line, compared to some of the stuff that was coming out of Japan at the time.

Back Catalog Memories: Vintage Domino Spartan Electric Guitar from MyRareGuitars.com

Vintage EKO 12-String DLX Electric Guitar

Here is an unusual 12 string model, likely dating from the late 1960’s or early 1970’s. Obviously inspired by the Hofner “Beatles” shaped guitars, it is a surprisingly good player. I’ll let the pictures to the talking from here on in…

Back Catalog Memories: Vintage EKO 12-String DLX Electric Guitar from MyRareGuitars.com

Vintage 1974 Carvin CM95 Electric Guitar

Bob’s House of Music was the creation of Bob Goodman, a former music teacher from New Jersey, who’d made his way out to the Denver area. He did, indeed, own a little strip mall in Wheat Ridge, a single-story L-shaped cinderblock affair with four or five storefronts facing the main street and another three or four along the left side. The space in back made by the two legs of the L constituted a large service and storage area. Parked in the spaces in front were various “vintage” cars and trucks that Bob had taken in on trade, none of which ran, and all of which got him periodic citations from the city. Along the front row was Bob’s House of Music, very crowded with guitars, basses, amps, and accessories, close quarters but for all intents and purposes a normal music store. However, all was far from normal!

That’s because there were no other tenants. Every—and I mean EVERY—square inch of the rest of the building—from the former beauty shop to the service area—was crammed floor to ceiling with vintage instruments. Hanging on racks, stacked in piles, lying in cases. Thousands of guitars everywhere and barely enough room to walk!

Vintage 1974 Carvin CM95 Electric Guitar

Mainly this was the case because Bob followed a unique business model. You’d walk in and see, say, a Rickenbacker on the wall marked $600. You’d say, “You take $500 for that?” Bob would scowl, draw himself up straight, square his shoulders, glare at you and spit out, “$700.” The Guitar Nazi. Bob didn’t sell a lot of guitars. Indeed, Bob lived on thrift shop clothes and expired canned food. For himself and the feral cats. Did I mention the cats? Hundreds had the run of the place. Use your imagination…

Vintage 1974 Carvin CM95 Electric Guitar

Bob and I got along fine. I was a “celebrity” and he let me photograph hundreds of prime guitars. Plus the chaos around us. I even bought quite a few guitars. As long as none were obviously valuable and I priced things fairly, he didn’t jack up the price. I even checked them into baggage for the flight home; this was way before you got a per-bag charge! They all arrived safely, with no “United Breaks Guitars!”

This 1974 Carvin CM95 was one of my prizes from Bob’s. Carvin was begun in Lowell Kiesel’s kitchen back in 1946. Kiesel, from Kansas via Los Angeles, began producing Bakelite lap steels carrying the Kiesel brand. After some early distribution through Continental, Carvin became one of the earliest direct-to-consumer mailorder guitar companies, a model it follows to this day. In around 1949 Kiesel’s brand name changed to a contraction of his two sons’ names: Carson and Gavin. Carvin.

Carvin began making solidbody electric guitars in 1955, the first a kind of cross between a Tele and a Les Paul. This was supplanted by more Fender-inspired solids in the early 1960s. In around 1965 Carvin began importing necks from Höfner in Germany. Carvin guitars sported imported necks until 1978 when it returned to making its own handles again.

The Carvin CM95 seen here was a short-lived model made in 1973-74. Carvin made the Eastern hard rock maple single-cut body, the APH-6 humbuckers, and the hardware; Höfner made the neck (it’s signed by the German makers on the back of the heel). The serial number is 1745, putting this at around 1974. This was at the height of the so-called “copy era,” and would have provided guitarslingers with an American-made (well almost) alternative to an Ibanez or Electra or Bradley from Japan.

I think there’s something in our DNA that looks down on a bolt-neck Les Paul-style guitar, but, honestly, there’s really nothing not to like about this CM95. I’ve always felt that Carvin’s pickups from this period lacked personality, but since all of us color our sound even if we just use an amp, nevermind effects, about all you really need is pickups that work and a guitar that plays well and this fits the bill!

In around 1979 Carvin’s brief fling with Gibson-style solidbodies began shifting toward pointy Strat-style guitars that would subsequently characterize the brand, several years before that style became popular, it should be pointed out.

