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 October 10, 2026, 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 October 10, 2026, 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.

I got an earlier-than-usual start this morning because I have a couple extra stops to make today, having made use of the rainy weekend to get a couple jobs done. I need to sit down here and let the caffeine depissitate. (y'all don't think about that one...)

This red guitar trend has been bugging me and I finally realized why. I ain't got anything against red guitars per se, but this is kinda'... it makes me think it's just the big boys playing games with each other. I guess it's working or they wouldn't be doing it. For your consideration, here is an original Gibson J-45 in Heritage Cherry finish. They still make these in limited numbers. J-45 is an American classic. It's been its own unique thing since before WW2. Some would say, iconic. Maybe not so much in red. Still, hear me out.

Here's the modern iteration-


Now, here's Taylor's Grand Pacific AD17e. AD= American Dream, if you're curious. The e is for onboard electronics.


And last week Martin's new DSS-16E. DSS= Dreadnought Slope Shoulder. E, electronics.


Y'all see it too, right? Not just the red. Are we getting to a place where everyone has already picked a team, and now you can just pick your color too? I've played all three of these guitars, and worked on them too. To be fair, the only repair on the Martin DSS was a 17-Series a couple years ago, just for loose binding, not anything structural. They couldn't be more different inside. The Taylor isn't even X-braced. The sound is within a certain wedge of what's expected but they are quite different if you're shopping guitars. They'd be easy to tell apart in a blind test. So in my mind the red scheme is purely, well... clearly an aesthetic choice here.

I can't come up with another reason for it but that Martin or Taylor devotees can now appeal to their own inner-Gibson desires and tastes without switching teams. I just... I don't think that way. And it hadn't occurred to me anyone else might. Maybe I'm way off.

Tain't natural, I tell you!  Acoustics should be natural or tobaccoburst; red (along with every other color) belongs on electrics!
Whenever I see a painted acoustic, my first thought is "They used the crappy wood on this one."

Peter

Quote from: edwardofhuncote on Today at 05:30:56 AM...
I can't come up with another reason for it but that Martin or Taylor devotees can now appeal to their own inner-Gibson desires and tastes without switching teams. I just... I don't think that way. And it hadn't occurred to me anyone else might. Maybe I'm way off.

Or, perhaps in some cases, buyers are just not as knowledgeable or sophisticated as you, as in, "oh, red, pretty!" as a primary criteria.  

But I don't know; just guessing.

As for my own prejudiced un-knowledgeable criteria, when I'm looking at acoustic guitars, I skip over the red and blue ones.

I'm still learning about guitars (and will never be done learning even the basics), and one thing I find interesting is the influence of tradition over modern techniques when it comes to acoustic guitars.  For instance, with electric guitars, apparently, lots of players prefer locking tuners because it makes changing strings so much easier; but apparently no makers put locking tuners on acoustics.

Quote from: David Houck on Today at 06:37:56 AM

Quote from: edwardofhuncote on Today at 05:30:56 AM...
I can't come up with another reason for it but that Martin or Taylor devotees can now appeal to their own inner-Gibson desires and tastes without switching teams. I just... I don't think that way. And it hadn't occurred to me anyone else might. Maybe I'm way off.

Or, perhaps in some cases, buyers are just not as knowledgeable or sophisticated as you, as in, "oh, red, pretty!" as a primary criteria. 

But I don't know; just guessing.

As for my own prejudiced un-knowledgeable criteria, when I'm looking at acoustic guitars, I skip over the red and blue ones.

I'm still learning about guitars (and will never be done learning even the basics), and one thing I find interesting is the influence of tradition over modern techniques when it comes to acoustic guitars.  For instance, with electric guitars, apparently, lots of players prefer locking tuners because it makes changing strings so much easier; but apparently no makers put locking tuners on acoustics.

Yeah, well, no matter where we stand on other matters, when it comes to our instruments guitar players are the most conservative people on the face of the Earth; "Can you build me a new guitar, and make it exactly like a ('30s Martin, '50s Gibson, early '60s Fender.......)

I'm actually surprised that good ideas like locking tuners (and bad ones like Floyd Rose wiggle sticks) have made  such inroads as they have.

Peter (who, while loving many instruments, including Alembic guitars, still considers the 1959 Gibson ES-330TD to be the acme of electric guitar development & the '64 Fender Vibroverb to be the ideal amp; now, with basses?  Alembic & high-tech amplification all the way!)

