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Classic Instruments
The story of the Martin F-50
Our friend Nate Westgor from Willie’s American Guitars shares the story of Martin’s first step into the booming 1960s electric guitar market. Enjoy, and have a wonderful holiday season from all of us at Vintage Guitar!
Guild S-200 Thunderbird
Back in 1958, when Gibson introduced its revolutionary Explorer, Flying V, and mysterious Moderne, the public – rather like Queen Victoria – was not amused. Although a few bold players…
The Komet Constellation
Amid the general run of vintage amps we have explored in this space, the occasional “modern classic” has proved itself worthy through sheer quality of design, uniqueness of tone and/or…
Soul-jazz legend Calvin Keys
Exclusive spin on “Six to Seven” Calvin Keys has worked with Jimmy Smith, Ahmad Jamal, and Ray Charles. Here, he and his ’72 Gibson Johnny Smith play “Six to Seven,”…
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Veillette-Citron Shark
It’s not often a guitar can be said to have been inspired by a TV show, but that is the case with this 1982 Veillette-Citron Shark, which came about as a result of the success of the program “Welcome Back Kotter.” Well, in a pretty roundabout way, that is! Veillette-Citron guitars were the product of…
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Tommy Castro
Circling Back
In a career spanning four decades, Tommy Castro has crafted a commendable catalog and built a devout following with his soul-infused music, informed by the blues, R&B, pop, and rock and delivered with conviction. Beloved for his guitar work and vocal style, he has carved his own niche. Born and raised in San Jose, California,…
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Classics: Tommy Castro’s ’66 Fender Stratocaster
Tommy Castro has never been much for sitting with a guitar teacher, preferring instead to rely on good ol’ time in the saddle to hone his craft. But this 1966 Stratocaster has taught him a couple lessons. The guitar entered Castro’s universe in the hands of San Francisco music legend John Newton – known on…
Jay Geils
Blues and Archtops
If you grew up listening to music in the ’70s, you probably associate the name J. Geils with a five-piece band that played raucous rock and roll to hip-shaking partiers.…
Star Board: Craig Bartock
This month, we take a guided tour of the pedalboard belonging to Craig Bartock, guitarist with Heart. Craig Bartock, a well-known (and busy) guitarist/composer, has been the touring lead guitarist…
Steve Evans’ Guitars & Cars Passion Project
Pretty Pairs
Steve Evans was just 12 years old in 1968, when he began to appreciate the sleek bodies of electric guitars in the brochures he collected through the mail – gazing…
DOD 690 Chorus
Something a Bit Different
Borne amidst a windfall of chorus units, it offers Something a bit different In the mid to late ’70s, chorusing for guitarists was a relatively new effect on the market…
Bex Marshall and her ’63 Hummingbird
Family History Straight from the “Classics” feature in the August issue, here’s Bex Marshall playing the ’63 Gibson Hummingbird bought new by her uncle, David, in his days with the…
The Modulus Graphite Flight 6 Monocoque
High-/Low-Tech
In guitar history, irony is almost always the result of circumstances. The market changes overnight or someone makes a mistake that proves successful, etc. Rarely is the irony planned by…
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Classics: Arena-Rock Alternative Amps
Mad Maxed
As rock started hitting the big time in the mid ’60s, it became clear to guitar-amplifier manufacturers that 100 watts or more was the way to go. The best approach to big power, however, would follow several paths. The stories of the high-powered amps introduced by Fender, Marshall, and Vox through the ’60s have been…
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Vivi-Tone “Skeleton
A Master’s Magnificent Misfire
The eternal question “Who invented the electric guitar?” has no single answer. By the late 1920s, many players, tinkerers, and inventors were exploring ways to get more volume from fretted instruments. Steel-string flat-tops from Martin, f-hole archtops from Gibson, and metal-bodied resonators from National were louder than their predecessors, but ran up against physical limits.…
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Zac Schulze gets straight to it!
If you’re a fan of Cream, Zeppelin, and Rory Gallagher (who isn’t?), you’ll dig Zac Schulze Gang, a British power trio that’s carrying the torch with both hands; they’ve played Clapton’s Crossroads and the Rory Gallagher Tribute Fest. Here, Zac flies solo on “High Roller,” tearin’ it up on his ’54 Guild Aristocrat M75 through…
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Jon Butcher’s psychedelia mastery
Jon Butcher tales his Olympic White ’63 Strat for a rip on “Jam,” a track from his new album, “Nuthin’ but Soul.” The disc is an homage to sounds of Motown, Stax, James Brown, and Sly Stone highlighted by Butcher’s mastery of Hendrix-style psychedelia. It was recorded using a ’63 Princeton, a Vibrolux, and a…
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The Electra Endorser
Flame-top guitars were fairly common during the 1970s “copy era,” but few reached the levels of figure we often see on modern high-end guitars. Then came the Electra Endorser X935CS, which set new standards for psychedelic woodgrain. “But it’s not a ’70s guitar,” you object. No, but arguably, the Endorser CS – which was only…
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Webb Wilder’s take on “Beautiful Delilah”
“Hillbilly Speedball” sample Since the mid ’80s, Webb Wilder has cranked out consistently fine roots-rock. His latest is “Hillbilly Speedball,” and here he grabs his ’61 Gibson ES-330TD plugged into a narrow-panel Fender Vibrolux to play a cover of Chuck Berry’s “Beautiful Delilah.” He’s joined by George Bradfute (on a ’50s Epiphone upright) and Bob…
Matching Mojo
During the “guitar boom” of the 1960s, one method of getting a band noticed was to equip it with matching instruments and maybe matching amplifiers. Better still, add matching stage…
Border Crossing
C.F. Martin and the Influence of German and Spanish Guitar Designs
It has often been said that today’s Martin guitars are direct descendants of the instruments made in Vienna by Johan Georg Stauffer, whose apprentices included one C.F. Martin, Sr. It…
Audiovox and Serenader Amps
An Interview with Bud Tutmarc
Introduction With this month’s feature story on the Audiovox bass (page 80), plus a comparison between Audiovox pickup (page 81) and early Dobro pickups, it seems appropriate to also dedicate…
Holy Cripes!
