Guitar amp cab idea with 2 leftover RS-180

[dyazdani]

I eyed the JB Epiphone when it came out a while back. He's got a Gibson signature model also...

I would like to get a Mark Knopfler strat of some sort, either a fiesta red strat (probably a custom of some sort) or a Pensa. I'm not far from Rudy's (Pensa's) Music Shop(s) in NYC, but would get shot if I dropped $8k on a guitar at the moment. For now, I'll stick to my MIM strat and Tele. I need to invest in practice more than gear anyway...

[oneplustwo]

All this from a simple post about trying to reuse some old drivers for a guitar amp.

[dyazdani]

Sounds like we need a guitar sub-forum...

[JonMarsh]

Sounds like we need a guitar sub-forum...

Hmmmm, let's see what the powers that be might say- I'll look into it later this week. :W

[JonMarsh]

All this from a simple post about trying to reuse some old drivers for a guitar amp.

yeah, well that was the equivalent of dropping a particulate in to a super saturated solution- just takes a small trigger for all kinds of hell to break loose! :W

[JonMarsh]

I eyed the JB Epiphone when it came out a while back. He's got a Gibson signature model also...

I would like to get a Mark Knopfler strat of some sort, either a fiesta red strat (probably a custom of some sort) or a Pensa. I'm not far from Rudy's (Pensa's) Music Shop(s) in NYC, but would get shot if I dropped $8k on a guitar at the moment. For now, I'll stick to my MIM strat and Tele. I need to invest in practice more than gear anyway...

Yeah, the prices of the prime gear are pretty crazy, if you want to go for the really high priced spread. Now, the Mark Knopfler Strat is unfortunately a classic example of marketing and pricing with a questionable basis in reality, just like the Custom Shop Jeff Beck stratocaster I bought on eBay. (which I really like how it plays, but it's not anything like what Jeff is playing, for the most part- it's just a royalty/marketing gig. To quote someone else knowledgeable on this topic,

There's no place where its specs fit into the picture of Knopfler's stage guitar history. His strat-type guitar was known not to be a Fender and Rudy Pensa's gotten a lot of mileage out of his association with Mark and the Pensa-Suhr MK1 which I personally associate with Knopfler over the years.[www.pensaguitars.com].Les Pauls are a part of his arsenal as well. He is known to be very particular about selecting a specific guitar and voicing for the songs he composes. Having lived and worked in NYC, I've enjoyed visiting both of Rudy's locations [48th Street, and Soho] often. If I wanted to own a guitar as a nod to Mark, it'd be MK1 and a Les Paul.

So you're certainly on the right track with the right music store available locally! But you're likely in a situation like mine where though you can appreciate some fairly nice stuff, you can't justify the money, not by a long shot.

What I've been doing is making some selected and careful buys on eBays, often losing bids until getting a good deal at the right time, and also researching the older Epi models and their construction- there are a few limited production guitars where it seems Gibson has allowed them to use pretty much the same construction techniques and materials, and even in some cases complete American Gibson electronics, including pickups, switches, pots, and tone caps.

The 1960 limited Edition Les Paul Standard I have reflects that construction, as does the Epi 1959 limited. The Joe Bonamassa model is also made with a full carved maple top, and I've actually seen a few posts from people who've played both the Epi and Gibson version (and in once case owned both!) and say the Epi quality control for that model is better (seems it's a high end Epi model, but a relatively low end Gibson model- look at the pricing).

From a build quality basis, though, I've actually disguised my favorite Epi Les Paul, buying a name plate from the Epi distributor in England that just says Les Paul Custom. This COULD be treated as just a nicely done re-issue of the 1977 Les Paul Custom, but with with Dmarzio super distortion pickup on the bridge and Dimarzio PAF's in the other two positions.



The neck, body construction, finish and build quality on this guitar are very high- let's just leave the whole Budokan thing out of the picture! Pictures don't do it justice, though I plan to try to capture that a bit better at some point.

[JonMarsh]

Other news-

Line6 has been acquired by Yamaha, and they are also introducing a new amplifier concept/design at NAMM later in January. I used to do engineering for a company that exhibited at NAMM, back in the 70's, and that was always fun, even back then. Met a lot of cool people.

[JonMarsh]

Father forgive me, for I have sinned... again.

Well, after a lot of reflection and agonizing, I gave in to the dark side. Maybe it's just how slick the black neck and backside body of this model looks, maybe it's the grover tuners standard, and of course, it's the Seymour Duncan custom shop Joe Bonamassa pickups sitting on my desk, telling me that they only belong in a Joe Bonamassa model LP, not in some 1960 limited edition re-issue.

Another factor causing me to strike like a cobra was after doing some research and finding these are nearly unobtanium at retailers, pretty much sold out everywhere! I did finally find one at Guitar Center Emeryville CA, so I pulled the trigger and am having it shipped to my relatively local Concord CA store.

Of course, any tale of woe and self destruction isn't complete without some more pictures, so here's one to whet your and my appetite this Monday morning before I face the working world fully (though I'm already at the Mac Caffe in Cupertino at 1 Infinite Loop).