Curiously enough, Bob’s father also had a music store in Wilmington, DE, and when I returned to Philly I drove down to see it. In stark contrast to Bob’s overflowing Temple of Doom, his father’s shop was a temple of gloom. It had an ancient pump organ in one corner and a couple new Johnson guitars on the otherwise totally bare walls. A few months later the story I wrote on the whole adventure ran in Vintage Guitar Magazine, and several weeks later Bob suddenly died. The next day—that’s the NEXT DAY—Bob’s father passed away. My friend Tom, who’d initiated the whole tale ended up buying Bob’s stash, liquidating it on eBay. I’d think I dreamed the whole story if I didn’t have this Carvin and a few other tokens to remind me of that fateful email once upon a time!

Bob's House of Music (Wheat Ridge, Colorado)

Bob's House of Music (Wheat Ridge, Colorado)

From the Temple of Doom (II): Carson & Gavin [Vintage 1974 Carvin CM95 Electric Guitar] from MyRareGuitars.com

From the Temple of Doom (I): Koob, Albert, Patricia, and Adeline

By Michael Wright
The Different Strummer

Imagine someone telling you about an old-time music store that had a huge stash of unsold guitars from the 1960s, plus some guitar effects from the ‘70s lying around in its upper floors in Newark, NJ. Well, you can bet it didn’t take long for me to beat a path to the door of Newark Music City (calm down; this was a long time ago and, while the company still exists, it’s long gone from Newark). Even though I was late in the game, there were still unmined treasures to be had. A real Temple of Doom!
I pulled a lot of good stuff out of Music City and owner John Ciarfella was great to work with. The store was full of New-Old-Stock gear, not to mention a bunch of vintage pieces taken in on trade over the years and just never sold. Maestro pedal effects, replacement Victrola parts, Japanese guitar hardware. Plus this NOS c. 1966 Kapa Continental No. CO-XII-V 12-String, culled from a huge pile in their old cardboard boxes stacked in a corner on the 3rd Floor. All leftover from when John’s father ran Newark Musical Merchandise and distributed Kapas, but was never able to sell. More about the Kapa later.

But the trip to the trip was the upper floors.  Music City was actually two joined 4-story buildings on a corner near the “new” Newark performance center.  The stairs were rickety and the floors unfinished, everything dusty.  The 2^nd floor was full of old shelving and drawers filled with the NOS stuff.  The stairs between the floors and buildings were a maze.

After I’d bought a number of things on several trips, John took me up to the 4^th floor of the corner building.  That had originally been a speakeasy and on the 4^th floor was a Burlesque theater.  It was still there.  The proscenium stage, all the seats, tattered curtains.  Water damage and some graffiti by locals who’d broken in through the skylight.  It was awesome, almost dwarfing the Kapa find.

But, unlike the KAPA, I couldn’t take the theater home with me. Kapa was a brand started by another music distributorship begun in 1960 and owned by a Dutch immigrant named Koob Veneman in Rockville, BD.  Veneman’s father had operated a music store in Holland and distributed guitars carrying the AMKA brand, an acronym made up of the first letters of his childrens’ names (K was Koob).  In 1962 Veneman decided to plunge into the Guitar Boom and manufacture his own line of solid- and hollowbody electric guitars and basses in nearby Hyattsville, MD.  He named the guitars KAPA after his family, himself, son Albert, daughter Patricia, and wife Adeline.

KAPA began in 1963 or ‘64 (sources differ) with three solidbodies, the Challenger (sort of a two-pickup mini-Strat), the Wildcat (three-pickup version), and an occasional single-pickup Cobra, made from scraps.  KAPAs were famous for their ultra-thin necks, made by KAPA, not Höfner as some online sources claim.  Until 1966 the pickups, which looked like Höfners, were made by KAPA.

In 1966 KAPA’s lumber stock got thinner and they began using Pix pickups made in Germany, the same as used by Höfner (but not made by Höfner).  They also switched from threeway toggles to sliding on/off switches about this time.  KAPA also introduced the Jazzmaster-style Continental in ‘66, including the 12-string example seen here.

KAPA guitars were actually quite well made, very easy to play, and give off a nice vintage ‘60s vibe.  They made upwards of 120,000 of them, so they’re not especially rare, but then, not too many people ever thought they’d be of interest to anyone in the future!

