Bell Custom Guitars
BY CHRIS KIES
The building bug bit Don Bell of Bell Custom Guitars in 1974 when he
was just 18 years old. The inspiration
was an acrylic polymer Dan Armstrong
Ampeg. And in the spirit of determined
DIY-craftsman, he decided to build his
own Plexiglas version rather than buy one.
“I wanted an acrylic polymer guitar, but I
wanted it in a Flying V body style. So to get
one, I had to build it,” says Bell. The infectious fever to build guitars was started with
the look of Armstrong’s transparent beauty.
But after plugging in his acrylic V he heard
something very different and interesting
going on in the interaction between wood,
polymer, and pickups. That realization has
guided Bell’s work ever since.
“After working through the body con-
figuration and developing the proprietary
bonding process, I set out to make the
acrylic sound better, but ended up improv-
ing the sound of the wood,” says Don Bell
of Bell Custom Guitars. “I noticed my first
Vs sounded brittle and thin, so putting the
neck and electronics centered in the tra-
ditional tonewood bodies—swamp ash or
maple—greatly improved the overall tone.”
Bell explains that the audibly distinctive give
and take relationship between the wood and
Plexi happens because the acrylic absorbs
the vibration from the wood and focuses the
tone, allowing the highs to sparkle without
becoming harsh or shrill. In addition, the
midrange is clear and clean and free of bleed
from the upper or lower registers, while the
lows are more defined and less woofy than
on a solid wood guitar. “In effect, the acrylic
wings act as a compressor,” says Bell. “The
overall result of the wood/acrylic fusion and
the set neck of a Bell Custom Guitar is long
sustain and a sharper, more focused tone.”
Bell acknowledges that the visual pecu-
liarities of his guitars draw players in—just
like it did to him ’ 74. But given the chance
to play and hear one, he believes players
remember the guitar’s vintage tone rather
than its 2001: A Space Odyssey look. “Ever
since I got serious about building, my
philosophy has been that I want guitar-
ists to experience a difference in tone and
a difference in the synergy and feedback
between guitar and player that is not there
with an all wood guitar,” says Bell. “Strum a
traditional guitar without amplification and
then strum a Bell—you will hear the differ-
ence… [laughs] and just imagine its pres-
ence and how it feels when it’s amplified.”
JazzBlaster Deluxe with Amalfitano PAF-style humbuckers
JazzBlaster
with Amalfitano P-90s
JazzBlaster Deluxe with lit LEDs
Bell Custom Guitars’ newest see-through creation is the
JazzBlaster. Shown here with a translucent red and yellow finish, it features a string-through, swamp ash body with acrylic
wings, a 22-fret, single-piece mahogany neck with Bell’s signature neck profile that, according to Bell “is similar to a ’60s
Gibson LP that I have.” They also offer a fatter neck based on
a ’ 58 ES-335 and custom necks are available upon request.
Both models are loaded with Amalfitano pickups—the red
model has vintage PAF-style units while the yellow one has
P-90s—which are favored by Bell because
“they are super clear and have zero mud
factor, while also giving us the vintage
tone we’re looking for.” Both models are
equipped with 15 LEDs and have an available “frost” option in which the acrylic is
blasted with small glass beads to give it a
smoky look.
