A Semi-Rarity: The 1966 Epiphone Wilshire (USA!)

Vintage guitars often come with a trade off: the "good ones" got played- hard.  As a result they have lots of character.  I don't mind character- in fact I love it.  I like seeing some scratches in the top of a guitar or the wear marks on the side of the neck from 60 years of first position chords.  Every once in a while however I will come across one that is clean.  This Wilshire, my friends, is CLEAN.

 

In 1957, Gibson bought a financially failing company that had been their long time competitor.  The Epiphone brand was known for very fine instruments like banjos, archtop electrics and acoustic guitars.  The competition was especially fierce in the large body electric archtop market.  Gibson would come out with a big jazz box and a month later Epiphone would come out with a slightly bigger or more fancy one.  Epiphone manufactured out of New York until about 1953 manufacturing moved to Philadelphia (although the labels still said New York!).  The failing company was at odds with its employees and the name was eventually bought along with a bunch of parts by Gibson.

Gibson began manufacturing Epiphone guitars first with leftover parts and continued by introducing their own Epiphone models.  This was a move by Gibson to get more guitars in stores.  Retailers didn't want 10 Gibson SGs but didn't really have a problem buying 5 SGs and 5 Epiphone Wilshires.  The USA Epiphones were made right along sides of the Gibsons in the factory at 225 Parsons Street, Kalamazoo, MI.  These are very high quality instruments!  The quality of the instruments bearing the Epiphone brand didn't drop to the current level until that unfortunate time in the 70s when the new owners of the Gibson brand (Norlin) shipped all production over seas to Japan.

The Epiphone Wilshire was a bit of a rare model until the its reissue this past year (made in China- sadface).  It has always had a small Mahogany body and neck but had two different editions.  The first was introduced in 1959 with a 3+3 headstock and P-90 pickups.  The second version appeared in mid-1962 that had a funky "batwing"style headstock and two mini humbuckers.  Mine is the second version with the silky smooth mini hums.

I absolutely love these guitars.  They have the coolest 60s styling with quality ingredients to boot.  The mini humbuckers are very versatile and can take you from Guns and Roses to Neo-classical jazz in a real hurry.  The neck joins at the very last fret so the player has full advantage of the fretboard.  Unfortunately the "Vibrola" was a source of frustration for most players so the trem arm is usually taken off and lost.

This is my second mid 60s Epiphone Wilshire.  My first one had seen some playing time and the finish showed it.  It was still original (but was missing the trem arm of course).  I eventually sold it but still had my love of Wilshires.  When I saw the ad for this one I couldn't believe it.  The seller was the original owner and the finish looked like it had just rolled off the assembly line.  I asked him when and by whom it was refinished.  He said that it hadn't been refinished.  Well, I have heard that before.  I always take that kind of thing with a grain of salt.

When I showed up to look at the guitar I still couldn't believe it hadn't been refinished.  We met outside of a Waffle House so I couldn't really take the pickguard off to check.  It looked "right" so I went ahead and bought it.  I took the pickguard off but the wires kind of stuck.  I looked closely to see what was going on.  Yes, the wires were stuck in the lacquer.  I carefully peeled them away to find that I was the first one to ever take the PG off.  This was clearly the original finish.  There was even a little bit of router dust in the electronics cavity.  That was a cool moment but I totally regretted it after!  I knew I had to take the pg off to verify the originality of the finish and electronics but I wish that it had still "never been taken off."  Oh well.

There is no checking on this guitar.  NONE.  It looks like it was made recently.  This thing is as real as it gets.  There are a couple of nicks around the guitar (about 3).  That is all. The original owner was not keen on the original set of tuners so he had them changed to mini Schallers.  He also lost the tremolo arm.  Other than that, this is the way it came from Kalamazoo.  One thing that is weird is that the gold Epiphone silk screen logo was done once, painted over, and done again slightly more centered.  Must have been a new guy at the silk screen booth that day.

The seller said he went into the shop in '67 to buy a Gibson SG.  He saw this one up on the wall and bought it instead.  Good call.  I don't think he played it very much because it has hardly any fret wear or wear on the back of the neck.  It is an absolute joy to play I hope you get a chance to play one of these oddities sometime too.

I took this guitar to the Nashville guitar show and another dealer was interested in it.  He took it over to an amplifier and played it for a while.  When he came back he told me that the pickups were wire out of phase!  That was news to me but I wouldn't have noticed it because I stick mainly to the neck pickup.  I took it out this morning and messed around with it and found that he was probably right.  One other thing I found interesting is that the bridge pup is rotated 180 degrees from where it "should" be.  I asked the original owner why he swapped it and he said that he didn't.  That is the way that it came from the factory.