Quote from: cozmik_cowboy on Today at 07:46:15 AM

Quote from: David Houck on Today at 06:37:56 AM

Quote from: edwardofhuncote on Today at 05:30:56 AM...
I can't come up with another reason for it but that Martin or Taylor devotees can now appeal to their own inner-Gibson desires and tastes without switching teams. I just... I don't think that way. And it hadn't occurred to me anyone else might. Maybe I'm way off.

Or, perhaps in some cases, buyers are just not as knowledgeable or sophisticated as you, as in, "oh, red, pretty!" as a primary criteria. 

But I don't know; just guessing.

As for my own prejudiced un-knowledgeable criteria, when I'm looking at acoustic guitars, I skip over the red and blue ones.

I'm still learning about guitars (and will never be done learning even the basics), and one thing I find interesting is the influence of tradition over modern techniques when it comes to acoustic guitars.  For instance, with electric guitars, apparently, lots of players prefer locking tuners because it makes changing strings so much easier; but apparently no makers put locking tuners on acoustics.

Yeah, well, no matter where we stand on other matters, when it comes to our instruments guitar players are the most conservative people on the face of the Earth; "Can you build me a new guitar, and make it exactly like a ('30s Martin, '50s Gibson, early '60s Fender.......)

I'm actually surprised that good ideas like locking tuners (and bad ones like Floyd Rose wiggle sticks) have made  such inroads as they have.

Peter (who, while loving many instruments, including Alembic guitars, still considers the 1959 Gibson ES-330TD to be the acme of electric guitar development & the '64 Fender Vibroverb to be the ideal amp; now, with basses?  Alembic & high-tech amplification all the way!)

Great points. I've had a buncha' runnin' around to do, hence a buncha' windshield time to ruminate more on the subject.

(what I didn't take into account before leaving this morning was that the Bank, Insurance Co. and the Hospital Billing Office were closed for the holiday. The Guitar Store and the Guitar Repair Shop are business-as-usual...)

I do believe both of you are right on something in the same vein. There is something of a generational gap in the guitar-buying population. It isn't completely that, or at least not exclusively, but it's there. What Coz says is very true of the buyers my age, and older. Let's say Gen X and Boomers. I'll throw Generation Jones in there with 'em because I identify and socialize more with people about 5 years older than me. Say, mid-60's. Very conservative (read; traditional) views about what guitars should be. That isn't nearly as pronounced in the Millennials or younger Gen Z shoppers. Just getting them to shop in a damn store rather than on their phone is hard enough. Here's what happens; they come in and play a guitar in the store to experience it, then quote the online price to the sales guys. If they won't  price-match, they just buy online. That's fair game... so they compete with every retail store everywhere that way. That's one difference... they don't care if it's "The One". Just buy the same one somewhere else. I think we (and I'm generalizing us too here) enjoy the experience of finding that guitar by playing it.

I'll grant them, I'm a self-confessed guitar geek... I love soaking up product knowledge even if I am not remotely interested in a particular instrument, but I don't think it's about sophisticated or not. I think this younger crowd on the whole legitimately wants something different. I think the marketing guys at these guitar companies must know something that I clearly don't understand or they wouldn't be making them. I'm trying to figure it out is all.

So lets put it back to home here, since we're in Alembic's living room. The Element guitar. Trevor didn't copy anything with that design. He used some time tested and proven principles to design a guitar that wasn't like anything else. Doesn't look like, doesn't work like, and resulted in a finished product that doesn't sound like anything else. It could not possibly be confused with another guitar by any maker. It is uniquely, and instantly identifiable. On par with the finest acoustic guitars available by any maker. It is however, still a very traditional design at the core. I could see the day that a blueburst finish got sprayed on an Englemann top of an Element guitar. Not my thing, but it could work and be beautiful. I could see any number of bursts or transparent washes. I cannot imagine an opaque red paint going on one with the pretention that it evoked the Gibson J-45 Heritage Cherry yet sounded and played like an Alembic Element. And I can't imagine the sample of customer base that would request such a thing. I'm at the same puzzling crossroads with Martin and Taylor. There must be something to it.

*I happened to notice today, the newest DSS-16E has a beautiful shaded top. Martin literature calls this the "1935 Burst".