TUNING UP
It’s a Good Time to Be a Gearhead
Many of you would’ve noticed that distinctive
tweed guitar case, too. There it was, leaning
diagonally in the small coat closet where the
pilots store their carry-ons—a slightly weathered old Gibson case with curves to keep a
Les Paul nice and snug. I wonder how many
other passengers spied it and spent the
entire flight wondering about it. What model
was it? Which year? What is it worth?
There’s just something about gear from
the mid to late ’50s and on into the early
’60s. Visionaries like Les Paul, Leo Fender,
Jim Marshall, Ted McCarty, and Seth Lover
were developing the instruments that would
define guitar tone—and popular music on
the whole—for decades to come. In terms
of craftsmanship, an awful lot has changed
between then and now, but many of the
guitars from that era are considered to be
as good as it gets. They’re not just collectible for their age—they’re guitars many of us
would sacrifice an awful lot just to play once
in our lifetimes. They feel different. They
sound amazing. Holding one allows you to
see and even smell things that pictures cannot convey.
As you’ve probably heard many a player wax
poetic about many times—or perhaps you’ve
even said it yourself—those guitars were cool
back in the day, but no one really knew just
how special they were. That’s pretty cool.
Think about it. These instruments that can
go for six figures now were within reach of
the common man back then. You could save
up and buy a ’ 59 ’burst. The earnings from a
summer job could land you a ’ 63 Strat. If you
were on top of things and had an open mind
in ’ 58, you might’ve sought out one of those
new-fangled Flying Vs made of “korena.”
Sure, everything from the continued evolution
of production techniques, culture, nostalgia,
and the economy play a role in getting those
instruments to the values they represent
today, but there’s certainly one thing behind
the entire era that could’ve and should’ve
been recognized back then—innovation.
There was an awful lot of tinkering going on
during that time, and it was a perfect reflec-
tion of what was happening musically.
This is my quandary. Imagine looking at cool
gear for a living. I’m writing this on the plane
back from the 2010 Montreal Guitar Show,
which is basically an all-star game for luthiers.
(We go to press within 24 hours, so it didn’t
make this issue—be sure to look online now
and in the next print issue for coverage.) Few
big companies that churn out thousands of
“units” annually are invited to exhibit. This
show is mostly for guys and gals who are
tinkering away in small shops to build better
or sexier mousetraps. Talk about innovation.
It’s hard to look around the Montreal show
floors and not think we’re in the midst of
another great era of innovation. Things that
have been shown by MGS luthiers in years
past have certainly found their way onto big
production guitars later—sideport soundholes, wedge-shaped bodies, arm curves on
acoustics. If I were a luthier, this would be
one show I wouldn’t miss each year.
But the idea that we’re in another important
era of gear making—surely that’s too easy to
surmise. Right? Of course, no one knows for
sure but I’ll tell you this: regardless of which
show you’re talking about, it’s hard to look
around at a gear gathering these days and
miss the innovation. Some pretty big players are using programmable digital effects
instead of amps these days. Some dedicated
craftsmen are taking inspiration from the
aforementioned solidbody golden era and
fusing it with new ideas and modern precision. Pickups that emulate a few different
kinds of pickups and guitar styles are sounding pretty good. Stompboxes are coming
with directions on how you can mod them
into completely different pedals. Guitars are
tuning themselves. Heck, your phone can
now tell you which strings are out of tune
after a single strum!
Now, I’ll be the first to seriously doubt that
the early models of today’s innovations—or
those from any other recent era—are ever
going to fetch six figures. Sometimes innovations are just that, too—innovations. Even
though you think something is cool, that
doesn’t necessarily mean you’d want to play
out with it. But my point remains: There’s a
lot of cool gear breaking new ground these
days. It’s to the point where we take it for
granted. At least until we catch a glimpse of
a something truly classic.
Oh, and the guitar? It was a 1960 Les Paul
sunburst consignment guitar that was headed
to Nashville. Value: $125,000. “I had a hell of
a time getting the guitar through customs,”
George Gruhn says. “I spent more than an
hour with customs officials, which included
web research on this instrument, before
they let me carry it from Canada onto the
Chicago-bound airplane. I have to say, I got
pretty concerned there for a minute.”
Cheers!
Joe Coffey
joe@premierguitar.com
