Vintage instruments used by Irish showbands and beat groups in the 1960s

guitarz.blogspot.com:

Hello there,

I just came across your blog and thought that you might like to see my site with photos of guitars and basses played by Irish bands in the '60s.

http://irishshowbands.net/instruments.htm

Francis Kaye

It's worth having a look through the pictures here; it's quite interesting to see the instruments used by working musicians back in the 1960s. Not everyone could afford the likes of Gibson and Fender guitars, you had to make music on what was available. I'm not saying that all these instruments were bad, but Egmond guitars - for example - do not have a reputation for being the most playable instruments ever made.

I was intrigued to see a picture of one guitarist playing a Wandre Krundaal Bikini guitar with the amp and speaker pod attached. I suppose someone had to play them, I've never seen any photographic evidence before!

If you want to search the archives further, there's a lot more on this website than just the guitars: irishshowbands.net

G L Wilson

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Hand-made guitar, influenced by Les Paul

guitarz.blogspot.com:

The auction for this homemade electric guitar is finishing on eBay very soon. I love stuff like this; it's a case of a guy wants an electric guitar so badly but the only way he's going to get one is to build it himself. Luckily he gets some sound advice from a legend!

I'm going to unshamedly copy from the text of the auction itself, as it's quite a long story:

My grandfather served in the Korean war and was entertained by Les Paul’s band during his service, upon returning home from the Korean war he was very excited to learn to play electric guitar.

Being from an area of little means (a poor coal mining region) he decided to manufacture his own, there was a walnut tree that was struck by lighting a couple years earlier and died.

He cut down that tree and from the trunk section he salvaged a decent solid piece of wood,this was the summer of 1958, at this time he was working as a coal miner an his schedule be came demanding so he had to stop working on his guitar project,he spent many evenings studying guitar design and planed to make a conventional two piece guitar being neck and body separate pieces.

Sundays were his only day off from work and he spent afternoons at his church practicing his playing with the church orchestra, that spring at the Tula county fair, grand father learned that Les Paul was going to play three evenings he went each night bringing the walnut hopeing to show Les this wood and get advise about his guitars construction.

On the third performance grand father saw Les and his band loading their equipment on to a bus, he approched Les upon introduction grand father say's Les remebered him from the servicemans used to help for his shows in Korea;

Because of his excitement and many question about the guitar, the two of them; grand father and Les examined the walnut and Les said his guitars were two piece because the neck is made from expensive maple and to keep costs down he used adler for the body,but he suggested since the walnut was large enough why not try to build a solid one piece guitar and he gave grand father an address to write him and send a photo when it was completed.

By june 1959 grand father completed the shape of the body, sort of stratocaster style with a thick neck, he felt a thick neck for strength and his large hands would be best.

At that same time a neighbour’s home caught fire and burned, this neighbour played guitar an as it happened his Silvertone acoustic guitar’s body was destroyed, my grand father asked for it's remains and he salvaged the finger board nut and tuning keys.

Grand father wanted to customize the fingerboard so he cut chrome pieces from the bumper of an old car shaped them and inlayed the chrome into the finger board, also from the burned home he took from a dining table a piece of formica, a faux pearl table’s top surface and applied it to the headstock surface.

At this point he bought a used tail piece, a bridge and strings and he was playing his new guitar he recalls his total cash investment was under four dollars, he was very happy and after a few adjustments everyone agreeded that the guitar played very well.

Grandfrather Oven had some pictures taken and he mailed the pictures to the address Les paul had given him, along with the pictures he sent a letter asking for help with how he was going to install some pickups, to grandfathers amazement Les paul sent him two single coil pickups that he had wound by hand while developing a design in 1952 along with a diagram and two pots for volume and tone, Les asked for him to route two pockets to set the pickups into, grandfather was afraid the pockets may weaken the body causeing it to crack, so he screwed the pick ups to the top of the body as well as the pots with wires external as well.grandpa Oren played his guitar at church for fifteen year he studied jazz and played at the same fair where he recieved help from Les Paul many years earlier.

My grand father retired in 1965 and moved to New Orleans Louisana so he could play jazz and learn more about the music he loved, this was the only guitar he ever owned,he joined a band called the Bluzers and played at many night clubs in the french quarter, a down town section filled with blues and jazz clubs.

In 1979 grand father passed away, his grand son my twin brother Gene Du Buque wanted to learn to play and so he inherited the guitar, my brother learned to play on this instrument,he liked the sound but felt the guitar was ugly.

He removed the pick ups and disguarded the guitar. Gene put the pick ups in a fender telecaster and later sold the telecaster,I kept the guitar, over the year i often thought it would be wonderful if some one might appreciate it as my grand father did, so Denis may it bring you happyness.