1966 Kapa Continental 12-String HS

Unfortunately, KAPA doesn’t seem to have been very concerned about consistency, and you’ll find Continentals with Challenger decals and vice versa, and dating is primarily a matter of guesswork.  In 1968 KAPA added a Minstrel teardrop-shaped solid to the line and in 1969 some thinline hollowbodies with bodies made in Japan.  However, by then sales were in decline and in 1970 Veneman shut KAPA down, selling leftover supplies and machinery to Micro-Frets and Mosrite.  Veneman sold Bradley copy guitars during the 1970s.  In the 1980s the shop got into the mailorder music biz.  The shop still exists, but as a premier Guitar Center location.

In any case, besides being a relatively rare ‘60s soldibody 12-string, this KAPA Continental carries the cachet of having been found unsold in a musty old corner of a musical Temple of Doom in Newark, NJ, next door and an obscure staircase away from a mothballed attic burlesque theater!

Michael Wright, The Different Strummer, is a collector and historian whose work is featured in Vintage Guitar Magazine.

From the Temple of Doom (I): Koob, Albert, Patricia, and Adeline from MyRareGuitars.com

Vintage 1979 Martin EM-18 Electric Guitar

Yes, Martha, that’s Martin. That’s because the late ’70s was one of Martin’s periodic failed attempts to break into the electric guitar market. That Martin never managed to challenge Fender or Gibson, or anyone else, for that matter, doesn’t mean they failed to make a pretty good guitar. Just that venturing outside your core competency can be pretty risky! So when I found this in a pawn shop in Philly, just down the pike from Nazareth, I had to pick it up!

Martin’s first attempts at making electrics occurred in the 1950s when it tried slapping DeArmond pickups on dreadnoughts. Ever hear of those? Then in 1961-62 Martin tried to market some thinline F-series electrics. These were pretty cool guitars with a unique design, but they never really caught on and were gone by mid-1965. Fast forward to the ’70s.

Vintage 1979 Martin EM-18 Electric Guitar

The 1970s were a strange time, to say the least! It had anti-war protests, wild inflation, fondue, gas shortages, odd new Japanese cars, presidential resignations, new STDs, and, man, disco. Disco! Guitarists were panicked by disco. Most of it was played on keyboard synthesizers and axe-slingers were afraid interest in guitars would disappear! Of course, they hadn’t reckoned on a young Eddie Van Halen! In contrast with the glitzy glam of disco spandex was the “back-to-nature” look.

The taste for natural-looking guitars coincided with the end of the Copy Era in 1978. Elger Guitars, the American beachhead of Hoshino, makers of Ibanez guitars, established itself by making high-quality copies of American guitars, as well as creating some interesting variations and original models (think Iceman). When Norlin/Gibson sued them, they introduced the Musicians and Studios, inspired by the neck-through, active creations of Alembic (and the Grateful Dead, kings of natural enjoyment). While somewhat more exotic in shape, Bernie Rico’s B.C. Rich guitars were also within this mode, as were the lesser known S.D.Curlees.

Vintage 1979 Martin EM-18 Electric Guitar

So anyhow it was into this mix of anti-disco naturalness that Martin tried again with its E Series. The Es were the creation of Dick Boak, who came to Martin as a draftsman in 1976 and by ’77 was given the project of coming up with some new electric guitars. Like many designs of the late ’70s, these have a kind of “organic” quality that’s unique in guitar chronology. The prototypes were produced in ’78 and the guitars entered production in 1979. Two guitars and one bass were made, all with glued-in necks and the retro “Stauffer-style” headstocks, reflecting Martin’s original 19th Century guitars. The guitars were the E-18 and EM-18. The E-18 came with a pair of DiMarzios and a phase switch. The EM-18 sported Mighty Mite pickups with series/parallel switches. The EB-18 was a bass version with one DiMarzio, though later versions had Schallers.

Following the au naturale aesthetics, this EM-18 has a 9-piece maple and rosewood laminated body, with a set-in mahogany neck. This is really a decent guitar, with screaming pickups. Mighty Mites were hot! Rarest of the ’70s Martins was the E-18 at 341 made. 874 EBs were produced. Most plentiful was the EM-18 with 1375 being produced until 1982. Serial numbers began at 1000 and this is #1034, so it was the 35th made.

