The Jazz Guitar Chord Dictionary
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  1. #26

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    The Firebird X was inoperable without a proprietary battery. A fresh battery was good for about two hours play time. I’m sure that decreased significantly after a couple of years. That’s fine for throwaway products, but not an expensive guitar.

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  3. #27

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    May be why Gibson's are so expensive!

  4. #28

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    Quote Originally Posted by GNAPPI
    Of course no employee of Gibson with a grudge, passerby, or the trash contractor could not possibly have taken that pic?
    Do you really think that the covert plan was to line them all up in nice lines and then have heavy equipment run over them out in broad daylight?

  5. #29

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    Quote Originally Posted by Jim Soloway
    I'm not about to blame Gibson for the state of inner city schools nor am I about to assign them the responsibility for fixing that. Investors sunk about $70 million into trying to revive a dying company. For that kind of commitment they bought the right to make decisions that they believe are in the best interest of their company.
    Very surprised to hear you say that Jim. And you're presenting a strawman argument. I never blamed gibson for the state of inner city schools, nor did I assign then any responsibility. But I do still have one of your guitars on the cover of my book...

  6. #30

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    I like how that former employee described the Firebird X as 'non-upgradable,' and 'too proprietary', and basically 'the bodies weren't even re-usable ' , and then says ' but I left those details out and just published the vid and the facts to see what people would say "....

    .......gee.......what did you think people were going to say ?

  7. #31

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    Maybe they just wanted to relic them enmasse.

  8. #32

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    Relicing Explained





    Relicing is Art




    What is Guitar Relicing?

  9. #33

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    there is also a video of workers destroying es 335 in the former Memphis Gibson factory

  10. #34

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    Great video. Nothing like listening to a couple of uneducated, blue collar bumpkins discuss something that is way over their heads. Here's the deal folks. It's Gibson's friggin' product, and it's Gibson's friggin' property.

    In product development companies, we have something called "scrap". But don't take my word for it, look it up. So if you don't like it, then start your own product company. That is - if you have the vision, talent, drive, and funds.

    So, there's really no need for all this butt hurt, social justice, warrior-ing over a bunch of fugly solid body guitars for Chrissakes.

    What poor kids really need is a solid STEM education, not solid body guitars painted in bird shit blue, lol.

    All IMO, of course.


  11. #35

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    The Firebird X has to be one of the more ghastly creations of Gibson but it's an awful sight to see a whole lot of guitars being destroyed. As someone who loves guitars of ALL kinds, it's not something I enjoy watching.

    It's like on "Top Gear" where nice old cars would inevitably get destroyed.
    As much as I liked other aspects of the show, the senseless destruction is hard to watch.

  12. #36

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    This hurts much more:





  13. #37

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    Couldn't Pete Townshend have handled that problem for them cheaper?

  14. #38

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    I find that second video with the ES models more disturbing

  15. #39

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    Quote Originally Posted by TOMMO
    This hurts much more:




    2-300$ cheap imports or 4-5K made in USA no matter, at the end of the day they are all equal expendables in front of the R&D (Ravage and Destruction) guy...
    It is nothing new or particular to Gibson, it just hurts to see it...its like wanting to eat meat and ignoring where and HOW it comes from...

  16. #40

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    I wonder what the defects on those might have been..

  17. #41

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    Gibson issued a statement:

    “The Firebird X destruction video that surfaced months ago was an isolated batch of Firebird X models built in 2009-2011 which were unsalvageable and damaged with unsafe components. This isolated group of Firebird X models were unable to be donated for any purpose and were destroyed accordingly.”

    “Gibson recently announced its re-launch of the Gibson Foundation. Since 2002, the Gibson Foundation has provided thousands of guitars and donations to schools and charities in excess of $30 million. As a starting point, Gibson has committed to giving a guitar-a-day away over the next 1000 days. 100% of donations to the Gibson Foundation go directly towards giving the gift of music, re-affirming Gibson’s commitment to giving back, helping under-served music education programs, empowering music culture and encouraging the creation of music.”
    While seeing products destroyed instead of being distributed to those in need is disturbing, that seems to hold. It doesn't make much sense for Gibson to revive their foundation and in the meantime destroy a bunch of guitars. As always the event triggered on the spot emotional comments all over Internet.

  18. #42

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    Almost 400 guitars being destroyed, I think they might have picked the wrong argument to defend themselves.. You can see the boxes right next to the brand new guitars.. 400 "unsalvageable and damaged guitars".. yeah, they only did cost 5000$

  19. #43

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    This is a popular thread and is interesting.

    When Gibson was in Kalamazoo they destroyed some instruments but kept reusable parts. I don't know what parts would be reusable on these Firebirds though.

    I've posted this before, but it's relevant again. Pete Moreno took a pickup truck full of PAFs to the dump in the early 1960s by order of McCarty because they were taking up space. They were considered useless.

  20. #44

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    OK so they ran them over to make them unplayable. Then what?

  21. #45

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    Businesses often destroy items that fail QC, prototypes, old stock, damaged or otherwise unsaleable / unfixable goods. I'm sure these guitars fall into that category, the custom electronics, tuners, battery issues on this particular model would mean that almost nothing could be re purposed even if Gibson absorbed the cost - & why would they?


    I'm not sure the answer is to lay them out in neat rows & hire a digger to crush them for the camera. I don't want to buy an instrument from people who do that any more than I'd want to buy a meal from a restaurant that made celebratory videos of all the food they threw away every day or a shirt from a tailor who cut up the clothes he couldn't sell...

  22. #46

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    Quote Originally Posted by Alter
    Almost 400 guitars being destroyed, I think they might have picked the wrong argument to defend themselves.. You can see the boxes right next to the brand new guitars.. 400 "unsalvageable and damaged guitars".. yeah, they only did cost 5000$
    They don't "cost" $5000. They cost a fraction of that. Retail price is not company cost.

  23. #47

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    Meaning we sell guitars for 5k a piece and 400 of them were defective (out of how many did they make, 1000 maybe?) being a weak argument.. and a not true one also in this case, since they obviously were neither "defective" nor "an isolated batch" as claimed.

  24. #48

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    I would've done it quietly.
    The video is lame and inflammatory.
    It's as idiotic of Henry J smashing that other Gibson guitar a few years ago.
    Why does everything one does need to be on social media?

  25. #49

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    "They don't "cost" $5000. They cost a fraction of that. Retail price is not company cost."

    Typically "cost" (and expense) of manufacturing a product is 1/6th the retail price.

    Considering Africa (and many other nations/countries) would not likely be a market for Gibson, and there are many musicians there who are not doubt impoverished, why not send the guitars there. ?

    Wasteful.

  26. #50

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    Gibson said they were defective, why do you speculate otherwise? They were not good enough to be released as the old "factory seconds". There were too many of them to be released into the market without warranty claim headaches and cannibalism of new sales, etc. So they were written off. They were scrap.

    In the car business they call them "lemons". In a restaurant they call it overcooked or bad tasting. In the wine business they call it "corked". Last night I had a politically incorrect cigar. The first one was stiff and didn't draw worth a darn. It was tossed in the trash and replaced.

    I know that everyone here loves guitars, yet many hate Gibson - but - these guitars were not living creatures, they were pieces of wood, plastic and metal. They had quality issues, they were not fit for purpose. They were scrap.

    Rest assured that no one was more displeased with the outcome of these instruments than Gibson. Manufacturers don't start out intending to make bad product, scrap it, and take a loss.