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Man, I really wish I had a chance to play one of Daniel's guitars - for now I just have to hope they sound as good as they look. His DS-250 clone is probably the closest I'm going to come to playing or owning an ES-250, and I love that he uses the full magnet UK CC pickups instead of the 2 screw mounted alternatives - I'm sure they get close, but there's something very specific about the tone of big magnets.
Anyway, I also dig some of his not exactly direct copies, like the "White Face" guitars. For somebody (me) who vastly prefers exact vintage aesthetics, those things look super cool. Plus they do have historical precedent on mandolins, and he's just extending that to guitars.
At some point, I think rather than an ES-250 clone, I might have him build an L-5CC. According to the Peter Broadbent book, Charlie had ordered a blonde, cutaway L5 with an ES-250 pickup but it arrived after his death. Broadbent says the guitar was sold to someone who has had it ever since, and it's been verified with shipping logs as the same guitar Charlie ordered. Even though Charlie is my guy, I think I'd instead go for a non-cutaway L5 like Oscar Moore. So yeah, when I have excess money to spend ('cause that'll happen) a blonde L5CC non-cutaway for me. Or maybe.....
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11-19-2014 11:27 AM
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According to this interview, it was Tony Mottola.
Originally Posted by campusfive
Finding Charlie Christian?s Guitar: Lynn Wheelwright Interview | Jas Obrecht Music Archive
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Yes I saw that video - he seemed convinced. Originally Posted by Jabberwocky
No one thought to mention that all pickup magnets, apart from ceramic, contain the magic Cobalt ( Al Ni Co= Cobalt).
I once had a lesson from UK guitarist Esmond Selwyn, who also had an original CC on his 175, and claimed it was made from Uranium....I said ' you look healthy to me', but he didn't get it.
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This might interest someone : https://reverb.com/item/200479-gibso...ntage-sunburst .
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the only issue w/retro fitting a CC p.u. in an acoustic guitar is the bracing.
the original Gibson's were X braced allowing for a clean installation.
you'd likely have to cut into an L-7 or similar guitar's parallel bracing to retrofit one, and there's a good chance you'll get some top sink over time due to the weight of the unit. on top of that acoustic braced spruce tops have thinner bracing to begin with, so....
Jab, didn't you have a 400 CC?
how does/did it sound?
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Yes, I have it but haven't put much time on it. Too afraid to play it as it is my most expensive archtop. (Paid $7165 for it.) Makes no bloody sense, aight? It doesn't cop the tone of the original 30s " unobtanium cobalt" CC pups, in my estimation; it is clean, articulate and sounds much like a warmer P90. Plugged it into a Lazy J20 and it was like they were made for each other. The amp wasn't mine unfortunately. Being a Super 400CC, the tone is fatter, with palpably more bass and less focussed than the smaller ES-150CC Reissue. Originally Posted by wintermoon
The CC has a funny characteristic, to my unwashed ears: played fast, the note following seems to step on the heel of the one preceding it, giving the sound a horn-like characteristic. The notes do not blur into each other but segue one into the other. It is very subtle. I might be imagining it; the CC pickup appears to "hold" onto the notes before releasing them. Those who have the original CC pickups can perhaps comment on it. Am I hearing things?
I will shoot a photo when the construction dust settles...in 2016! I pack my guitars in cases in their shipping boxes to keep out the dust. (No, man, I don't live at the foot of Mt. Saint Helens but it feels like that some days.) Maybe I would show those instead...
Last edited by Jabberwocky; 11-19-2014 at 03:09 PM.
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I can only claim personal experience with the CC pickup (pre-war) on two ES-150 guitars, one Recording King M-5 that it was added to (taken from a donor RK Roy Smeck archtop), and one pre-war Gibson L-5 that had the CC pickup added (my mentor's personal guitar).
I borrowed one of the ES150s (a '37) from a friend who deals in vintage guitars for a six-month period. Subsequently, I borrowed his Recording King M-5 to which he had added their version of the pre-war Gibson CC pickup for a comparable period.
I have also played several ES175CC guitars, but these have a post-war recreation of the pickup and sound, to my ears, excellent, but markedly different than the pre-war CC pickup.
It is my understanding that as the cobalt-steel magnets in the pickup degauss the pickup assembly becomes both weaker and much noisier, picking up more stray background noise. It must be the case that the Gibson and Recording King examples that I used were in good repair, with strong magnetic fields, because both pickups were less noisy than the typical Fender single-coil pickup, or than, say, a P90. Moreover, I found the string-to-string balance to be decent on both guitars. Again, the Gibson was a '37. IIRC, the Recording King was a '38, but I don't know which year M-4 electric the pickup came from--other than it was also pre-war. Both guitars featured round-wound strings--they seemed to be bronze windings on the wound strings. This may have contributed to the good balance (if there is any tendency for the bass strings to be picked up stronger, then bronze winding would cancel this).
Again, my experiences playing CC guitars (and in listening to my mentor play his old L5) reinforce all the listening I did growing up to Howard Roberts, Jimmy Raney, and others who played and recorded with the ES150. It is a tremendous guitar.
Here is a concrete impression of mine: the harder you dig into a 150CC, the more it responds. With most other electric guitars there is a compression factor involved in the guitar/pickup. That is, you can play from soft to loud, but beyond some point--that's all she wrote. The guitar just has no more to give back. The dynamic range tops out. If you play piano, you experience the same phenomenon with upright instruments and smaller grand pianos. They reach a point at which--that's it. With a 9-foot grand, however, you can just keep on banging--the louder you play, the louder the instrument gets. Well, with the Gibson ES150CC it's much the same. I have never experienced this with another guitar. The harder you drive the 150, the more it responds. The guitar and pickup have the greatest dynamic range of any electric instrument I have ever played--the range from softest to loudest sounds for any amplifier setting. It is just amazing.
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Very accurate observation GT. I just thought I'd add, in my experience the tone produced by it is highly influenced by the height setting and proximity to the strings. More so than with any other p/up I've owned previously. Originally Posted by Greentone
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Back to the mustache headstock thing for a moment. Dan E just posted this on the stewmac site.
Wouldnt this be frowned upon by Gibson as well?
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How did anyone ever build any guitars without all the Stew-Mac Thingumajigs? Jeez, it would require too much real skill. Originally Posted by SamBooka
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I like that he made the jig because doesn't want to clamp that neck tenon, and then he clamps it to the jig. (No disrespect to Big D; the dude knows his business.)
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