I think this will look just right with the aged 59 replica pickups from Seymour Duncan. Now, when will I find some time to install them? :W

[oneplustwo]

We all have something to aspire to: http://hamptonroads.com/2008/06/ches...on-250-guitars

[JonMarsh]

We all have something to aspire to: http://hamptonroads.com/2008/06/ches...on-250-guitars

:E

:jawdrop:

;x( ;x( ;x( ;x( ;x( ;x(

Woww.... unbelievable! Well, this let's me and my picayune purchases off the hook! I'm so unworthy in comparison! I mean, THREE of the custom shop Gibson 1275 Jimmy Page edition double necks? I feel bad enough owning 2 Epiphone G1275 double necks... one bought for the case, the other for the specific year and improved hardware construction, and brand new on eBay...

Sheesh!!! :roll:

In other music related news, I've about gotten my lessons drive fully organized- so glad I started downloading Hendrix song related lessons, as so many have been pulled off the web at the request of the Hendrix estate in the last year.

[oneplustwo]

It's all relative. A buddy of mine who can play the strings off any guitar only has one guitar and one amp. Big splurge for him was getting the sonic port for X-mas. We all manage our money as we see fit I suppose.

I still would like to build myself a 69 thinline telecaster. Perhaps with an "incorrect" 24.75" scale neck.

[JonMarsh]

Hat's off to your buddy if he can get all the sounds and tones he wants from one type of guitar!

I guess there's too many things I'd like to play with, and I don't think you'll ever make a tele sound quite right on a BB King song, though it might be interesting to try. Back in the day when I was playing, the other two guitarists in my main band in Colorado thought it was a little weird that the keyboard player who seconded on guitar had more guitars (3) then they had (1 each). I wish I still had the Les Paul Recording I had back then. That was a pretty unique guitar, though it was maybe so configurable that it was too easy to get a sound you DID'T want than the one you did, until you got the hang of it. It was my attempt back then to find the best elements of an LP and Stratocaster sound in one guitar.

Now, this is where the internet is wonderful and surprising... in checking online in Google for an image, I discovered that this model is now produced as a re-issue of sort, the Les Paul Recording II.


Image not available

Oh my....

This Was Les Paul's Idea of The Ultimate Guitar
Gibson designed the Les Paul Recording II solidbody electric guitar based on the exact specs of Les Paul's own guitar. While it wasn't accepted as readily as the Les Paul or SG models, the Les Paul Recording was actually Les Paul's favorite guitar out of all of them. This Les Paul Recording II guitar sports the same unique features like a low-impedance output for plugging into a mixing console, a phase switch for each pickup, and coil tapping for single-coil tone too.

Image not available


Slightly lighter colored body than the one I had- which looked more like this Les Paul Personal (a variant of the Recording):


Image not available


Houston, we have a problem here.... Limited edition, only 600 produced. And Sweetwater has four?

Here's another one of theirs:


Image not available


Scheisse Scheisse Scheisse! Just when I thought I was finished and no chance or need for another guitar purchase... May have to put on the shopping list... and soon! Sell a few shares of Apple or something... I had no idea these were being made... and to think I thought I knew what was going on! Yet, when I've searched Gibson models online at eTailers, for all Les Paul models, this has never turned up.

Mmmm, I think I feel some G.A.S. coming on... :W

[JonMarsh]

Oh Hoh! NOW I know why I hadn't come across this before! I'm not a moron- this is a new 2014 model!

http://www2.gibson.com/Products/Electric-Guitars/Les-Paul/Gibson-USA/Les-Paul-Recording.aspx

They must have someone in marketing who figured out one of the few marketing areas for re-issues that they hadn't tapped yet was older guys like me who had one of these back in the day and regretted parting with it- no wonder Sweetwater has 4, they must have just gotten them in!

Image not available


Still leaves me in the same pickle, now that I figured that out... Now, if only they made a Nighthawk scale guitar (Strat style neck length and width) with all this groovy stuff in electronics... THAT might be a guitar I'd be happy with 95% of the time (excepting when I need a 12 string).

[oneplustwo]

That's a pretty cool axe! I didn't know it even existed. Big fan of the Bigsby look. Adds to the retro flair. It's not cheap though... maybe Epiphone will have one some day.

[JonMarsh]

That's a pretty cool axe! maybe Epiphone will have one some day.

Yeah, Gibson does have a habit of letting Epi build replicas of some of the stuff that's "interesting" but not mainstream popular. Jensen transformers in this version, both low and high impedance outputs, phase switches and pole splitting.

You're right, the design definitely has a back to the future retro vibe.

[JonMarsh]

I'm seeing incomplete and conflicting info online about the specific capabilities; even the Gibson site is pretty vague!

The Zzounds site specifically says it DOES haves the decade tone switch (which alters the corner points of the tone control).

Low-impedance pickups for direct recording convenience

Les Paul paved the way for recording guitars, and his idea of the perfect instrument included low-impedance pickups that could be plugged directly into a mixing console. The Les Paul Recording II features these same unique pickups, with a low-Z/hi-Z toggle for changing the output impedance. You can connect directly to a microphone preamplifier in low-Z mode, or connect to your favorite amplifier in hi-Z mode.

