A much younger JB, playing an early Les Paul Custom that I traded away for the 1936 000-18S. I still miss this guitar:

He comes in the Fret Mill every time they play Roanoke, most of the time just to kill time and look around but has bought guitars, or amps. Always plays something and hangs out. The guys love it, cause it's usually middle of the day so nobody's in there, but he's always very personable even if there is. 

He's playing here again in February, and we're stocking the new JB signature Martin 00-18's down there. I'm kinda' planning to be on-hand that day... you know, sweepin' the floor or changin' strings... 😆

He's just about the nicest guy ever. He's also the one person who knew EXACTLY how my Paramount Style L wanted to be played.

Quote from: Nova Constellatio on Yesterday at 09:22:04 AMHe's just about the nicest guy ever. He's also the one person who knew EXACTLY how my Paramount Style L wanted to be played.

I thought they were all Hawaiian until a tenor showed up in the store years ago. (maybe 25 years ago... long enough that I don't remember) There wasn't a lot of information about them to be had. I only knew what was in the Longworth book, but that was enough for instant recognition.
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Posting on another thread this morning, I was reminded of this one. I don't have it anymore but I sometimes wish I still did. This Gibson F-5 has a 1965 FON, ink-stamped into the back, and a 1969 serial number handwritten on the orange label visible through the f-hole. Which isn't too crazy for that time to believe an F-style mandolin laid around the Kalamazoo plant for 4 years before shipping.





The guy who played mandolin in my Dad's band all through my formative years had it and played it almost exclusively since the early 70's. It so happens, I also knew the man he'd bought it from because he was who introduced me to my friend and mentor Ward Elliott. (I'll come back to that...) This mandolin player was one of the best to ever pick up the instrument and play it from around here. Completely self-taught. All by ear, no musical education whatsoever. OCD, and ADD, before they even had acronyms for it. Brilliant musician and gifted singer. His backup mandolin was a 1923 Gibson A-2z "snakehead" if you're curious. He'd had it since the early 50's and took it to Korea with him. But the F-5 was his baby... the pinnacle of mandolins in his mind. In reality, that thing had enough lumber in it to build another mandolin. He dug the sound out of it from 1970-something until the cancer took him in 2004. His widow gave it to me 10 years later. It was still tucked away in the case with a bundle of pictures and his tooled leather strap. It was utterly unplayable. He'd played clean through the frets and into the ebony board.

I took it to Ward's shop with me, just to get it back up and running. We pulled what was left of the frets out and planed that fingerboard back smooth, then replaced all the frets with EVO Gold. Set it all back up with a new bridge and gave it the best chance we could. I'll have to say, it took a while for me to 'get' what he ever saw or heard in that one, but it grew on me daily. It was so radically different from my own old A-model Gibson that just having the longer scale and extra frets available changed my thinking and approach.

My oldest nephew has more talent for playing any musical instrument than I would have if I could have another full life to live over. Unfortunately he has the attention span of a squirrel that just ate a bag of coffee beans. When he started branching out from guitar to cello, then fiddle, then realized a mandolin was tuned to that same pitch, he just had to have one. Well, I had several... and being the cool uncle, I decided to pass along a very special mandolin. I hope, beyond hope, that kid takes care of that thing. I had to repossess a 1926 Gibson banjo he left laying in the dog's bed. I gave him a 1962 in it's place, but still... come on kid, get it together.

Long way around saying, I had one of these.

It's a super cool instrument, and I really wonder when the wood was from — I wouldn't be shocked if they were still using up the stuff they'd had since the '20s in the '60s (when it came to mandolin family stuff).

I wish I had some EVO gold for one of the basses that's in my future. It's a shame they no longer make it.

Quote from: Nova Constellatio on Yesterday at 04:12:42 PM...
I wish I had some EVO gold for one of the basses that's in my future. It's a shame they no longer make it.

Yeah, that kinda' sucks. I managed to get both of my Series basses done in it before the supply dried up. So at least they'll be good for a couple decades. Ward always kept a bunch of it on-hand from LMI and then of course they folded too.

The story I get is that the alloy used to produce EVO Gold wire came from a foundry in a region affected by the Russia/Ukraine conflict. The Stewart MacDonald gold fretwire is a different copper alloy. It's pretty decent wire but nowhere near as hard or durable as the EVO wire. One of our shared clients is/was a student at Virginia Tech, and did some metallurgic study of that stuff. It had some titanium content. Which we kinda' assumed anyway. Maybe someday it'll be back.

I'll just stick the the old fashioned stuff until then.