This guitar sustains longer than any guitar i've ever seen I attribute this to it's one piece construction;

Cheers

Lyle Du Buque

(sic, throughout)

I think that's a great story. It's nice to know that the guy used the guitar throughout his musical career. I bet it had that certain mojo. Great also that the grandson learnt to play on the same guitar. I think, however, that it is such a pity that the guitar is not now destined to stay in the family.

G L Wilson

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Ergonomic Guitar Iberica 1C

guitarz.blogspot.com

It's not necessary to say much, the picture of this Ergonomic Guitar Iberica 1C tells the obvious: you take the most regular classical guitar and bevel it a little bit where it's necessary and you have a much more conformable instrument.

Not only electric guitars deserve ergonomics improvement, and the traditional form is not obligatorily the better one!

bertram

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1975 Gibson S-1

guitarz.blogspot.com:

Didn't think I'd ever be surprised by a Gibson Les Paul - until I discovered the S-1!

Love the Flying V headstock, and the pickguard shape simulating a SG on top of the Les Paul body is brilliant... Together with the Marauder, it was an attempt of Gibson to attack the Fender niche with its 3 single coil pickups on a flat-top. Didn't work though, and the 2 models were discontinued in 1980... I won't tell much more, these guitars have their pages on Wikipedia if you want extra information!

bertram

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Egypt Karnak Luxor from 1986

guitarz.blogspot.com:

This guitar does have a very 80s vibe to it - perhaps it's the metallic lilac finish. It wouldn't have looked out of place in any of the hair metal bands of that era. Oddly, it doesn't have a locking trem - just a regular one, but if you're like me that will be something in the guitar's favour.

Egypt Guitars were built in Glasgow, Scotland, and the business is still going although these days mainly functions as a guitar repair shop. If you check theie website you'll see an Egypt Pharoah Isis from 1985 that shares the same body shape as the guitar pictured above, only in mirror image. (Hey, Gibson don't hold the monopoly on "reverse" body styles).

Anyway, the auction for the Karnak Luxor is finishing in a little over 4 hours as I type this, so why not bid? You could snap up what looks like a very nice guitar (although possibly playing in a 80s cover band might be a pre-requisite!).

Additional: It didn't sell and has been re-listed here.

G L Wilson

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Can anybody identify this guitar?

guitarz.blogspot.com

I found this guitar on a German-Swiss site and it might be called a Dulci but I can't find anything more about it... I'm not even sure if it's really a guitar - is it a travel acoustic one, a 6-string ergonomic ukulele or some hybrid I've never heard of until now?

So just for the sake of my curiosity, I call for the expertise of the innumerable guitar lovers who read this blog...

bertram

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double-neck 12/8 Shergold Modulator

guitarz.blogspot.com

This is the double-neck Shergold Modulator inspired by Mike Rutherford's custom model. Of course it doesn't have its characteristic splitting/recombining system (if I understand well, Rutherford claimed Shergold's exclusivity for this innovation, and I don't think that there's been any other builder that made a similar guitar) but it has the typical 12-string guitar neck on top and an quite unusual 8-string bass neck (Rutherford has been Genesis's bassist and rhythm guitarist behind Anthony Phillips then Steve Hackett before becoming the front guitarist, that had him develop a special style requiring a special instrument), plus the Modulator long upper horn that makes it look much better than the single neck (what a long sentence, and all these brackets!) .

If you want to know more about Shergold guitars, you can have a look at the most exhaustive website about them or wait a few weeks to read GL Wilson 's '500 guitars' book!

bertram

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70s Shergold Modulator 3

guitarz.blogspot.com

This is a Shergold Modulator 3 - that I first noticed because of its square knob plate, the kind of things that I love in a guitar (the general shape is not so exciting)!

Then I deepened a little bit the subject and I discovered that the square knob plate actually allows to interchange the electronics of the Modulator series - there are 6 versions -, and that Shergold was a kind of spin-off of Burns - actually a company that provided woodwork to Burns and Hayman and other British brands before making their own guitars in 1975, first from left over material.

Shergold's guitars and basses have been used by Joy Division / New Order musicians, and Genesis's Mike Rutherford played a famous double neck 4/12 custom guitar that could be reassembled in different combinations of basses and guitars... - I'll come back on Shergold double-necks in a following post.

bertram

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Pointless triple-neck

guitarz.blogspot.com:

Uh-oh! You know you're in for trouble when you see a Tennessee-brand guitar. They are often very wacky instruments, but don't be fooled as the workmanship is shoddy and the instruments themselves are reported to be virtually unplayable.