Alas, for better or worse, the fad for “natural” guitars was pretty much over by the early ’80s, when these guitars bit the dust. Martin imported some Japanese-made Stingers following the E-affair, but never again really returned to the idea of competing in the solidbody arena. Dick Boak would later become one of Martin’s key marketing people. Finally, in fairness I have to say that despite the great fears about disco, there actually were a fair number of them that had some bitchin’ guitar parts! So it wasn’t quite as dire as we thought at the time. Seems to be a pattern there.

C.F. Martin Takes on Disco? (1979 Martin EM-18 Electric Guitar) from MyRareGuitars.com

1979 Gretsch TK 300 Model 7624 Electric Guitar

Gretsch was founded in Brooklyn, NY, in 1883 by Friedrich Gretsch of Mannheim, Germany. He died a couple years later and the company was run by Fred Gretsch, Sr., until 1942. Bill and Fred, Jr., took over and when Bill died in ’48, Fred, Jr., was in charge. Most of Gretsch’s most famous guitars date from the 1950s, including the famous White Falcon that was promoted by touch guitarist Jimmy Webster in guitar demos offered at Gretsch dealerships throughout the country. Gretsches during this era were powered by DeArmond pickups and were undoubtedly cool!

Then along came the Swinging Sixties. Baby Boomers fused with the Beatles and suddenly you could sell every electric guitar you could make. Sensing gold in them thar hills, major corporations, some of which had nothing to do with music, stumbled over themselves to get into the guitar business. In 1965 CBS, with TV, radio and record company holdings, bought Fender. Ok. In ’67 Norlin, with a beer-making history, bought Gibson. In between both guitar manufacturers and distributors sold to corporations. Guild went to Avnet, an entertainment company. Kay went first to Seeburg, the jukebox company, and then to Valco. Jack Westheimer’s Teisco went to King Korn trading stamp company!

1979 Gretsch TK 300 Model 7624 Electric Guitar

Anyhow, Gretsch got caught up in the buying frenzy. Baldwin Piano and Organ Company of Cincinnati made a bid for Fender, but lost out to CBS. Then later in ’65 Baldwin bought Burns of London. Two years later, Baldwin added Gretsch to its portfolio. After that, Gretsch guitars began incorporating Burns features, like the “gear-box” neck adjustment and vibratos. To save money, in 1970 production was relocated to Booneville, Arkansas, and finally to DeQueen, AR. HQ moved to Cincinnati in ’72. Later that year the plant burned down, marking pretty much the end of the era acceptable to hardcore Gretsch freaks. Production didn’t really ramp up again until 1974, by now facing stiff Japanese competition. Baldwin was interested in capturing as much market share as it could.

In around 1978 Gretsch came up with a bunch of new models, including the ill-fated Committee (designed by same), as well as the Beast models (bitchin’ guitars), and this Bizarro TK, with the asymmetrical body and hocky-stick head. The hardware and pickups on these were made in Japan. This model may have been Gretsch’s first bolt-neck guitar model. The rising sun was about to set.

This particular TK came from my classic visit to discover the Temple of Doom, aka Bob’s House of Music in Wheat Ridge, Colorado. Bob owned a strip mall and instead of renting out the shops, filled them with guitars. More guitars than you can imagine. If you came in to buy one and tried to negotiate, Bob would drive the price UP, not go down. He didn’t sell much with this strategy. He also collected feral cats and wore cast-off thrift store clothes. I went out there to take pictures of guitars, and came home with this as one of my prizes. No, it was a fair price but no bargain. What would you expect?

Collectors who like Corvettes or Mr. Chets or Falcons disdain these later Gretsches, but if you ignore the history, these are really nice guitars. The necks are slim and fast. They’re light-weight, which is good if you’re older like me (or like to jump off amps). And the Japanese pickups are HOT, HOT, HOT. These are great guitars. In a popular guitar context.

Gretsch died shortly after this adventure, though it would return as an import later. But if you’re interested in good guitarflesh that, like Rodney Dangerfield, don’t get no respect, but is quite respectable, you might want to keep your eyes open for a TK 300!

Like Rodney, It Don’t Get No Respect (1979 Gretsch TK 300 Model 7624 Electric Guitar) from MyRareGuitars.com

1978 Kawai KS-700 Electric Guitar

It was 115 degrees in the shade – of which there is none – in Las Vegas, the city that never sleeps. I was there for a scientific conference and found myself with an open early afternoon before the next session. I’d heard about this hot strip club on the edge of town and thought, “What could it hurt to spend an hour or so enjoying the local sights?” So I hopped a bus and headed out toward the desert. I got off the bus and walked toward the club door full of anticipation. Doors opened in about 2 hours. Right!

