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I've had many. Thinking back about the guitars that have gotten away, I had a pair of L5-S, a '64 L5 CES, '70 L-5 CES, a couple Wes Montgomery's, a couple Johnny Smith's, a 1948 super 400, etc...
But this one stands out...I traded my '64 L5-CES for a Mesa Son of Boogie, which you can buy today (used) for about $800...
Below is a recent ad for a guitar similar to my L5. (Though no guarantees it will sell for this price...)
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11-30-2023 05:14 PM
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I had a Heritage Golden Eagle that was one of the very early models, antique blonde finish. I had Heritage build me a pickguard without the "spike" and put a hotter pickup on it. I loved that guitar and even had them engrave my name on the truss rod cover. But a crisis around a credit card necessitated selling it for cash and the eBay "broker" who sold it would not tell me who bought it, so it's just out there somewhere. I hope it found a good home and someone to just play it. I would love to know where it is. I might even want to buy it back if the owner is willing, though I don't feel entitled to it in any way. Still, even when I'm playing the L5ces, I think about that Heritage Golden Eagle.
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Originally Posted by lawson-stone
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Ca. 1982 (in my broke, credit-card-less student days), I saw a BF Fender Vibroverb with a JBL 15" speaker in a shop for $350. This the SRV holy grail amp (though I didn't know it then), not the earlier 2x10 brown version. This was crazy cheap for a pre-CBS amp even then, but I a lot of money for me. I tried it, and it was unbelievable, the perfect blues amp. Didn't have enough money on me for whatever they wanted for a deposit, so I spent the next few days scraping that together and Hamlet-ing about whether it was too much money. Went back the store, and it was gone. They also had a brownface pro for $250 (also stupid cheap at the time), so I got that as a consolation prize, but always wished I hadn't slept on the Vibroverb.
Otherwise, all kinds of guitars that cost a fortune now used to be cheap. At some point it became obvious that the collectors market was going to start spreading beyond pre-CBS Strats, old Les Pauls, and pre-war Martin dreads, and you could pretty much predict what the next thing would be. Should've pulled the trigger on any number of sub-$1000 Martin 00's, J-45's, ES-175's (later on, 125's), Guild, etc., but never did. But I can't say I regret any de-acquisitions. I've only ever sold stuff I didn't use anymore, and/or to finance stuff I truly wanted more.
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I bought a 1960 ES335 in 1975 for $800 in mint condition.
It was a 335/330 hybrid with the center block ending right past the bridge. Light as a feather. Trapeze tp, block inlays, ice tea sunburst.
Must have been a custom build. Great neck and tone.
It was actually stolen and it turned up in a pawn shop and I got it back.
Also my 1978 Super 400. Best sounding guitar I ever had.
A couple really great 175’s too.
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I dunno, what's a '63 Strat worth these days? (Or was it a '62?). Long gone...
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In 1966 I traded an ES-175 and $150 for a 1961 L-5CESTSV (a mouthfull). The asking price was $800. Back in those days the guys I played with did not obsess over pickup part number/type, scale length, tuning key brand/model, etc. We just played 'em. But amps were another story.
Eventualy I traded that guitar in on a new L-5C, that I ordered with a single Johnny Smith pickup in 1967.
Fast forward to today's century and I read on this forum awhile back, that the T variant of an L-5 is a rare guitar. One of those small details, had you known it way-back-when, you might have put that one in storage for future trade bait. Oh well...just play them and enjoy them!
Tom
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Just a regular Ibanez JP20
hanging in a shop
didn’t even get to plug it in
but man what a neck ….
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'59 burst Les Paul when I had my retail store in the late 70's. Bought it from a guy who wanted $260, sold it to a vintage dealer friend of mine the next day for $800 and he consigned it at Gruhn's - hard to tell what it's worth today (just a crummy plain top though ...lol). Mint 1947 Super 400 that I traded for a black LP Custom in about '73 - I heard that it ended up in Acuff's museum. I bought a '68 Tele with Bigsby for $120 in about '73 and played it for 35 years - wore the neck out. When I parted it out in the late 90's, the only thing original was the neck and it went for $700 on Ebay. Back in those days, these deals happened all the time - I had a blond Johnny Smith in the 90's that I traded about $700 worth of stuff for. I could go on.........
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Originally Posted by John A.
1964 Fender Vibroverb
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The one that got away? My first piece of real estate in San Francisco. I bought it for 180K in 1985, put 20K into it and sold it for 255k in 1987. After commissions and closing costs I made a 40K profit of which I gave about 15K to the government in taxes. Today that property is worth 2 million. All of my guitars that I have sold combined do not involve leaving anywhere near that much money on the table.
