As a teenager who just wanted to play music, Norm Harris lived with the reality that he and his band weren’t going to be millionaires anytime soon. So he did what musicians do – side-hustled. But when most were manning the counter at a music shop or serving tables, Harris was up at the crack

Our perception of Japanese guitars has evolved slowly. At one point, they were cheap toys, at other times imperfect copies, then startling innovations. Perspective encircles the truth. So, how should we perceive the Yamaha SA-15? Japan became interested in guitars in the early 1920s, as some musicians there began to perform what we’d today call…

Greg Koch: Gristly “Blues” Greg Koch fearlessly wrings the sort of vibrato that only a Tele will tolerate from his ’53 to play this exclusive version of Freddie King’s “The Stumble” flavored with a bit of delay and running into his Tone King Royalist. Inspired by fan requests, it’s just one of the tracks culled…

Jack Jones Doubleneck
In November of 1954, 16-year-old Jack Jones walked into a Seattle pawn shop and noticed a strange doubleneck guitar. “It…

Little Brothers
Often forgotten, the diminutive student-grade duo went from concept to reality in short order to capitalize on teenagers taking up…

Behold, this specimen that checks off all the right boxes for fans of vintage amps; beautifully clean, it has a…

Round and Round She Goes
Since its beginnings in 1952, Guild has gone through many changes in ownership, location, marketing approach, and design philosophy. In…

Building a From-Scratch Class Project, the Conclusion
In my November ’22 column, Ceil Thompson’s class-project guitar was nearing completion – the lacquer coats were applied and, after it cured for two weeks, she was ready for final…

This Gibson RB-3 five-string from 1925 is a rare piece, as is any five-string banjo from the era dominated by tenor banjos. But it’s more important as a representative of…
1967 Rickenbacker 360/12
Live-music fans who roamed South Florida from the early ’80s until the mid 2000s might recognize Craig Ball’s ’67 Rickenbacker 360/12. Ball was lead guitarist in the Rockerfellas, a band…

Viewed from our contemporary perspective, it’s difficult to fully appreciate how different the music scene in general – and the guitar scene in particular – was back in the early…

The Tal Farlow is one guitar in a quartet of full-depth Gibson Artists models first cataloged in the early 1960s. Introduced in ’62, it was based on the ES-350 – the…

Hilary Gardner returns! Ready to set the tone for your holidays, Hilary Gardner and her band return for a fantastic take on the classic Elvis hit “Blue Christmas” (written by Billy Hayes and Jay W. Johnson) just for VG followers! Accompanied again by Justin Poindexter and Sasha Papernik, this time they’re joined by Jen Hodge on…

Having looked at the most expensive electric guitars offered in 1960s – over 50 years ago. Traditional makers – Gibson, Guild, and Gretsch – concentrated on flashy amplified archtops that retailed up into the $700 to $800 range – beautiful instruments, but not representative of where the electric guitar was going. More forward-looking makers offered…

Double Time
It may be difficult to imagine now, but Gibson’s original Les Paul was only a modest success. Introduced in 1952,…

Collect 'Em and Smile
This year marks Boston-born Dave Amato’s 19th annum with REO Speedwagon. The guitarist moved to California in 1980 and became…

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

A Look at Gibson’s EB-6
As the ’50s drew to a close, Gibson was locked in a heated battle with Fender for a share of…

Preamp tubes: Two 6U8A, two 12FQ7, in addition to more-common types Output tubes: eight 33JV6 horizontal-output tubes Rectifier: solidstate Controls: Volume, Treble, Mid, Bass, Resonance, Distortion; Echo effect: Mix, Repeat,…

Mexican guitarist Javier Batiz, a teacher and inspiration to Carlos Santana and other musicians, passed away December 14 at his home in Tijuana, Baja California. He was 80. Known as…

Billed as “the latest orchestral sensation… unparalleled for versatility,” Vega’s electric banjos – developed to compete with one being made by Gibson – were of little consequence in the market.…
It’s an extraordinarily rare event to find a high-grade, historically significant mid-1800s guitar in a pawn shop, but that is indeed where this Martin was discovered. When found in Nashville…

In the Epiphone line of the 1960s, the Casino occupied middle ground. In appearance as well as electronics it ranked well below the semi-hollow Sheraton and Riviera or the solidbody…

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…
A lifelong vintage-guitar nut who has had “a million guitars,” Jeremy Graf’s all-time favorite is this 1961 Stratocaster. A native of Knoxville, Tennessee, Graf was just seven when, for reasons he doesn’t remember, he asked for an Elvis Presley record. His mother obliged and brought home Elvis’ Golden Records, a compilation of ’50s hits. “That
In an era when the sub-20-watt combo is arguably the most popular guitar-amp format, it’s worth remembering that several classics of the category emanate from the ’50s. And just as interesting as the well-worn favorites, several lesser-known alternatives were also born in the decade of rock and roll. In the December ’24 issue, we examined
Marc Schoenberger was part of the early-’70s vanguard on the Southern California guitar scene – not as a gigging musician, but among the crowd that raced the 101 freeway to check out old guitars every time a new issue of the Recycler hit the streets. He’d also been repairing guitars for friends and local shops
Despite their catalog-grade status, Supro amps have been used by several noteworthy guitarists. For many, the sturdy Thunderbolt is the preferred workhorse. It’s been a long time since Supro amps were any kind of secret find or hidden gem; players have long recognized the eccentric splendors of certain mid-sized examples, with their thumping tremolo and
George Beauchamp and Adolph Rickenbacher founded Electro String in 1931 to manufacture what everyone would soon call “Rickenbacker” guitars. Success came early and their lap steels set standards of quality, performance, and tone. On the other hand, the company’s electric bass viols and violins excited segments of the industry but never sold well. Same for
The word “underrated” is belabored in music journalism, but Joey Molland was just that. As co-guitarist in Badfinger, he was part of a quartet signed to the Beatles’ Apple Records, yielding glorious AM hits like “Come and Get It,” “Day After Day,” and “No Matter What.” The foursome fell into obscurity and tragedy a few

Family Barn Jam! With his ’82 Gibson 335 running into a Headstrong Corduroy (20-watt/6V6) amp, McKinley James shares a taste of his new album, “Working Class Blues,” with this run at “Call Me Lonesome.” In the October issue, he tells us how the album was made in the family barn with the only backing…

Steve Cardenas and Jim Campilongo have been playing guitar together for a long time, though the constellations only recently aligned so they could record. Captured on three nights in September of 2022, New Year showcases harmonic personalities merging through atmosphere, reverb, and ancient acoustic guitars. It’s also a meditation on the beauty and strength of…

Genuine Lone Star Jams Dallas guy Rocky Athas built a career playing blues in the vain of T-Bone and SRV,…

Former Gibson president Ted McCarty (1909-2001) is credited for his leadership of the company when it peaked in terms of…

Put your gut money on a dark horse every so often, and you might find the rest of the regurgitating…

Part One: The Guitar in Non-Anglo America
Ed. Note: In this series, Tim Brookes attacks the common argument that the guitar in 19th-century America was small, quiet,…