• The story of the Martin F-50

    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!

    Read more >>

Paul Reed Smith #11

The eleventh instrument made by Paul Reed Smith, from 1977. Photo by Whitney Lane. Rick Kennell, bassist for ’70s prog-rockers Happy the Man, was one of the very first players…

Audiovox Electronic Bass

Discovered! The World's First Electric Bass Guitar

While there have been lively debates raging in the rare instrument community for many years about any number of puzzling early guitars – not to mention the perennial issue of…

National Westwood and Glenwood

'60s Alt-Materials Make Short Run

Westwood 75 While the mantra for 21st century “alternative material” guitars focuses on carbon fiber (i.e. Rainsong acoustics) and wood/glass/carbon fiber/epoxy composites (i.e. Ken Parker’s Fly line), electric guitars made…

Yamaha Weddington Custom

A Better “Classic”

In 1987, classic American guitars like the Les Paul and Stratocaster were still going strong, with few changes since their first appearance in the early ’50s. Thus it was a…

Home Feature Image

Homer Haynes’ ’59 D’Angelico Excel

From 1932 to 1964, independent builder John D’Angelico produced some of the finest jazz guitars. After apprenticing and working in the violin trade, D’Angelico transitioned to building archtop guitars with…

Gibson Post-WWII

Amps

Introduction In its first 40 years of corporate rule, Orville Gibson’s lutherie developed into a manufacturing giant, expanding to meet the needs of mandolin orchestras popular before World War I,…

Bruce Kulick

Star Board: Bruce Kulick

Bruce Kulick played lead guitar in Kiss for more than a decade, and today stays busy as a solo performer and tours as a member of Grand Funk Railroad. Speaking…

Seth Lover

Seth Lover

The history of the musical instrument business is full of stories, from the drab to the miraculous. Some bean-counters will busily push their way to the forefront, grabbing for a…

Sun Rises Again

Sun Rises Again

January, 1950: 27-year-old Sam Phillips opens Memphis Recording Service, soon to become famous as Sun Studio and launching rock and roll with the 1951 Jackie Brenston-Ike Turner ode to an…

Fender Princeton, Deluxe, and Tremolux

Three Small Tweeds

Fender Princeton, Deluxe, and Tremolux

From 1954 through ’59, the Fender Electric Instrument Mfg. Co. built guitar amplifiers with controls mounted atop using “chickenhead” knobs that go to 12, and covered with “the finest airplane…

Echoplex

Roots of Echo Part IV

For those of you checking out our Echoplex series for the first time (and regular readers, too), a brief glance back: Part I perused the groundbreaking use of echo by…

1934 Martin D-28

12-Fret D-28

1934 Martin D-28 photo courtesy Daniel Salvo. The Martin D-28 was first issued in 1931. And all dreadnought Martins made from 1931 through ’33 featured a 12-fret (a reference to…

The City of Guitars

Git-Shopping in Paris

On your way to Paris for a romantic getaway? Wanting to see the sights in the City of Light? Then take this advice; forget Rick Steves, think Stevie Ray. Skip…

Christopher Thorn

Alt-Rocker/Studio Guru

Best known as half of the guitar tandem in the ’90s alternative-rock band Blind Melon (that’s his rhythm on “No Rain,” using his Gibson J-30), Christopher Thorn has since recorded…

Greg Martin honors Dickey Betts

Tribute licks Kentucky Headhunters co-founder Greg Martin was a senior in high school when he first heard the Allman Brothers Band “At Fillmore East.” Like so many guitarists, for Martin,…

Recording Electric Guitars

The Art of Home Recording

The process might seem simple – stick mic in front of amp, press "Record." Truth is, though, that even just one guitar and amp can render results that vary greatly.…

Bruce Kulick

Star Board: Bruce Kulick

Bruce Kulick played lead guitar in Kiss for more than a decade, and today stays busy as a solo performer and tours as a member of Grand Funk Railroad. Speaking…

Classics: August 2022

Billy Soutar’s custom-order 1936 Gibson L-7

While scanning an Elderly Instruments ad in Vintage Guitar one day in early 2009, Billy Soutar spotted the description of a 1936 Gibson L-7, “Custom… with factory Charlie Christian pickup.”…

Standel Amplifiers

Recapturing the Classic Sound

Contrary to what some fledgling vintage guitar and amplifier enthusiasts may think, amplifier brands other than Fender were made in California during the ’50s, the decade some consider the golden…

1971 Dumble Special 16 #0001

Prehistoric Beast

1971 Dumble Special 16 • Preamp tubes: three 12AX7 • Output tubes: eight 6L6GC (most likely) • Rectifier: solid-state • Controls: Volume 1, Volume 2, Treble, Middle, Bass, Accent; Bright…

Rex Solidbody

Italian Connection

An internet search for “Rex guitars” will turn up a fair – if confusing – amount of information about the brand used on budget guitars and banjos made by Gretsch…

Mastertone Guitar-Banjo

While five-string banjos are far more popular today than any other style, during the height of the Dixieland Era of the 1920s, when Gibson introduced its famous Mastertone banjos, four-string…

Epiphone Model M Steel

Misjudged Beauty

The Epiphone company already had a long history when it hit big with banjos in the early 20th century. And it was quick to change with the times as musical…

Selmer/RSA Truvoice TV10

Shock and Awe

If the British market needed a couple of decades to decide what form the guitar amplifier would ultimately take, we shouldn’t be surprised; well into the rock-and-roll age, the U.K.…

Fixing Tuner Holes in a Rare Gibson

Replacement Plague

I’ve worked on plenty of old Gibsons, but guitars like this 1939 J-55 are rare. It’s only the second one I’ve ever seen, and first I’ve worked on. It was…

The Gretsch 6169 Electromatic Twin Western

What good was selling a newfangled electric guitar back at the dawn of the revolution if you didn’t have an electric guitar amplifier to go along with it? Any significant…

Eight-String Basses

Sonic Niche

Emerging in ’60s catalogs from Hagström and Framus, eight-string basses occupy a distinct place among musical instruments – their potent, dense sound used to add texture or color. An all-mahogany…

Star Board: Tom Guerra

Guitarist/singer/songwriter (and VG contributor) Tom Guerra recently released his first solo album, All of the Above, which reviewer Pete Prown says is “hook-laden rock and roll originals that pay homage…

Peavey RJ-IV

Peavey RJ-IV bass, serial number 04938996. Photo: Bill Ingalls Jr. Instrument courtesy of Naffaz Skota. Americans by the millions “know” Randy Jackson. But not many realize that his gig as…

Marshall 2100 Lead & Bass

Rock Breaker

Adescendant of the legendary “Bluesbreaker” combo that helped launch the cranked-Marshall sound into the annals of rock, the 2100 combo is also one of the rarest post-plexi models – and…