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Eastwood Guitars to recreate Aria SB1000?


BassManGraham
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3 minutes ago, hooky_lowdown said:

As far as I know Eastwood are a different name for the Stagg brand.

Not at all!

Eastwood is an American company founded my Mike Robinson, a vintage guitar collector with a thing for oddballs and rarities (he's the guy behind My Rare Guitars) who aims to affordably recreate some classic designs that are hard to find in their original version. His designs aren't exact recreations or reissues though, but rather modern interpretations made in China with readily available generic hardware and pickups. They'll get you close to the looks and feel of the originals, but not quite. The tone is also not necessarily the same as the originals.

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2 hours ago, BassManGraham said:

Any fellow Basschatters know anything about Eastwood guitars?

From their website they obviously recreate some old classic guitars.

What's the quality like? What is the company like to deal with?

I love Aria SBs and might consider one if they go into production.

If they are it will most likely appear on the Eastwood Customs site first.

How close they get to the original version is very variable. As LeftyJ says they tend to use standard parts, so what you end up with is something with roughly the same body shape as the guitar or bass it is copying but not much else. The very worst example is their take on the Ovation Magnum bass which doesn't even manage to get the body shape right. Some would appear to be much better. I have a Hooky Bass 6 PRO on order and apparently both the bridge and pickup had to be custom made for this model as there was nothing even remotely right in the parts bin. 

I'll post in detail about my experience and how good (or not) the bass is when it actually arrives. However I can say that the delivery date for this instrument has continually slipped back from being late March when the bass was first announced, to at the moment late July when I expect to get mine. Whether that is due to the current pandemic or simply a symptom of over-ambitious deadlines I don't know.

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1 hour ago, LeftyJ said:

No need: Aria themselves are still reissuing these 😎

https://ariaguitarsglobal.com/product/sb-1000rib/

Expensive though! 

Yes they are pricey. From a playability perspective I also prefer the later SBR and Elite versions with slightly wider necks (and snake eye fingerboard inlays. The Eastwoods would be around a third of the price. I have Aria SBs, but I wouldn't have a problem with plagarism, lets face it the Japanese manfacturers invented it

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5 minutes ago, LeftyJ said:

Here is the page for this project on the Eastwood site: https://eastwoodguitars.com/collections/bring-it-back/products/eastwood-sb-1000-bass-deposit 

It's still in a concept phase, they have two pledgers so far but they'll need a fair amount more before they'll actually build these (see status bar on the right). 

Yes seen this, Not sure I like the pledging concept? 

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10 minutes ago, LeftyJ said:

Here is the page for this project on the Eastwood site: https://eastwoodguitars.com/collections/bring-it-back/products/eastwood-sb-1000-bass-deposit 

It's still in a concept phase, they have two pledgers so far but they'll need a fair amount more before they'll actually build these (see status bar on the right). 

That's interesting. AFAICS all the other instruments on the "Bring It Back" page have previously been made in limited edition Eastwood Custom Shop versions, so that would imply that there has been an Eastwood version of the SB1000 before. 

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9 minutes ago, BassManGraham said:

Yes they are pricey. From a playability perspective I also prefer the later SBR and Elite versions with slightly wider necks (and snake eye fingerboard inlays. The Eastwoods would be around a third of the price. I have Aria SBs, but I wouldn't have a problem with plagarism, lets face it the Japanese manfacturers invented it

Personally I think that Eastwood would be on dodgy ground trying to make an exact copy of an instrument that is still in production by company which has a reasonably strong link to the one that originally made it. Also given what the majority of the other Eastwood instruments are like, there is no guarantee that what they produce will have more than a passing resemblance to any of the previous versions, although I would have thought that they would be using the original late 70s version as starting point if any.

Personally if I was after a specific specification of the Aria SB1000, I'd be looking for a second hand model that met my requirements.

8 minutes ago, BassManGraham said:

Yes seen this, Not sure I like the pledging concept? 

I seems to work fairly well. Only a small deposit is required to secure your instrument, which you will get back if the target amount isn't reached. The balance isn't required until Eastwood are ready to ship the finished items. If you are really unsure you could wait until the target amount has been reached before putting down your deposit.

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2 hours ago, LeftyJ said:

Not at all!

Eastwood is an American company founded my Mike Robinson, a vintage guitar collector with a thing for oddballs and rarities (he's the guy behind My Rare Guitars) who aims to affordably recreate some classic designs that are hard to find in their original version. His designs aren't exact recreations or reissues though, but rather modern interpretations made in China with readily available generic hardware and pickups. They'll get you close to the looks and feel of the originals, but not quite. The tone is also not necessarily the same as the originals.

You're right, I was thinking of Eastcoast 🙈

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My problem is that I sold a perfect SB1000 in the early 80s to have a WAL custom built. I still have the WAL which is a beautiful instrument, my longest serving bass, and obviously is in a different league to the Aria. However, to this day I still regret having to let that SB go, just couldn't afford both at the time.

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The two big questions marks for me on the Eastwood "repro" would be replicating the brass bridge and the MBI, MBII or MBIE pickups. if they can't/won't replicate those then it won't look, feel or sound like an SB. It's one thing to tool up for the woodworking for a mid-price shortish run model. However, I find it hard to see them doing anything but slapping a generic high mass bridge and soapbar pickup in it. They're sure as heck not going to be going to Rautia or similar to get a proper replica pickup at $899 per bass.

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I don't see the point when even the left handers come up quite often and at affordable prices considering the quality. I'd rather trawl ebay or the Facebook groups for a reasonable condition 2nd hand one, or as I did an absolute wreck that needs cash investing in it. I reckon my 1984 with a neck repair and a brand new replacement pickup will have cost less than this Eastwood. They should get back to making the lefty flying V bass I have no issues with that whatsoever! 

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On 09/07/2020 at 10:09, BigRedX said:

Personally I think that Eastwood would be on dodgy ground trying to make an exact copy of an instrument that is still in production by company which has a reasonably strong link to the one that originally made it. Also given what the majority of the other Eastwood instruments are like, there is no guarantee that what they produce will have more than a passing resemblance to any of the previous versions...

They seem to have stayed surprisingly (and annoyingly) unscathed over their dodgy knockoff of Yamaha's SG, which is still in production.

https://eastwoodguitars.com/collections/guitars/products/eastwood-mcgeoch-1000

And a good example of only bearing a passing resemblance to the original - this is basically an SG-shaped LP copy, with generic components entirely unlike the in-house hardware & electronics Yamaha used on the classic SGs. And at nearly £900 it's about what you'd pay for an original '80s SG1000. It's also a bit of an insult to attach the name of a deceased musician to this piece of tat, which I think is how they're trying to validate it. As it happens, McGeoch used several different, but completely standard SGs so this is hardly a "tribute".

I think there's every reason to assume an Aria SB copy would be a similar inaccurate travesty with an eye-watering price tag. Please don't encourage this bunch of cynical knock-off merchants.

15 hours ago, Grahambythesea said:

I’ve always fancied the Eastwood retro of the Surfcaster, but can’t justify the expense for something I have no purpose for, it would just adorn my room. 🤪

And you'll find real ones (admittedly uncommon) are cheaper than their ripoff.

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