Incredible tonal variety with the Decade switch

The idea behind the Les Paul Recording guitar was that Les Paul wanted every awesome guitar tone he ever created to be accessible from one guitar. So for maximum tonal variety, he designed the Decade switch. You can dial in everything from bright and biting highs to softer, subdued highs, and everything in between.

But Zzounds site doesn't mention pole splitting or phase wiring of the two pickups for noise cancellation or pole splitting.

Sweetwater's description is more complete in other areas...

Low-impedance output for direct recording convenience
Les Paul paved the way for recording guitars, and his idea of the perfect instrument included low-impedance pickups that could be plugged directly into a mixing console. The Les Paul Recording II features a lo-Z/hi-Z toggle for changing the output impedance, handled by a Jensen transformer. You can connect directly to a microphone preamplifier in lo-Z mode, or connect to your favorite amplifier in hi-Z mode.

Incredible tonal variety
With switchable phase and coil tapping, you've got a lot of range with the Les Paul Recording II. There's even a ground lift switch to help reduce ground noise when you're using both the hi-Z and lo-Z outputs. And speaking of reducing noise, the pickups are reverse wound/reverse polarity, so the single-coil mode is hum-canceling when in the center pickup position.

Designed to be Les Paul's "everything" guitar
By the start of the '70s, Les Paul had blazed the trails for countless guitarists. After decades of conjuring all sorts of iconic guitar tones, Les Paul still wanted more. Specifically, he wanted them all from one guitar! Thus the Recording model was born. This Les Paul Recording II is based on Les Paul's very own original Recording model, right down to the exact specs. It may have been ahead of its time, but the Les Paul Recording II faithfully reproduces one of the most unique guitars ever made.

Gibson Les Paul Recording II Solidbody Electric Guitar Features:
Faithful reproduction of the original Les Paul Recording model
Based on the specs of Les Paul's personal guitar
Low-impedance output can be plugged directly into a mixing console or microphone preamp
Pickups can be switched to hi-Z output for use with a guitar amplifier
Bigsby vibrato tailpiece for expressive playing
Phase reverse switch for tonal variety
Limited edition - only 600 available globally
Hard case included

all the dealers are emphasizing how this is limited to 600 globally, becoming an instant collectible- that part of the current instrument business model really annoys me, as I think they're suckering a lot of people into buying guitars they'll never play, with the belief that 20 years from now this will matter to someone else, who will be willing to pay higher prices for these- yet the generation that would will be dying off, trying to figure out how to sell all these old guitars to pay for their retirement! (am I a cynic, or what! :W )

If I buy one, it will be to play, not collect. :B :roll:

[JonMarsh]

The Joe Bonamassa Les Paul arrived today- I should just start calling these NOS- "New Old Stock", because the only thing that isn't "new" about it is that I'm not the original purchaser- otherwise it looks like it was bought from dealer stock, put in a closet, until being sold. The paper work and certificates and cable haven't even been opened. That's how people keep guitars when their collectors for resale- many of the guitars I've bought the last year have been in that condition, but these guys have not likely made any profit.

This one is totally mint; I'll see if I can get some pictures later on the weekend, probably over at GF's where I have my stands. Now, I just have to find some time to install the Seymour Duncan Bonamassa pickups... I suspect that may not happen until I'm out of indentured servitude at Cupertino. That could be anywhere from one month to nine months...


After all, we also have some stuff to do with Isiris and Wavecor Ardent! Got the midrange and tweeter cable in for those today, too, from Parts Connexion in Canada. UPS is pretty fast with this Canadian thing these days.

[JonMarsh]

I've been following up on the "new" "Les Paul Recording". I'm less and less convinced that this is a faithful reproduction of the original- I'll discuss why after I get a response back from Sweetwater, where I asked them a bunch of detailed, and perhaps too pointed, questions.

I've found a few good photo's of the original guitar and control panel layout, confirming my recollections about the original, and the use of 1 volume control, a tone decade rotary control, and bass and treble.











The Gibson site only says that the new Les Paul Recording has a traditional complement of independent volume and tone controls (traditional for the Les Paul Recording? or traditional for standard Les Pauls? which have a volume and treble roll off control for each pickup- that’s NOTHING like what was on the original Les Paul Recording. It had one volume, the tone decade switch, treble, and bass.

This wording from the Gibson site gives me the impression these could be new high impedance pickups built to look like the old Lo-Z ones:

Two versatile new pickups route through a premium, industry-standard Jensen audio transformer for a balanced low-impedance output that can go direct into pro mixers or computer audio interfaces. Or, select the High-Z out for traditional guitar amps.

It may just be a poor choice of words, by the marketing and copy writer guys, but who knows?

So, I wrote Sweetwater (to my personal sales engineer) early Monday but haven't heard back from them yet. They were probably closed on MLK day, and perhaps had trouble finding answers- the manuals coming with guitars these days are distressingly free of useful information, it seems...

[oneplustwo]

The more I see those Bigsbys the more I like them! And it sounds like you should find one of the originals instead of the reissue. How much are they if you can even find one?!

