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The Evolution of The Gibson Guitars Logo Henry Juskiewiecz Era Logo New 'Hedge Fund Management' Era Logo

I think Gibson's assertion that the Firebird X's were unsafe is fundamentally bogus unless Gibson meant that the mere sight of a Firebird X would cause strong men to weep. They were horrid guitars that only someone like @ped would covet. Well, I think it was Ped. I'm happy to be corrected.

It was ped ☺️

I think it's unrealistic to expect that Gibson wouldn't. Gibson officially stopped selling B-stock in 1985 yet since that date the examples are legion of theoretically 'perfect' guitars with flaws worse than the old factory seconds. Which is why their QC has been derided for years and is the subject of intense speculation since the new lads took over. A nation thanks you.

Also known as 'Robbieeeeeeee' from that heart warming story of genteel east-end folk: You're welcome!

The Helix family, including the baby Stomp, allow you to run parallel signal paths and to use variable crossovers for splitting your signal however you want. There's a ton of drive options including some bass specific ones* and you also have the option to use guitar amps as drives too if you want to. The quality of the modelling is virtually indistinguishable from the real thing to my ear too. * There's even a B7K model, which I find totally authentic if only because I can't get a usable drive sound out of it no matter what I try, but that is exactly the same experience I had with the Dark Glass amp. Loved the clean channel but the drive section isn't for me, but then again I'm not trying to sound like Noddy whatshisname with the daft jumpers

Unfortunately, despite how interesting it is to see demos, most of the professional demos are paid for. Otherwise, why would they do it, unless they are musicians with financial stability and they just enjoy it... I've seen Darkglass products jump to higher and higher prices. £400 for a distortion pedal is absolutely INSANE. They have become 'the' distortion tone for more metal/heavier tones....and personally I think it just makes all basses sound very very similar. It sounds almost metallic and processed. The craze is: fanned fret bass, shed loads of Darkglass distortion, normally some sort of dual pickup bass....then the bass riff almost sounds like a djent style guitar riff. I still prefer Tech 21, if I'm honest. Also, you can get a Helix Stomp and probably get exactly these tones or close and thousands more.

It was carried out under the new management regime. However many of those guitars were made -the third video speculated less than 800 - Gibson intentionally destroyed almost half the number of these guitars in existence as a financial write-off. They had to destroy all the parts and cases too as a result. That’s why they’re strung up, with the tuners, pickups and electronics in place. The whole instrument needed to be destroyed in order to write off the full value. It’s a financial move, pure and simple. They weren’t defective, other than the actual design, and they weren’t unsafe, other than to their tax liability. The cost of this kind of nonsense is absorbed into the price tag of every other Gibson out there, just bear that in mind next time you’re looking at one in a shop. A final point and one which is being overlooked - Gibson finally made a guitar where it seemed to take effort to remove the headstock and they destroyed them. It’s a crazy, crazy world.

Jeez, Pete Townsend has really upped his game.

If I was going to do something that people would find obscene and/or disgusting - I'd have the decency to do it in a darkened room, and in private.

Hi everyone! Finally made an account to this wonderful world of bass warriors. My names Adam I hail from Oldham near Manchester, currently I play in 4 bands, downsizing to 3 in a couple of weeks, doing my last 2 gigs with them. In terms of gear, I keep 4 basses - an ESP (Edwards) ET-125 BZ, she's a bonny bugger (is that word allowed? Apologies if not!). I have a Fender FSR 70s Precision which I got about a month ago, and 2 Ibanez's - an early 90's ATK400 and the more recent TMB310 which I can't praise enough. Incredible bass, a tonal monster! I've attached some piccies... Amps I use my trusty Hartke HA3500 through their old 4x10s which weigh a metric ton but provides a lot of tone and volume, Ashdown Mag 300 into the Mag 4x10 (due a swap, not a fan) and at home I use my Eden EC210. Not into pedals. I prefer straight in, natural tone of the bass, plus it's so much less of a faff! So, lovely to meet y'all. Hope to make some friends and hopefully learn from others as well as help some others. Til then my fellow 4 stringers (or more if so inclined) Toodle pip! X

We discussed ways we could destroy these when we were asked to sell them. F*ckawful nightmares they were. and the ones we did sell, broke. like the Robots, Dusk tigers and DarkFire’s which led to this. All shite. This video does them no favours really. Shame. Like a nice Gibson - it’s like enjoying U2, you feel a bit grubby because you know Bono is a bit of a tit.

