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Originally Posted by Dennis D
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09-29-2019 02:17 PM
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Julian Lage, Gilad Hekselman, etc., converting to Teles isn't going to help the case for Gibson investing in equipment and specialized personnel to make archtops, either. The Les Paul has long been the brand's bread and butter- Jimmy Page and Slash are more influential in today's buying market than Johnny Smith or Wes Montgomery. But who knows, jazz may yet stage a resurgence among younger musicians and audiences and archtops may come back into demand; weirder things have happened.
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Originally Posted by Jabberwocky
Thanks heavens I am perfectly happy with my watch that cost under $100 on sale 25 years ago. To paraphrase the old proverb, a man with a watch knows what time it is- a man with two is never sure.
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So will Gibson start making computers and video games? Maybe Henry J wasn't so crazy with his Firebird X,LOL!
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Jeez! Jabs! Come to Maui and you’ll save money! Wear a sundial with a wrist strap!
Originally Posted by Jabberwocky
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Originally Posted by Stringswinger
the introduction of the F-5 mandolin was very late as mandolin sales had already started to decline, there's not a lot of post 20's mandolins and banjos.
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Wildwood Guitars sold a lot of Gibson Archtops, darned nice ones too, in the run up to Gibson's chapter 11. They were never the "fly off the shelves" models anyway. They can sell again.
Eric Clapton was right, we need new guitar heroes for the kids to get excited about.
And we need (or Gibson needs) some young stars to appear on stage with fancy bright colored L5s. Taylor Swift and Justin Bieber are probably too far over the hill now, so somebody else. And don't forget the country fan base.
The music is critical, as Clapton said, but imagery drives purchasing decisions too.
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Originally Posted by iim7V7IM7
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Some of Gibson choices are questionables, an example, Why launching an almost perfect Natural Limited Sg 2016, with 2 p90's, a classical C rounded neck, an affordable $1000 price, with an almost unplayable 39mm nut width (1.55 I think) ?? Why ? To preserve standard SG sellings ? So do nothing rather than disappoint your customers.
If tomorrow you release a VOS L5, do you think making pink the only available color would be a good choice ? Perhaps a Floyd rose too ?
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Originally Posted by TedBPhx
Veblen Good Definition
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Sometimes a company will have halo products that are not profitable but increase the brand's standing. Since we're not seeing much interest in archtops, Gibson is more likely to have overpriced Les Paul's than an archtop. Things change and music has changed a lot.
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Originally Posted by mr. beaumont
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Guitar is not very important in the 21st century, it's glory days are over.
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Originally Posted by Stringswinger
OTOH, I don't think the archtop is dead. There are tons of younger artists playing archies all the time...just recently I have seen Guy Clarke Jr, Sturgill Simpson, Jeff Tweedy, and many others playing various archtops. Bob Weir plays an archtop for gosh sake.
What's needed is focusing the marketing on such artists and making models that the average player can actually afford. There hasn't been a full-bodied Gibson archtop at a player's price for many years (Epiphone excluded). The 175 started out as a midlevel alternative that cost, yes, $175, which should cost about 10X that amount adjusted for inflation alone.
The 135--my favorite model--is a great guitar that was always affordable and could be played in any genre of music, also played by some well-known artists. However, it's been out of production for almost 2 decades.
I think that focusing on collectors and rich people is not a recipe for success in the mass-market guitar business though.
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i'm interested in how this will affect gibson owned- epiphone...asian made archtops..the elitist, inspired by and premium archtops do pretty well...
i still think asian made gibson branded archtops would work...maybe not for die hards around here, but for many younger or less historically motivated folk out there
gretsch and guild did it with good results..some players even prefer modern gretsches to the brooklyn mades
cheers
ps- if the present owners don't consider it, someone else will down the line
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So.. the local version of Gibson 'honoring their past' is making unprofitable products old jazz guys want them to make? Nope. I think they should make tenor guitars. And banjos. And mando-this and thats. Yes. Those.
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I don't think they're unprofitable, especially now. Available on order only, price firm.
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Originally Posted by Tatayoyo
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It used to be one was expected to know how to properly tune a guitar.
Especially by the time you were good enough to play and own a Byrdland.
But with all of immediate gratification needs required for the average consumers I can understand how self tuning guitars came into .being
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Originally Posted by TedBPhx
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Originally Posted by Jabberwocky
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Originally Posted by starjasmine
Thanks for the memories, it is humorous now when thinking back on that night of our misery.
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Originally Posted by Jabberwocky
Bonhams : A rare 16th century gold sundial and compass ring, possibly German,
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Originally Posted by mr. beaumont
I am tempted to suggest that the big jazz box is irrelevant in 2019, but then again, a lot of young players opt for instruments from smaller builders like Baker;
^This Vic Baker 15 inch model was $5500 in 2017. The only "new" ES-175 for sale where I'm from is $5200. I've tried one of these Bakers, and it's something else entirely.
^When you can get an all-carved archtop with a Lollar Imperial humbucker for $5200, the exact same price as an all-laminate ES with 57's, I can understand why a young player might opt for the former.
(Just using Baker as an example, I know there's a ton of others)
I don't know that there's any legitimacy to this supposition, but I wonder if Gibson painted themselves into a corner by banking on tradition and history before anything else? A lot of people I know see them as "dad" instruments, if that makes any sense. Then again, most young players are playing Fenders & superstrats, or Boutique strats and teles - I play a Tyler for gigs where I can't use an ES, such as an alternative rock gig yesterday. The other el.guitarist used a Suhr.
Ibanez have made a great series with the AZ guitars, which have supposedly been made up using the input of very popular progressive & fusion players of the now. I can't speak for the validity for that particular claim, but I know a few people who have these guitars and they play like butter. None of the -serious- session players I know give a rat's ass about historical authenticity and all that... Henry J nearly hit the mark with innovation but seems like he didn't ask a single gigging musician... those robo tuners and all that, yuck!
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Originally Posted by GNAPPI
Henriksen Blu 6 w/ gig bag
Today, 03:29 PM in For Sale