[JonMarsh]

The more I see those Bigsbys the more I like them! And it sounds like you should find one of the originals instead of the reissue. How much are they if you can even find one?!

Very hard to find an original in good shape. I've been looking for a while. most are beaters. Sometimes you can find the 1976 version built on the smaller body in the $4K to $5K region in decent shape. that's a bit pricey in my book.

[oneplustwo]

You should then build your own! Think of the money saved! And the option to make one exactly like you want. You build speakers... why not guitars?

[JonMarsh]

I was even hallucinating about finding an old one with functioning electronics but not a good body, and putting the electronics in one of the new bodies.... now, that's probably a pretty sick idea, and more revealing of the kind of nut job I can be at times than I care to have discussed in public!

Another reason I may not hear from them this week is because of the NAMM show- starts tomorrow. I used to work in the late 70's for a company exhibiting there- it was fun, at least in those days! And there's some kind of new Line6 amp concept going to be unveiled at the show, too. And now they have some real money behind them, being part of Yamaha now.

Just for fun I'll post some of the original Gibson material I dug up on the Les Paul Recording when I can find the time...

[JonMarsh]

Haven't had time to post the older Recording material- and my "dedicated sales engineer" at Sweetwater has not been able to come back with any answers to my questions so far in three weeks- including a phone call and a couple more emails prodding him. He says he's not getting any answers from Gibson, and they probably don't have anyone in their organization who's actually played much less owned the original.


I have MADE time to do an update to my Joe Bonamassa Les Paul. I figured it just wasn't right for those Seymour Duncan Custom Shop Joe Bonamassa pickups to be lying around not doing anything useful. The story I hear checking forums is that these pickups have been scooped up pretty quick, often being bought to go into a future guitar acquisition, not known yet except for being some kind of dual pickup Les Paul. Hmmm, I hope they really ARE that good...


Well, a project isn't a project without pictures...

So in case anyone else wants to tackle this but hasn't done this sort of thing before, I'm laying it out in typical Mission Possible detail.

For those just tuning in, this is updating an Epiphone Joe Bonamass Les Paul from the Gibson Burstbucker pickups that come with it to Seymour Duncan Custom Shop Joe Bonamassa pickups that replicate the tone of Joe's favorite 1959 Les Paul. Both the Epi and Gibson version of this guitar were limited production items, and use a 1959 fat profile neck, mahogany body with a full carved maple top (typical for Gibson, limited to select Epiphone Les Pauls), jumbo medium nickel-silver frets, and a rosewood fretboard. The Gibson version comes with some signature Seymour Duncan pickups; the Epi with a Gibson Burstbucker 2 on the neck, and an overwound Burstbucker 3 on the bridge. This update will install JB signature pickups in the Epi.

First, these are single wire pickups, so the wiring is straight forward, using a standard Les Paul wiring diagram- and for replacing the pickups, all we have to do is disconnect the original pickups from their volume control and wire in the new ones.




This is the starting point- a "NOS" Epi JB Les Paul (New Old Stock)- never played before I bought it on eBay, apparently.



Here I've got the bench ready and strings stripped- after finishing the installation, I'll be oiling the fretboard and doing some other setup.



After removing the rear control plate cover, the next thing was dismounting the pickups and unsoldering them. While one could just splice these in right in the pickup cavity, if one wanted to re-use the Gibson Burstbuckers in another guitar or project, it is best to desolder in the control cavity and leave the full leads on the pickups.




When I desoldered the neck and bridge pickups I marked which went to which pot, just to keep track of things- and when pulling out the longer neck pickup wire, I tied another slim wire to it so I had something to pull the replacement pickup wire back through. In the case of the bridge pickup, the cavity is wide and short for the wiring, and just stuffing it in is no problem.




Yes, that scruffy looking pickup by the bridge is one of the new pickups- they're "pre-aged" to look like a vintage pickup that's been around. I'm not a fan of that for pickups, and even less for vintage re-issue guitars; I'd prefer it look new and not like something that's been knocking around for 40 or 50 years! But I hear a lot of the young guys like really vintage beat up looking gear- makes them look cool, supposedly... Like they're vintage and beatup? Hey, there's only one way to get to that... in reality... putting in the years.



Here we can see both of the pickups wired into the original volume pots- the shield goes to the pot body, the pickup wire to the same input lug it was attached to. BTW, the wiring in this one was NOT per the normal Epi Les Paul, but like the old standard Les Paul wiring, into the high end of the pot, and the center output going to the tone control.



Then the pickups are installed in the mounting rings- compressing the mounting standoff springs is the only tricky bit, while attaching and tightening the screws. Gawd, aren't these pre-aged pickup covers ugly? :W




Now all that's left is some maintenance and setup work, and it will be ready to play with the new pickups.


Perfect kind of music for this guitar? How about "Texas", from Up Close?

[oneplustwo]

Looks good! I'm still shopping around. My latest idea is to build myself a tele with a 24.75" scale neck. But byoguitar doesn't have that combo available and I don't want to spend the bucks at Warmouth for what they offer. Time to practice is becoming more and more scarce so not a huge priority at the moment. Still enjoy shopping around for one though.