Peter Green's 1959 Gibson Les Paul was made this same way in that his pickups are wired out of phase as well.  Apparently it is more common than originally thought but most people probably didn't notice it.  Maybe they just played on the neck pickup too...

TVG

Harmony Bobkat Video Blog

I picked up this Harmony Bobkat a couple of days ago.  I didn't feel like writing tonight but I wanted to get the word out about these so I made a quick video about it.  Check it out, comment, disagree, like it, share it.... participate.

I just wanted to show that while I could be playing much more expensive and technically "better" guitars, instead I am playing this one.  You don't have to pay 3 grand to get a solid vintage guitar.  Price does not translate into quality, playability or tone.  The price of a vintage guitar is only the result of supply and demand.  Most of the time the demand for a guitar and its overall tone/quality go hand in hand but there are always exceptions.  I believe this is one of them.

This girl is tearin' up this Bobkat!  Good stuff!

The $200k Les Paul's little brother: 1960 Gibson Melody Maker

According to Gibson's website, the Melody Maker was the best selling guitar at the time.  It was cheap and looked cool too.  They produced them on the same line that made Les Pauls, ES-335s and J-200s.

The Melody Maker was a full scale guitar with trimmed down features. The body is solid Mahogany but is much thinner than a standard guitar at 1 3/8ths" thick.  It has only one single coil pickup made specifically for this model.  The neck is a full size standard neck except the headstock doesn't have the "wings" glued on the side like a standard Gibson.  

This guitar was owned by a blues player and you can tell!  He played and played it.  It has a nice aged patina but still fully playable and has all the original parts.  I bought this guitar and two others from the brother-in-law of the blues player.  The other guitars I bought from him were a 1964 Fender Duo-Sonic and a 1946 Gibson J-45.  They all have a distinctive wear mark where he put his arm and shoulder over the guitar.  This wear doesn't photograph well but this picture shows it the best.  

The guitar is all original but the case is clearly not.  It is from the late 60s/early 70s.  It fit the guitar well and protected it much better than the chipboard case that it probably came in.  That case is long gone.

 This guy must have been a hell of a player!  He played these things all the way through the finish on the neck.  It feels good- very good.  I guess he figured they needed to be broken in before they played well.  He may have been right!  Many people would pay big money to have their guitar "relic"ed like this.  Now I know why.

The neck retains the 50s style big full neck.  It has the standard width with just enough depth to feel full.  The is the same neck shape that would be on a Les Paul from the same year.  The fretboard is Rosewood but is flat-sawn instead of quarter (like would be on a Les Paul).  I've seen this one some J-45s from the late 50s as well (email guitar).

This simple layout includes a jack, tone, volume and pickup.  You could take all of the electronics out by removing the pickguard if the ground didn't go to the bridge post.  

Some have described the Melody Maker single coil as a cross between a P-90 and a Tele neck pickup.  I would say that it is closer to the Tele pickup but a bit darker.  

 Do you have one of these?  Send me a picture!

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Pre-war Epiphone Flat-top: 1940 Epiphone FT-50

I say 1940 but I don't really know.  A friend on the Unofficial Martin Guitar Forum concluded that this was built by Epiphone in 1940 or '41.  There were very few of these ever made.

This one popped up on the local Craigslist.  I don't think that many people on there knew what it was.  Of course, this is no asian made Epiphone.  This was made before Gibson purchased the Epiphone brand in 1957.  They moved the production of Epiphone branded instruments overseas in the 70s tarnishing the name.  The American made Epiphones were very fine instruments.

This Epiphone lived a sordid life.  It came to me covered in soot with two stickers and a name carved right in the top.  The seller was the nephew of the schizophrenic aunt that owned it (last).  The soot and stickers came up fairly easily with some Naptha and elbow grease.  The name, "Kelsi" is there to stay.  It features an Adirondack Spruce top, Walnut back and sides, and what looks like a very dark Rosewood fingerboard.  It has feaux tortoise shell binding and a very nice pearl inlay on the headstock. The tuners have been changed.  It still has 4 of the original Bakelite bridge pins.

 The FT-50 started showing up in the 1941 but it says that they had Mahogany backs and sides.  It also shows a model FT-45 that had Walnut but also white binding.  This may have been pre-catalogue before they really nailed down what was what.  The label with the model number and serial number is badly torn so we may never know if this was a 45 or 50.

The Epiphone researcher that I spoke with on the forum said that since this was X braced and lacked the metal cover for Epiphone's "thrust rod"then this was probably pre-war.  His research indicates that the model line was reduced during the war and this was one that was cut.  They start reappearing a couple years later with serial numbers indicating 1945.  After that, the FT-50 was cut for good.  

He is currently compiling serial numbers, pictures and catalogues into a database so he can offer a better understanding of Epiphone's past.  Do you have a guitar like this?  Please email me and I will pass the information along to him.  

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