But let's put aside the provenance for this discussion. Just look at this thing: it's a triple-neck comprising 8-string bass, 10-string bass, and 6-string lap steel.

Just WHY?

Why would anyone need that combination of necks on a single instrument? To start with, how many bass players double on "lap steel"? Not that this could ever be a real lap steel. Is the player supposed to un-strap it mid-song, sit down and lay the instrument on his lap for a lap steel solo?

Perhaps the "lap steel" neck was added because it was lying around at the factory at the time this ridiculous instrument was assembled.

Let's forget the lap steel neck. What about the two bass necks? Why would any bassist ever need a 8-string and a 10-string on one instrument? (That is to say, a 4-string and a 5-string with doubled courses, rather than 8 and 10 individual non-paired strings). Surely if you needed to play a song that required both 8-string and 10-string bass, all you'd need would be the 10-string neck and you could ignore the low B course in the sections that "require" the 8-string. In the same way, I can't see why anyone would ever need a 4-string and 5-string bass combination on the same instrument. I could understand a 4-string and 8-string, or a fretted and fretless, but this instrument shown above offers nothing of advantageous use.

It's utter nonsense, and as I've commented on previous occasions, Tennessee guitars seem to be put together by people who know nothing about guitars.

G L Wilson

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Franquin's Gaffophone

guitarz.blogspot.com

OK, GL Wilson stunned me with his Omstrument and there would be no possible answer to this extreme instrument if genius Belgian comics artist Franquin didn't invent the infamous Gaffophone.

Franquin's prominent character Gaston Lagaffe (seen here playing the Gaffophone) is not well known by English-speaking audience since these comics were never translated in English, but he and his monstrous instrument are famous in French- and Spanish-speaking countries, also in Scandinavia...

The Gaffophone is supposed to have an horrible and destructive sound (Gaston being himself a terrible musician, also playing sousaphone), being thus a frequent reference and joke amongst continental European guitar and brass players.

Some Gaffophones have been built for real, but of course could not match its supposed terrific sound.

bertram

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"Carol Brown" - Flight Of The Conchords

guitarz.blogspot.com:

This week I've been listening to "I Told You I Was Freaky", the new Flight Of The Conchords album featuring songs from Season 2 of their TV series. I wanted to include the above clip on this blog because I just love those guitars they are playing. Yes, I know they are just props. Basically, Jemaine's guitar is a video editing console with a guitar neck attached to it, and Bret has a similarly obsolete-looking video mixer with a bass neck. Imagine if guitar synths were really as cumbersome as these! They do bring to mind the Stepp MIDI guitar.

G L Wilson
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The Omstrument

guitarz.blogspot.com:

In our previous post about Uli Jon Roth's Sky Guitar, Bertram, my co-blogger here at Guitarz, made a note in the comments appealing for "Less frets, more strings!"

Is this enough strings for you, Bertram?

With a combined total of 46 strings, the Omstrument is the creation of Jack Haas and is a gestalt instrument comprising harp, guitar, longneck dulcimer, strumstick, and tanpura. And before you ask, yes, they are supposed to be played together at the same time.

Perhaps it's easier to let one of Mr Haas' videos do the talking:

Before anyone else comments, yes I am aware of Pat Metheny's 42-string Pikasso guitar created by luthier Linda Manzer. It's a crazy-looking guitar with strings all over the place, but surely more portable than the Omstrument!

G L Wilson

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Uli Jon Roth's Sky Guitar

guitarz.blogspot.com:

Thanks to KC for jogging my memory. The guitar that the Gruggett Raindrop reminded me of was Uli Jon Roth's Sky Guitar, as seen pictured here.

To unashamedly quote from his Wikipedia entry:

Uli Jon Roth has (or at least has had) at least five of these "Sky" guitars. They are made by a British luthier, and also used by the guitarist from Fair Warning. The first three Sky guitars were as follows: One had 36 frets, another had 42 frets, and a third one is fretless which was used on the Beyond the Astral Skies album. In an April 2001 Guitar Player Magazine interview, Roth reports that the guitars are either fretless above the 30th fret or have whole step fret spacing above the 27th fret, with 35 effective (half step) frets. All of the Sky guitars with frets have extensive fretboard scalloping as is favored by Swedish guitarist Yngwie Malmsteen (who was influenced greatly by Roth) and many neoclassical metal guitarists. The Sky guitar's pickups are custom 4 coil humbuckers made by John Oram, with one guitar having an Oram pickup hidden under the 24th fret. The guitars named Mighty Wing and Destiny each have 7 strings and the others have 6 strings. The 7th string is a low B string. The US company 18th Street Guitars made 50 commercial versions of the Sky guitar in 2004, each reportedly selling for $18,000 USD.

G L Wilson

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