Thought this was going to be thread about me I need to learn: Not everything's about me

You’ll lose your head at our build quality!

Errmmm.....Rickenbacker, lol

It's like Nick and Juan at Pedals & Effects, everything they review is the best example ever. The Meros Enzo is the best symth pedal. But so is the Boss SY1 and the Pigtronix Mothership. They should really refer to them as demos rather than reviews, that way at least everyone would know where they stand.

I don't believe many folks would agree with waste like that. There are starving children in Africa who don't even own a Gibson, etc.

Absolutely, the technique section is like a barren wasteland... so is the recording section.

It's perfectly understandable that a company will destroy unfit merchandise. The old management had a reputation for less than perfect QC, so the new management has to do a lot of tidy up to do before they can restart the company. No company would put known "bad" products out into the market place, so it's unrealistic to expect that Gibson would. There's a lot of knee-jerking going on here!!

Three possibilities: They didn't play authentic enough. Someone fitted the strings in the wrong order. They took advice from John Hall and he said "destroy any guitars that aren't genuine Rickenbackers!"

That non-slip rubber grip mat stuff would do it. I had a similar problem with some of those very light D class heads, this solved it.

Gibson no-longer make guitars. They now just make gaffes. Anyway, I'm surprised that they needed that machine to destroy those guitars - normally you just have to look at the neck on a Gibson & the head voluntarily separates from the neck...

That'll be just their normal quality control procedure before they get sent out surely? 😏

So is this. And it's less that twenty quid.

By the way , I’m not a full time musician . I’m actually a plumber

Remember to count your fingers before cutting out the body and afterwards as well. If there's a discrepancy, call 999 right away. 😃

So I received some cash for my Birthday and decided I would buy myself an nice ash p bass body but with jazz routings. I looked thenm up and for a one piece it was going to cost £230.00. A lot of money but if thats what they are. So I contacted the firm to see if i could see a picture of the blank they would use ....they wouldnt do that until I had paid. So I declined as I have seen some lovely ash and some awful looking ash. A little dissapointed I decided to see if I could build one myself for similar money. So I purchased off of sphock a Bandsaw, pillar drill, router. £95.00 total Tempate kit £55.00 Bit of ash 38.00 total Router bit 22.00 I have no woodworking skill at all...what i do have in abundance is ...stupidity that this is going to be any good....who knows! If the body turns out ok I am goi g to have a go at a neck.

Has he got a VPN?

my go to bass is a Sandberg California TT custom , I’ve also got , 8 jazzes, 2 p basses, a Washburn force 4 , Yamaha 415, and a semi acoustic bass, there’s probably 1 jazz I would sell , but I’ve got a really bad urge at the moment for a shell pink Limelight jazz 🙂

By any chance is it Prefab Sprout - When love breaks down??

I suffer from anxiety, depression and ptsd. Whether because of this or simply because the universe likes to kick a man when he's down, I always get nervous before gigs, even if no-one is there. Always have done (started gigging at 17 and am now 55 and it's made no difference whatsoever). The degree varies; sometimes it lasts a few numbers, sometimes the first set, sometimes pretty much all evening. Recently it's been especially bad as it's been a terrible year, for various reasons, and my nerves are shots to bits. But still, I plod on because the option is to not plod on, and I've seen first hand where that leads. We played a couple of numbers at the start of the year at a fairly large local event event that was being filmed by the BBC. Amazingly, we got through it without a hitch (I've seen the footage and we were spot on), but to say I was nervous would be a huge understatement. Frozen to the spot is more accurate. 😉Typically of course, they didn't show our bit, so it was a complete waste of nervous energy. I think the most nervous I've been in recent years was playing to a packed (and very large) tent at the Acoustic Festival of Britain the other year, going on immediately before Martin Turner of Wishbone Ash (something of a legend in my eyes) and on the same bill as Fairport Convention, Howard Jones etc. It was by far the most prestigious gig we'd done, and one where we were very aware of the possibility that we might not be up to it. Thankfully I wasn't alone as the rest of the band (well, bar one) were absolutely crapping it too. I was so terrified I could barely move my fingers. Once again, we actually played fine and went down really well, even getting a great review in Acoustic magazine (as I stated in another thread). I have to say that occasionally when I haven't been so nervous the band performance generally has been terrible, so there's always that. 😂 It would be nice to play one of these gigs completely (or even vaguely) relaxed though, as I'm always firing on about 3 out of 6 cylinders and it would be lovely to play with the full compliment. I think I've only ever been in one band where I was hardly ever nervous, but I was generally very drunk at gigs in those days, which helped a great deal. 😉

He lasers it off with his eyes.