If only adulthood came with a crystal ball.
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I traded a pre-war blond L5, along with a few others, for a '24 Loar L5. The Loar's neck was a huge V and too difficult to play. Doing a lot of big band stuff these days, I wish I had the blond back.
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Long time since I had seller’s remorse. Decades. One if the first-ever Squier strats comes to mind, sort of a trial run. That thing was great. A late 70s Gibson Explorer. But the sore ones are a mint, original Marshall Silver Jubilee 50W head (sold it in the mid-90s) and a mint, original 100W Super Lead head (ditto).
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Originally Posted by Hammertone
Hmm, anyone got a madeleine?
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Originally Posted by John A.
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Originally Posted by wintermoon
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I have too many to list all. First that comes to mind that I should have, but didn't is I had a student sometime late 90s offer to sell me his 1970 Byrdland for $800. I didn't want the Florentine cutaway...geez. OTOH I sold my 1954 es175 single P90, to a student for $600 in 1984.
Traded a 1924 the Gibson L4 for a 1958 Epiphone Broadway (later sold to buy the above ES175).
And so it goes..in 2004 I sold all my Gibsons at the time - Les Paul TV special historic reissue, 1998(?)Tal Farlow,
Gibson Blueshawk, 1979 ES175/CC, 92 ES135 - in order to fund the Slaman I have. But after 19 years I still have the Slaman so I haven't big regrets musically.
Maybe financially though.
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Originally Posted by Stringswinger
Like most people. I passed on some things I should have bought. But the only thing I truly wish I hadn't let out of my hands was my first and only 175. My music dealer was very supportive of me from the day I got my first "good" guitar (a new Gibson LG-1 in 1957). As I progressed and started getting gigs, he somehow always had or found what I needed at a price I could afford. When my 5W Kay amplifier wouldn't do it, he magically came up with a used Ampeg Jet and then a Reverberocket. When I was ready for a real electric ( spring 1960), he came up with a well used but solid 345 that was miraculously close in cost to my LG-1 trade-in. But he knew how much I wanted a 175 and called my parents about a year later to report that he'd "found" a used one I could have in an even swap for the 345.
So at the age of 14, I had a 175DN (a '59 or '60 - I never knew or cared which) in amazingly fine shape. I had to settle for a battered old gray Gretsch hard case, but I didn't care. I played that guitar for about 10 years through college and into grad school. But the bug bit me, and I bought a new L5CN with a DeArmond pickup. In retrospect, I probably didn't have to sell the 175 to get the L5, but I did. I sold it to a friend who wanted to learn to play the guitar and had always coveted mine. He never did learn to play it, but he wouldn't sell it back to me when I realized how stupid I was to have let it go. I tried for years to no avail.
I truly wish I had that baby back. I wouldn't even be playing it now, since I've been on 7s exclusively for for almost 30 years. But we had some fabulous times together and I let it down by letting it go.
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Originally Posted by John A.
Originally Posted by Hammertone
Originally Posted by John A.
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Originally Posted by Hammertone
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I keep re-learning that large, bling-y guitars trigger my imposter syndrome. At some point I feel like, "Well well. Lookit me, Johnny Law with the L-4000."
But if your job is to stand, dressed to the nines, in front of a throng of people then a vintage Johnny Smith "CES" is exactly the thing.
I will never have another vintage top-of-the-line Gibson archtop but I am deeply satisfied with my little bunch of four, three of which are true lifetime keepers no matter what the peghead says.
+ + +
Originally Posted by wintermoon
And what did you get from the monster, Dr. Frankenstein?
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For me, the one that got away was probably the '59 Les Paul that I was offered in the early '70's for $2000, a lot of money back then!
In terms of what I owned and let get away, that's a long list! Of those, the '60 ES345 and the '69 L5CES are the ones I miss most.
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My first archtop - a brand new from the factory special order from my local music store 1997 blond Epiphone Emperor Regent. Had figured woods, dead on inlays and a beautiful buttery sound. Traded it in for my L4CES which I love. I could have had both.
The only visual bummer was the scarf joint for the headstock. It was obvious and drove me nuts. I solved this a few years ago by purchasing a time capsule Antique Sunburst '94 version. I was originally going to get this color but got talked out of it. Worked out perfect and I can't see the scarf joint. YipPy!
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My Dad and I had about a 150lb. Bluefin tuna we lost right at the boat after a half hour fight. Now that my Dad is gone, I will always remember that "one that got away".....
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Originally Posted by John A.
The Autumn of Solo Guitar 2024
Today, 12:42 PM in Chord-Melody