[JonMarsh]

Time to practice is becoming more and more scarce so not a huge priority at the moment. Still enjoy shopping around for one though.

That sentence hits home- I'm still on my 5:30AM to 9 PM door to door work lifestyle. GF is starting to work on summer vacation plans, but it will be with the GF of hers that she went to Cuba with in December, not me, because I can't get the time off committed, due to the customer commitment (not due to lack of vacation hours- got those out the yin yang, for all the good it does me...)

Keep looking for the project that fits your needs- you'll find it eventually! I haven't given up on the LP recording, either, but there's so much other stuff going on right now... it took a big prioritization effort to do the pickups yesterday, but I needed a mental health afternoon! :W

One of the other guys at work who plays is getting back into it, bought a Fender Stratocaster and small amp at Christmas, and I just loaned him the limited edition 1960 LP to play with, as he's been wanting to try out a Les Paul. He and another guy at work want to get together and rehearse for a company function with some other guy who have done this in the past, but I think I have to pass for now, unfortunately- it would be a great motivator, but just don't have the spare time right now.

[JonMarsh]

Father forgive me, for I have sinned...

Uh oh....

Shipped today, this specific one...

I got incredibly frustrated looking at over priced crap for original ones in terrible shape online- torn up finish, busted and repaired necks and still thousands- or $6K or $5K for a yellowish white one with the Gen2 body which is actually a standard Les Paul body- not the same thing as my original and double the price of a new one. Ah well... no impulse control! GF will probably kill me... :B













Now I've fully rebuilt the the basic configuration in guitars I used to play with (SG Custom Les Paul, Les Paul Recording) and have a modernized amplifier setup (Marshall Vintage Modern 2266 replacing my old JTM45 ("dirty channel", a Line6 HD100 replacing my old Traynor 100W (clean channel), and a few other goodies thrown in- still getting the hang of the Line 6 POD HD Pro X and how it can interface directly with my DT50 (analog modeling amp with digital front end) and the HD100 (basically, the POD replaces a bevy of stomp boxes and switching clean to dirty. Using the 1960A cab with Greenbacks for dirty, and the 1960B cab with Vintage 30's for clean.

Got no excuses anymore, except no spare time. And some other guys at work want to start a band of sort... would be a great opportunity if there was any time!

And I just got a potful of new (to me) Joe Bonamassa CD's- can life get any better? :B

[kevinm]

Beiaitufl guitar. Can't wait to hear what you think.

Also, you're inspiration to us other impulse shoppers, Jon!

[JonMarsh]

So I'm a bad influence on the rest of you? :W

BTW, up until a few days ago, Sweetwater had four of these in stock. This morning, only two- I took one. By lunchtime the other one was gone, too. It's a limited production run, only 600 world wide. I'm hoping in spite of the design differences I can do similar things with it as my old one in the '70's.

[dyazdani]

Nice purchases on both accounts!

[JonMarsh]

Hoo Boy! The Recording LP arrived today and was waiting for me when I got to GF's. Looks just as nice as the pictures, and plays well just acoustically. Can tell the body has a lot of sustain, and the Bigsby works nicely, too.

Need to strip these strings, put on some of my favorites (D'Addrio XL120's) and try it out with the DT50 or POD HD Pro X this weekend! The POD even has a balanced low impedance input (one of the reason's I bought it). It's all part of the plan... :W

[JonMarsh]

"Moving Day" Saturday, as the Leslie 3300 cabinet arrived from Nevada on Friday instead of next Tuesday as UPS predicted, and we figured we'd better tackle that end of the living room and get it sorted out. That meant brining over the organ, too, moving a china cabinet, and finding a new home for GF's monstrous stacks of slide trays... (*don't ask, you wouldn't believe....)



It was a good excuse for picking up a new deluxe handcart which will be needed for other parts of the moving activities to come, but you can't see it here because it's covered with padding for the organ. Made this an easy 1 man job, whereas the one GF borrows from neighbor now and then just isn't the right size or configuration. Or configurable (this one has three modes). It came in handy moving the partially assembled Wavecor Ardent into the family room on Sunday, too- that sucker is HEAVY! (those big magnets on the Wavecor woofers)

[oneplustwo]

That looks awesome! Can't imagine how it sounds but I'm sure it's just as awesome knowing you.

I bought myself a b-stock Mandolin. It's tuned like a violin so I already know how to play it. Just need to find some fun bluegrass tunes to play. That plus the sheet music to Maggie May.

[JonMarsh]

That's pretty cool! I should try to get GF interested in one of those- she's got a couple of ukelele's, but a mandolin would be much more interesting! How's it sound? It looks very nice! :T

[oneplustwo]

That's pretty cool! I should try to get GF interested in one of those- she's got a couple of ukelele's, but a mandolin would be much more interesting! How's it sound? It looks very nice! :T

It sounds ok. I have no point of comparison really but it seems to stay in tune and there's no buzzing or anything. The pickup and electronics seem to be crap as I get a fair amount of noise. But I don't expect to be plugging in that often if at all. If I get more into it, I'm sure I'll invest in a "real" one at some point.

[oneplustwo]

Jon - you still there? Haven't seen any new gear recently!

I went on a bit of a spree last week.