1978 Kawai KS-700 Electric Guitar

Then heaven intervened. I turned my gaze across the street and what should I see? Two blocks (two blocks!) of pawn shops! Hmm. Let’s see. Beautiful naked girls. The chance of a guitar find. It took about 2 seconds to place that bet! A sure thing was calling!

A number of interesting possibilities presented themselves before the spirit led me to a dark corner in a cage and this Kawai. I didn’t know what it was, but I knew it was cool and I’d never seen another. Done.

What I’d found was a cool 1978 Kawai KS-700, a rare artifact from that brief period in time in the late 1970s when the realities of global guitar trade were finally hitting home. The “copy era” had revealed both the excellent skills of Japanese guitar makers and the lack of direction of the American establishment. This culminated in the famous 1977 lawsuit of Norlin (Gibson) v. Elger (Ibanez) that put at least a temporary end to copying. Japanese companies rushed into the breach with a number of original designs, many inspired more or less by the popularity of Alembic at the time (think Musician, Rev-Sound, etc.).

1978 Kawai KS-700 Electric Guitar

This Kawai was part of that response, but also but reflects an earlier related development. As early as 1975, the Japanese, feeling confident in their abilities, wanted to establish more of a Japanese design identity. The result was both some of the most interesting “conventional” solidbodies of the ’70s – like the Ibanez Artist, Aria Prototype, and Yamaha SGs – and some of the more curious designs, including the Ibanez (and Greco) Iceman, the Lucky Cat guitar, the legendary Kawai Moonsault and others, all decidedly Japanese.

The Kawai KS-700 shows all the “natural” predilections that surrounded the Alembic aesthetic (the brown sunburst), plus overtones of guitars such as the Artist. Unlike many of its contemporaries, this features passive rather than active electronics (the mini toggle is a coil tap), though the amount of shielding is remarkable. But what makes this really cool is the head treatment, which reflects the Japanese design movement. Use of the retro slotted headstock allowed Kawai to create a design inspired by the Torii gates that mark the entrance to Shinto shrines. No way Gibson could mistake this puppy for trademark infringement! Talk about a statement!

The Kawai KS-700 was only made until 1980. It’s not even certain that it was ever marketed in the US. I’ve never seen another. How it made its way to a pawn shop across from a strip joint in Sin City remains a mystery. But one thing’s sure, if someone’s hand hadn’t closed the doors of that strip joint in the heat of day, this nifty guitar never would have made its way into my hands. And that would have been a sin.

The Wages of Sin (1978 Kawai KS-700 Electric Guitar) from MyRareGuitars.com

1978 Hondo II Longhorn Electric Guitar

Calling this guitar a Longhorn is obvious because the cutaway horns are, well, long. Duh. But in fact, associating the Longhorn guitar with cattle (though perhaps not cowboys) has a basis in ancient history. Technically speaking, this two-horned body is the shape of a lyre. Lyres were in use in Mesopotamia—a region we know today as Iraq—at least by 2500 BC and probably earlier. Since some of the harps (a related instrument) that have survived from that time were outfitted with elaborately decorated bull’s heads, it is entirely possible that the lyre’s shape was also meant to bring steer horns to mind!

The lyre continued to be popular at least through the flowering of ancient Greek and Roman civilizations and may have survived in one form or another into the early Middle Ages. The shape was actually rediscovered in the late 18th and early 19th as Europeans became interested in unearthing ancient cultures. By the mid-1800s guitars with lyre arms began to appear. Indeed, they may have been responsible for the invention of harp guitars, but that’s just a guess. Lyre guitars continued to show up in the hands of cute babes on postcards up until World War I after which they slipped from memory, until Nate Daniel brought them back in the late 1960s.