The Story of Jerry Garcia’s Last Guitars
Steve Cripe left a unique legacy in the annals of music history. He was not a guitar player, not a songwriter. In fact, you may not even know his name.…
Cry, Baby!
The Story of the Vox Wah
Beyond being crowned “Album of the Century” by Time magazine, Marley and the Wailers’ 1977 LP Exodus is a wah-wah masterpiece thanks to Junior Marvin and his Thomas Organ Cry…
Guild S-200 Thunderbird
Back in 1958, when Gibson introduced its revolutionary Explorer, Flying V, and mysterious Moderne, the public – rather like Queen Victoria – was not amused. Although a few bold players…
Gretsch Rancher
“A spectacular model in real he-man outdoor Western finish with powerful appeal for Hill-billy and Cowboy bands.” This is how Gretsch first introduced the Rancher Jumbo – offspring of the 1940s…
1904 José Ramírez I
Possibly no name is more associated with the classical guitar than that of José Ramírez (1858-1923), the founder of a long dynasty of Madrid makers dating from the late 19th…
Carson Creation
One Very Personal Stratocaster
An itinerant Western-music guitarist who befriended Leo Fender and other employees at his up-and-coming company in the early ’50s, Bill Carson was the “test pilot” for the Fender Stratocaster prototype,…
Epiphone Crestwood
’60s Un-Gibson Solidbody
Gibson’s acquisition of Epiphone in 1957 presented a tremendous challenge to guitar designers and marketers at the company. One challenge was to design a new solidbody instrument that could be…
The Fender Tremolux
Most amp nuts are utterly fascinated by Fender’s rapid evolution from archaic to modern through the course of the 1950s. Within that arc, the transitional moments are often among the…
Walter Becker’s Bogner Ecstasy 100B
In 1993, when Bogner was fast becoming the hippest name on the high-gain-amp scene, star guitarists were clamoring for that hot new tone. One who missed out recently brought “his”…
1904 José Ramírez I
Possibly no name is more associated with the classical guitar than that of José Ramírez (1858-1923), the founder of a long dynasty of Madrid makers dating from the late 19th…
The History of Hamer
High-End Boutique or Budget Vintage?
“We didn’t quite get it,” explains company cofounder Jol Dantzig, discussing the birth of Hamer Guitars. “It was kind of a mistake. When we created Hamer, we created the high-end…
Rickenbacker Electro Bass
Photo courtesy George Gruhn. When discussing the origins of the modern electric bass, most typically think of the Gibson Style J mando-bass of the 1910s and ’20s, the Audiovox electric…
The Gibson GA-20
Behold, this specimen that checks off all the right boxes for fans of vintage amps; beautifully clean, it has a watertight provenance and emerges from a heart-warming backstory. If we…
Fender Precision Elite II
Sleeper Axe, Gorgeous Finish
If you could only see the beautiful hue of this Precision Elite II finished in Sienna Burst, you’d melt. Arguably the most devastating of Fender’s bursts, this finish was made…
Fender’s Musicmaster and Duo-Sonic
Little Brothers
Often forgotten amongst Fender’s many classics, the Musicmaster and Duo-Sonic were conceived to capitalize on teenagers taking up the guitar in droves as Bill Haley and the Comets’ “Rock Around…
Antique Guitar Amps 1928-1934
Which came first – electric guitar or amp?
The influence and restraints of technology on amplifying the guitar Let’s pretend for a moment that former Gibson historian Julius Bellson misinterpreted stories of Lloyd Loar’s experiments with electrified instruments…
Samantha Fish: Slide-Blues Fury!
“I’m Done Runnin’” on a D-18 VG readers know Samantha Fish is the real deal. Here, she uses a Martin D-18 Modern Deluxe on an unplugged arrangement of “I’m Done…
VG Q&A: Odd Dots
Import fretboard markers, and Kay’s Model 1961
In the mid ’60s, why did some Japanese electric-guitar manufacturers put the marker on the 10th fret rather than the ninth? – Joe Bigley Very few Japanese makers put dot…