This is on the way since I gave my other Tele to my dad:



And these two (1 & 2) showed up today since I wanted a classical guitar and wanted to try P90s:



All told, all my electrics together still aren't worth as much as a "real" LP or strat. So I feel ok with the stable of guitars that continues to grow.

[JonMarsh]

Nice additions! What do you think of the Agile P90 LP? Is it based on the '56 LP? Is the Tele - like axe a semi-hollow body like some I've seen? What's the acoustic like- seems to be a nylon string model- what kind of music do you like with nylon? (my GF only plays nylon string- she'd like to do flamenco someday, but as she says, has quite a ways to go..)

Talk about synchronicity- I was planning on a post this AM. Though about 95% of my limited spare time is still focused on that Wavecor Ardent build, there are some other things that have been percolating in the background and now finally being realized- it's a bit of a story though, so bear with me.

Are you familiar with Peter Green, one of the founders of the original Fleetwood Mac? It's funny how the name of the band is derived from the rhythm section of the group, but the group was originally the brainchild of Peter Green, who really got his first big break playing with John Mayall as Eric Clapton's replacement. Anyway, there are a lot of guitarists who have been inspired by his work, culminating with what I'd call FM's swan song for Peter Green, "Then Play On".

I just recently picked up the SHM-CD of "Then Play On" (and two other early Fleetwood Mac albums), and though some note that not all of the SHM-CD's are of a quality that justify's the price, I'm pretty happy with these, particularly "Then Play On"- it's the best I've heard these cuts in digital.




Besides his most storied compositions, like "Black Magic Woman", "Albatross", "Rattlesnake Shake", "Oh Well", and "Coming your Way", he is known in guitarists circles for his unusual tone, ascribed to "magical" characteristics of his '59 Les Paul. Now, Gary Moore bought that Les Paul from Peter after Peter went around the bend in the early 70's, apparently due to an LSD overdose. In 1984, that guitar was closely examined by Jol Dantzig, who determined that the wiring and construction was all basically "stock", other than Peter having turned the neck pickup around, BUT, and this is a big but, the magnet was installed backwards in the front pickup, reversing the electrical phase of the pickup. So, in summary, one might reasonably say that the tone of Peter Green's LP was a combination of the rather nice sound of the Alnico II PAF pickups used at that time, with the classic late 50s LP body with long tenon neck and fairly meaty construction with a maple top, AND the front pickup effectively being out of phase.

So, here's a fairly recent picture of that "storied" '59 Les Paul... obviously been around the block more than a few times...




Now, hold on to your seat, the last time this guitar was sold, by Gary Moore because he needed money to cover costs associated with a cancelled tour, the tab was $2,000,000. Yes, that's a 2 and six zero's after it!

Well, you know, I'm rather fond of Peter Green's work and that tone, so one of the thing's that has also been on my radar was how to put together a cheapie clone of the instrument, covering the key construction and configuration bases. To hit the jackpot, I figured it needs to possess these characteristics:

• Classic 50's/early 60's LP construction with a long tenon neck, fairly beefy, and the classic carved maple top
• PAF style pickups with Alnico II pickups like the originals, preferably in a construction or style making it possible to reverse the phase of the front pickup (this part is tricky, because the original single wire pickups are not very feasible to phase reverse EXCEPT by the magnet, as it creates shielding and hum problems).
• Gibson style electronics, with the high grade caps, pots and switches, and a fully shielded control cavity
• Last, but not least, ideally, a lemon burst curly maple finish similar to the original- this part is not so critical (not at all sonically) but would really be the icing on the cake, you know?

In fact, in thinking about this and researching it, one of the things I found this concept may hinge on is the availability of the Seymour Duncan SH-55n Seth Lover Humbucker Guitar 4 conductor Pickup, which being a four wire design, built on the original Gibson tooling with Alnico II magnets, is my best bet. Both bridge and neck versions are available in original nickel. With these, electrical phase reversal is feasible, without any hum problems.





But what about the axe? This is where it gets tricky, but interesting, in a sick kind of way...

In 2010, Epiphone did a limited run of a signature model called the "Slash Appetite for Destruction" (or Slash AFD as it's known for short) and that model is a remarkable fit to the requirements, including the long tenon neck construction, carved maple top, upgraded electronics, AND some special Seymour Duncan PAF style pickups with Alnico II magnets. Oh, and the appearance is pretty much on the money - unlike the earlier SLASH gold top versions.

I've been looking for one of these for a while, without any luck, but last Sunday, one popped up on eBay, and I moved quickly; it's in transit now.




Checking the specs in detail about the Seymour Duncan SLASH pickups, they're quite nice, BUT, unless I'm willing to disassemble and reverse the magnet, I'll need to spring for the Seth Lover pickups, which are four wire and can be electrically reversed. Well, I figure, what the heck, I may as well try modding the neck pickup to get the phase change; nothing to lose, and I could save $230 for a set of pickups... but then, it would be more "authentically" an ersatz Peter Green model with a complete new set with the conventional looking construction... and it would be a slam dunk...

Stay tuned...

[oneplustwo]

That's awesome! It looks like the original had the volume and tone pot holes re-drilled? Maybe that's the secret to his tone.