1978 Hondo II Longhorn Electric Guitar

Most of us probably know this longhorned guitar shape from the legendary Danelectro Guitarlin. Indeed, this Hondo guitar was intended to be a tribute to that ‘60s beauty. Danelectro bit the dust in 1969, yielding to the beginnings of international guitarmaking. Ironically, it was in that same year that the Hondo brand was born, soon to become the first significant guitars coming from Korea. Hondo was owned by International Music Corporation (IMC) of Fort Worth, Texas, which was run by Tommy Moore and Jerry Freed. In 1969 IMC had a relationship with Tokai in Japan and in ’69 traveled to Korea and entered into an agreement with a relatively new company called Samick. IMC upgraded the Samick operation with technology from Tokai and began to import Hondos.

To be honest, the Korean Hondos weren’t all that great, but Hondo kept working with Tokai, and some of its deluxe models continued to be made in Japan. Which brings us to this Hondo II Longhorn, which was introduced in 1978. This is actually a swell guitar with a mahogany body and 31-fret fingerboard. It was probably made by Tokai. The active 12-hex-pole pickups were powered by an onboard preamp that let you kick this puppy into overdrive at the flick of a switch. Giddyup!

It’s not clear how long this model was offered by Hondo, but probably only a year or so. By the time this beast was history, so pretty much was the classic celluloid image of Texas, replaced by the post-modern cynicism actually introduced by those Spaghetti productions. Indeed, the Hondo II Longhorn itself was the beginning of a post-modern heritage of tributes that includes the early ‘90s hybrids assembled by Tony Mark and the excellent reproductions still made by Nashville’s Jerry Jones. Nevertheless, when you pick up one of these kick-ass, steer-inspired Hondo Longhorns and throw that pre-amp switch, you’re deep in the heart of Texas!

Roundup for a Texas Longhorn (1978 Hondo II Longhorn Electric Guitar) from MyRareGuitars.com

1975 Morris Custom Electric Guitar (Copy Era)

Marvin found this guitar at a flea market and he refused to part with it cheap. But I had Marvin’s number. On one guitar, he knew his cost and he knew what he wanted firm. But if you bought three guitars and presented a lump sum, his math skills went to hell, and you could walk out with a real deal. Instead of $300 he saw $600 and forgot that it was for three guitars! That’s how I transferred ownership on this beauty.

1975 Morris Custom Electric Guitar (Copy Era)

And what a beauty. Morris is the brand name used by a large Japanese manufacturer called Moridira. Little is known about their history, but by the mid-’70s they were a minor part of the Copy Era, though their forté seems to have been in acoustics. Many guitar fans think of the Copy Era as a time when Japanese companies made cheap knock-offs of American guitars and sold them to kids who couldn’t afford the real thing. Some truth, but many of the Japanese makers built excellent guitars and already by 1974 they were innovating. None more so than Ibanez, whose guitars by then were made by Fuji Gen Gakki. Maple fingerboards on Les Pauls, tree-of-life fingerboard inlays, varitone switches, all Japanese innovations. Perhaps the most famous was the Ibanez Custom Agent, which took a swell set-neck Les Paul, gave it fancy inlays and a cool pickguard and topped it with a head shaped like a Gibson F-5 mandolin.

This 1975 Morris Custom attempted to do the Custom Agent one better by using an F-5 body shape as well! Featuring a killer flametop and a mahogany body, the Custom is semi-hollow. The neck is mahogany and set in, with a bound ebony fingerboard and big, real pearl inlays. The humbuckers aren’t Gibson quality, but they’re fine. This guitar plays like a dream, and it’s less than half the weight of a solidbody, which my back likes a lot.

1975 Morris Custom Electric Guitar (Copy Era)

Alas, like so many things, Torresdale music is no more. Marvin had diabetes, but refused to give up a steady diet of cheesesteak sandwiches from Chink’s up the street. Chink’s – periodically the object of controversy because of its politically incorrect name – is a little malted milk parlor whose booths make you feel like you just stepped back into 1940 and that serves up renowned steaks. Bruce Willis always orders them when he’s shooting a movie in town. Marvin’s health deteriorated and the shop was sold, its many wonders dispersed into suburban music stores. The store is now a hairdresser. But at least I have the memories, and the Morris Custom now calls to me from the back of my rack!

The Eastwood 1975 Morris The Cosey tribute model

Eastwood 1975 Morris The Cosey

Those not lucky enough to own the rare Morris original, can at least comfort themselves with the Eastwood 1975 Morris The Cosey tribute, which is an excellent guitar in its own right and won’t disappoint. Watch this demo:

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Mando Mania (1975 Morris Custom Electric Guitar) from MyRareGuitars.com