Alembic Guitars Club
Alembic products => Alembic Basses & Guitars => Topic started by: blazer on May 18, 2005, 04:05:26 PM
-
Okay there's word going round on several Bass player forums that Alembic will be bringing out a reissue of the modified Guild Starfire basses as used by Jack Cassidy (Jefferson airplane, Hot tuna) and Phil Lesh (The greatful dead)
I wanted to be sure if the rumors were either false or true so I'm posting the question on the one forum where it can be told truthfully.
(http://club.alembic.com/Images/393/18546.jpg)
If it's really so I would applaud it, they would be awesome.
-
I was told that there was the possibility of a limited edition based on sn#1 as well as Phil's Osage Orange.... nothing about the Starfire, though. Susan knows a few of us would love to have our own Godfather....
-
My guess would be that Fender Musical Instruments, who owns Guild, would not be happy about this particular endeavor. Since they've graduated from the CBS school of trademark and patent protection they would be unhappy...
-
this would be bad...I would want one really, really bad (esp. the osage orange), but probably couldn't afford it....
-
i've always entertained with the idea that when i get more $$$, i would have 2 basses made for me: 1 osage bass and one godfather....
-
I really don't need to hear this kind of stuff. I've got 2 kids to put through college in a few years and a house to pay off...
John
-
hey you got priorities... like it or not, its what i want.2 more basses!..kids got to go to college, and house needs to get paid off. do what you need to do.
-
I like the Idea of a limited edition reissue based on serial #1.
Hypothetically, I dont see how Fender could get offended or even begin take legal action against Alembic for buying a huge number of Guild Starfires regardless of the motive to modify and resell them. If anything....Fender should encourage this and give Alembic a special deal on a bulk purchase. This kind of deal would surely seem to benefit both companies and make a lot of bass players happy.
-
Hypothetically, I dont see Alembic buying any product from Fender/Guild to modify, unless the customer is content with a very limited warranty..... Having a Godfather built from scratch in Santa Rosa would be ideal.
-
Jimmy,
I'm just not sure how to go about selling the kids and the house without the wife getting upset, that's all. It's an interesting idea. Fender sells plenty of Gibson and other stuff through Guitar Center. I think the bigger issue would be Alembic doing a big bucks extensive upgrade and accepting the liability for an instrument they didn't build. Otherwise, I think it's an awesome idea. Perhaps the route to pursue would be having Alembic modify an existing instrument you already own, rather than partnering with another manufacturer. Any agreements/liabilities would be kept between the customer and Alembic.
John
-
Sounds like smoke on the water to me. I'm sure Mica or Valentino will respond to this thread. Besides, don't we already have exceptional basses already? Anything more would be like extra icing on the cake Michael
-
no i think in order to do it right, alembic would have to build everythung from strach. that would be the way i would want it to happen. alembic would have full control of the construction.
-
What Jimmy Said.
I'm sure Susan would rather build them from scratch than have to put the Alembic name on a body manufactured by somebody else. And, alas, they're not tooled up to do semi-hollow-body instruments in that format.
That said, I'm sure they'd be delighted to drop Series electronics (or damned near anything else you can imagine) into a Guild bass _you_ happened to own. Just be prepared to wait well over a year for the mod, and to pay substantially more than a full-bells-and-whistles custom Series bass would cost.
But I don't see it as ever being a catalog instrument, even on a very limited run.
Now, replicating #1 would be a bit easier. It's possible they still have the templates, but even if they didn't the crew is brilliant enough to cut new ones, even if they only have photos to work from. Matching the carving will be interesting...
Maybe if we start now, we can convince them to do it as a 40th Anniversary project for 2012. I doubt their current production load would let them cover the necessary R&D and pre-production tooling before then.
-
I'm quite certain that if someone ordered a duplicate of #1, Alembic would make it.
You just have to have the funds. The kind that come in aluminum (aluminium) briefcases, and have pretty little bands around the bills.
Brad
-
Guild no longer produces the Starfire II Basses so they would all have to be made from scratch, most likely with Fender's blessing since the Starfire shape and peghead are registered trademarks of FMIC. And like I stated before, Fender Musical Instruments CORPORATION has graduated from the CBS school of trademark and patent protection so a license would have to be granted from FMIC at some kind of cost that may make the project impractical. Though it would totally be a cool idea...
-
Nic,
Catalog instrument struck me as incredibly funny, for all the obvious reasons. Good stuff...
John
-
I did have my tongue buried in my cheek when I typed that... :-)
-
A couple of years ago, about the time this board was established (and soon replaced the old yahoo(IIRC) board), Susan and Mica posted that they had plans to make a reissue of Alembic #1 (the Casady bass). AFAIK , this was never pursued. The reissue would not have been as complex as the original in either carving or electronics.
here's a link to my modded Starfire:
http://www3.sympatico.ca/videoimage/Starfire.htm (http://www3.sympatico.ca/videoimage/Starfire.htm)
(http://alembic.com/club/messages/393/18801.jpg)
-
That's amazing looking bass, how does it play/Sound?
And while looking at it I can't help but to wonder couldn't they at least put on a more substantial bridge while they were at it?
-
or maybe a few more knobs . . .
-
Oddly enough, that Guild bridge setup, when augmented with brass saddles as shown, works exceptionally well with the Guild body. The coupling to the body's center block is substantial, and the neck joint on the beast is solid. So there's plenty of energy transfer from the bridge back into the neck, which accounts for much of the Starfire's basic woody, somewhat upright-sounding tone. And there's no lack of sustain. Putting a block in wouldn't gain anything in that department, and the Guild bridge actually has more adujstment range than the basic Alembic tune-o-matic.
The brass saddles improve definition and sustain (over the rosewood originals). Also the way the bridge contacts the front plate of the instrument gives good energy transfer to the top as well, which really lets the body chamber pump. Even with the lower f-hole obstructed by the shielding plate, and that side of the bout weighted down by the electronics, the body is very active in the tonal shaping.
Overall, it's quite a remarkable instrument, even before the Alembic mods. I certainly love mine, even without the Alembic pickups and full-bore electronics setup. (I did do a master volume and stereo output setup, and converted all the controls to Clarostats.)
nic
-
Nic; thanks for the comments on the modified Guild bridge. I figured there was probably a good explanation for why it was there!
Kevin; they probably ran out of knobs .
-
Well ,I guess I'd better go get some more brass saddles! (only got one...:-)I still haven't got the knobs figured out. I think I'm playing with no filters (what the previous owner calls passive - but can't be really passive -i.e. no power), but I'm not sure!
I'm glad there ain't no mo knobs...
It has a full rich sound - maybe electronics, maybe the age, maybe the semi-hollowbody construction, maybe all 3.
The neck is very easy to play.
Frank
-
Dave - My pleasure. I _love_ my Guild.
(And thanks for cloning those other posts over to the FAQ section. I'm totally flattered!)
-
I remember reading about the oils in the osage orange wood being an issue in the original...
Is there schematics somewhere of Phil's bass,the shot of the guts with the backplate off is jaw-dropping.
smiles,
kris
-
too many knobs ! Good god!