[JonMarsh]

That's awesome! It looks like the original had the volume and tone pot holes re-drilled? Maybe that's the secret to his tone.

yeah, yah, that must be it!!!

Actually, what looks like the shadows of holes it most likely the pointer that the old LP's had to indicate the knob setting, probably more than a little bit of dirt on this one... :W

Well, Sweetwater had the Seymour Duncan Seth Lover pickups in stock (BTW, Seth used to work for Gibson and is the guy who invented the hum bucker...) so I talked to my Sales Engineer Zach, a young whippersnapper who had no idea at all who Peter Green was... (you probably have to be an elderly curmudgeon like me to remember things from the late 60's... it just doesn't seem that long ago!) but I have the pickups on the way, so I can do a fully OCD recreation- I think I'll even mount the front one in reverse, like Peter did... (sheesh, the things old guys will do... )

Of course, I shouldn't feel so bad... was just talking with my GF yesterday, had sent her an email about the 50th anniversary of the introduction of the IBM S/360, and she was in one of the first classes at IBM for doing customer installations and support back in '66. Long live the mainframe... (I did took a programming course while in High school at the local college, learning Fortran on punch cards; they were run on a shiny new S/360 they'd just gotten, of course it was a baby one).

Let's put this in perspective; an S/360 would be blown away by the 1985 Cray MP4-




Which has about the same floating point through put as an iPad 2... really.

[oneplustwo]

Are you going to "relic" it to look like the original?

[JonMarsh]

Are you going to "relic" it to look like the original?

Gawd, NO! you've touched on a raw nerve for me, this whole business of building new guitars and selling them for exorbitant prices that look like they've been beaten around for 30 or 40 years... I think it's sick. However this instrument winds up being configured (and yesterday I downloaded a number of video's about creating an LCPG), I want it to look and play like new, not like it's near the end of it's usable lifetime! I mean, even the Gibson custom shop '56 Les Paul re-issue I bought was the one that looks like it was just manufactured, not the "aged" version that's all beat up. I just don't see any point to that, unless you plan to fib to your friends that you actually have one of the old originals.


But then, there's a lot going on in the current musical instrument business that does not look very healthy to me, including the whole business of guitar models that are literally built for collectors, not players, and just who is going to be collecting these things 10-15 years from now when a lot of the boomers are dying off? I mean, it's not like my generation spent a bunch of money collecting the sax's and trumpets and whatever of the guys who played swing music in the 40's, and we certainly didn't collect replicas of their instruments, as opposed to the originals. Yet, when you check the forums, particularly discussion about "signature" models, it seems the majority of purchases are guys who buy the instrument, look at it a few minutes, then stick it in their closet or underneath their bed like it was a savings bond. I have to wonder if that's not a bubble that's going to pop some day...

There's another really serious problem I see in the musical instrument business, which is the consolidation and concentration of retail distribution in what is essentially one company, though to the naive it may look like a multiplicity of competitors. It's not. I'm referring to the Guitar Center syndrome. On my own, I figured out that GC has multiple subsidiaries, often actually selling the same instruments, including the same used instruments, under different names. This includes Music & Arts, Musician's Friend, GuitarCenter.com, LMI, Giardinelli, Musician.com, Private Reserve Guitars, Woodwind and Brasswind, Music 123, and Harmony Central. If you try to look into the financials of these organizations, you'll see that it's an incredible shell game- for a reason.

This outfit was funded/controlled by Bain Capital (Mitt Romney's former company), but recently has been taken over by Ares Capital.

http://www.latimes.com/business/money/la-fi-mo-guitar-center-completes-debt-swap-with-ares-management-20140403,0,3327446.story#axzz2yOjr1Kpf

This is a pretty innocuous reading article, but I think it conceals a darker reality. That is explained in this article here:

http://www.ericgarland.co/2014/03/29/parasite-economy/

Executive Summary:

A detailed analysis of GC and their subsidiary company's health supports an analogy like this:

To summarize the story for those who don’t have a taste for corporate finance, just imagine you had $65,000 in credit card debt financed at a crappy rate, and that you made around $80,000 a year. Things on the horizon would look bleak, and you would be forced to either change your lifestyle or declare bankruptcy and get a fresh start. As such, irrespective of the contradictions inherent in the big box model and the general draining of wealth from their supposed middle class customers, I figured that these guys would be lucky to make it a few more months.

More:

The other shoe dropped a few weeks back when the main holder of Guitar Center’s debt, Ares Capital Management, stepped up to take ownership in place of future bond payments. The business media reports this arrangement as an alternative to bankruptcy, which sounds about right. I expected as much, because this model is in a slow death spiral, and the only way to extract the millions of dollars owed will be to run the Bain playbook, only harder and faster. As such, my forecast is for the $500 – 600 million of inventory to be sold at cheap prices while employees and vendors get squeezed for every nickel. This is no different than the past six years of company management, according to my sources, it’s just that this time, there is a time-sensitive goal – to get the most money out before the whole thing collapses.