Or maybe it is and these are all coded references? Hmmmm? Hadn't considered that, had you? 😁🤫

Like American car ads..... SAVE! SAVE! SAVE! WE'VE DRIVEN A BULLDOZER THROUGH OUR PRICES (and over a sh*t-ton of our guitars but let's not talk about that....)

Oh, my... I designed and built this before the G&W one appeared on the market: ...and - though not faultless - was very pleased with it. And so was reluctant to take the fairly hefty outlay of the G&W one. But trust me - this is SOOOOOOOOOO much better! Quicker, more accurate, MUCH easier to centre everything. Less than 10 minutes got me this: Then no more than another 10 minutes with the sanding block to get to this: If I compare that with the two days it took last time I tried to sand ebony with a block only (AND that one came out skewwhiff after all that)... Very pleased with the investment - even including the cost of the rather pricey extra radii for future projects.

He must have had his knuckles surgically removed. It's a common modification for serious reggae players - so I've heard. 😉

...On a jazz bass, and everything!

One thing is the 'robot' tuners. My brotehr had an LP junior from new with robots. They were never good, and when they automatically removed his g-string during a performance he was not impressed - I mean if you're a Chippendale it would be OK, but... They became so reliably unreliable he was able to record a video of the guitar removing its own strings just in response to being strummed, which he sent to Gibson. In the end he fitted 'normal' tuners and ended up selling it as a standard guitar to part fund his '62 SG junior. He's a utter Gibson devotee but has few illusions about their QC, although he is very pleased with a new LPJ he bought last year.

Nar then. Big up to the northerners. Even the ones from t' wrong side o't' Pennines.

Really? Never had a Gibson then?

I know it will go against the grain, but I read another interesting thread - I think it was on a guitar forum though - which observed that there's far more threads about gear itself - guitars, amps, effects, selling/buying etc than using that gear either gigging or technique or theory. That forum was probably more skewed than this one but its worth mentioning. I'm probably the exception - I really don't buy that much, or often - but as an estimate, I probably buy something every 3 months, but actually play at least every other day. So that's 50x the time spent. Of course, not every day playing is noteworthy......but hopefully you get the point.

Is that where the derogatory term 'war paint' comes from? ... of course it does. How could I be stupid enough to ask that... unless I'm mad of course.

Don't let the door hit you on the way out, tumbleweed... *said in a western drawl*

A "rarebit" of casting? Hmm? Geddit? Huh? I'll get me coat....

Readily available from the Australian cricket team 😀

I dunno - some didn’t seem too broken - maybe after this they were deemed safe and then are up for sale

And, importantly, it's clearly good for metal.

But it’s Ultra....

I wanted to just say publicly how much I enjoy this forum. I may not be a very active member at the moment, but I thoroughly enjoy the content on here, and especially the people. Indeed, a huge thank you to forum member Raymundo who, about 18 months ago now, saw my post on here that, due to financial difficulties, I had to sell my beloved Brook acoustic bass. Ray immediately got in touch and offered to lend me an acoustic bass to tide me over. I have just given the bass back to Ray (I still hope to be able to buy back my Brook shortly) but this lovely act of kindness will never be forgotten. I truly think bass players are the loveliest of musicians- humble, extremely musical, empathetic, and without any delusions of grandeur! An example of this is the thread on Depression. Such a thread is unheard of on other forums. Indeed, on a guitar forum I belong to, discussions of people’s mental health is positively frowned upon! The way people help and support each other in that thread is really quite beautiful. Anyway, just wanted to get that all off my chest. Hopefully, at some stage in the next few months I will have my bass back and continue with my project of exploring solo folk bass!! Robbie