More details about the Bain-Ares handoff came out around 48 hours ago. They revolve, unsurprisingly, around a restructuring of senior PIK (payment in kind) notes that offered money up front with huge balloon payments on the back end. Under the current deals, GC would owe over $950 million in 2017 alone, an amount that would be impossible to pay off. I was skeptical about any form of refinancing, since the ratings agencies have compared their debt to scratchers tickets. But Ares is charging ahead and is preparing a bond offering to the market despite all the hullaboo:

Ares Capital is not taking on the risk themselves, but is preparing a bond issue which would sell securities in this debt... not unlike the securities sold in the mid 2000's for subprime mortgages, and in fact this debt/bond offering is being labeled exactly that, subprime.

Chances are, Ares Capital Management will find buyers for Guitar Center debt at 6 – 9% interest, because for financiers today, higher risk just means higher returns, not actual risk - just like back in the mid-2000s. Because of wealth concentrated in the financial sector, the dynamic is almost identical to what destroyed the mortgage market: Complexity obfuscated the true risk of financial instruments, which was being fobbed off onto other parties until the whole thing blew up.

Then, I think there will be a day of reckoning for the MI business, including all the manufacturers.

BTW, this is one reason I limit my buying to selected retailers, such as Sweetwater, who are not part of this conglomerate and who pass the sniff test for financial integrity. Or, of course, to stupid collectors on eBay who have to wake up to the real value of their "collector investments" and sell at a reasonable price when they need the money.

Harsh, but reality is a harsh mistress.

[JonMarsh]

Back on our current OT Topic:

I've reviewed the video's for procedures to swap around the magnet in the front pickup, and particularly for an open frame uncovered pickup like the Seymour Duncan's used in the SLASH "Appetite for Destruction" model, this should be very straight forward.

The Slash "Appetite" features Slash's signature Seymour Duncan Alnico II Pro pickups, which provide the same crunch, power and performance that Slash hears when he cranks up his Les Paul. The Slash "Appetite" humbuckers feature Alnico II magnets, just like the ones Slash has used for years. However, these Slash Alnico II Pro's are wound with just enough boosted output to push a stock Les Paul toward the sweet sustain and rude crunch that characterize Slash's sound. To further capture the vintage Les Paul tone that Slash loves, the Slash "Appetite" features a tone circuit using high-quality "Orange Drop" tone capacitors, tested and approved by Slash himself. Another great Slash touch is the "reverse" Zebra-coil pickup in the bridge position.

So, although I have the Seth Lover Seymour Duncan's on the way, I'll probably start just by doing the mod on the Seymour Duncan SLASH pickups, which are supposed to be fairly special themselves, as they're basically an overwound original Alnico II PAF, without the covers (which tend to be microphonic on the unspotted PAF's). The look won't be full tilt, but hey, I can always at least turn around the pickup to confuse people a little more... :W

Most likely what I should do with the Seymour Duncan Seth Lover pickups is upgrade one of my other Epiphones, like the G400 SG- maybe turn that into a Peter Green SG? Talk about sacrilegious!

[oneplustwo]

Rondo Music Agile AL-2000 Goldtop P90 initial review

A little more detail on my new Goldtop P90.

First the good:

1. Action pretty spot on right out of the box
2. Intonation is great as well all the way up the fret board
3. Fret work is nice and smooth
4. The bridge looks to be installed backwards from traditional but Kurt from Rondo says this makes it easier to adjust for P90 models
5. The finish is pretty decent. There are a few really minor flaws around the rear cavities but nothing major
6. The Grover tuners are great

Now the not so good:

1. The neck is three piece as I expected. But the two piece heel has a "bonus" third piece that likely won't make any real difference but does further emphasize the
2. fact that this was a $250 guitar.
   
   
3. The strings don't seem to align perfectly with the pickup poles. I've noticed this with many guitars and although it doesn't seem to impact performance, it just bugs me.

All in all, about what I expected. It's my first guitar with P90s so I don't have a point of comparison, but so far I like it a lot! Need to play with it some more, but it definitely helps round out my tonal palette.

[JonMarsh]

That's good- the picture looks very nice, the overall workmanship and wood finish looks remarkable at that price point! I could ask stupid questions, like does it have a shielded control chamber- but that's probably not likely at $250. P90s and their controls tend to be quite a bit more sensitive to noise pickup- you may find things like fluorescent lights could drive you crazy! So, you got the AL-2000 with Grovers- seems to me like a lot of guitar for the money! :T It's pretty remarkable- and made in Korea, too, not China.

Tracking info shows my SLASH AFD should be delivered today- cross fingers- it's going to GF's.

[JonMarsh]

The new LP was delivered yesterday- looks to be a keeper!








The screws clamping the magnet are visible on the pickup back side- this shouldn't be any big deal to try the swap...




With what's going on for work, the only impediment is going to be finding any free time- between working Saturday and doing taxes this weekend, won't be any in the near future.

[oneplustwo]

Nice touch with the slash logo on the underside of the pickup! HAHA!

Turns out the control cavity does have foil on the cover and looks to be painted with "shielding" paint? At least that's what I've read it is supposed to be. Regardless, with the 6 fluorescent lights in my office, I haven't noticed any buzzing yet so likely not an issue.