Are there guitars you're in the market for because of sentimental reasons?

This is where I’m at, too.

In fact on a few occasions I’ve managed to buy back a guitar I had in the past, and I resold it later. Guess I’m not as attached to them as I thought.

 

One guitar only, whatever the hell model that pawn shop Ibanez Roadstar II was I bought back in 1997/8. Played until it fell to pieces, then pieces got lost during a move. Dismissed it as bad luck at the time, unaware that tracking another one down and left handed was going to be next to impossible.

 

As a young beginning guitar player, I used to dream of owning one of the top of the line Gibson jazz archtops of the early '60s, such as the L5CES, Tal Farlow, Johnny Smith, Birdland, or Barney Kessel models. My sentimental dream came true. In the late '90s I factory ordered a new L5CES from the Gibson custom shop. After a year and a half wait I received it. But there were some major build issues with it and I ended up trading it.

I'd still like to have another L5CES, or one of the other models mentioned above. But not until I had a chance to play it. My sentimental dream ended up as a major disappointment. But I know there are many good examples out there.

I'll be in the market for another jazz archtop next spring. Thinking pretty seriously about a Heritage next time around. Or, maybe a used Gibson archtop. We'll see.

 

Keep your eyes open. Deals pop up. One of my buddies here in Cleveland just bought an amazing 79 LP Custom in Black. It’s an incredible guitar, with just the right patina and tarnish. It was listed on the local CL for $2k. He offered $1800 and the guy took it. If I’d seen it first, it would have been mine.

 

Still looking to replace my Carvin DC127. Traded it for an SKS with lefty scope, Savage .22 and a boatload of SKS ammo. I could probably sell the remaining ammo with these inflated prices and break even.

 

I want a strat. I probably won’t ever play it, I just want it. Ideally a ‘95 American Standard with a maple fretboard. Red. I’ll find one next year I think. Shouldn’t be too hard, but it will mean a lot to me.

I’d like a black Martin J40. That’s the guitar I saw Amy Ray playing for so many amazing shows back in the 90’s, and I always thought it was just cool as hell.

 

My first elec was a nice well used red fender jag.
10th b/day pressie..with an AC15...started learning when i was 6 on an old crappy acoustic..and the "a tune a day " book
my dad got it off his workmates wife...his workmate came to an untimely end and his wife wanted his gear to go to someone who would enjoy them and use them...i loved that guitar...sold it when i was 16 though...and very quickly wished i hadnt...it was an absolute cracker
no rattles squeaks or bits falling off....had big thick flatwounds on it when i got it...yet was set up well and was easy enough to play.
had jags since...not one was anything like as good as that one
would love to track it down

 

I really wanted to replace the 335 that was my first electric. That itch is now scratched.

 

Only one, a Gibson Hummingbird. My first good guitar was a ~1972 model that old Gibson players will tell you shouldn’t sound good, but mine sounded great. The head of the Kalamazoo repair department looked it over while Gibson was still making guitars there and said “Oh, this one was kinda an experiment we tried that didn’t work”. It did have the hated double X bracing but a lighter or different X pattern that greatly improved tone, but also led to top twist. I bought the guitar as a “second” from a guy who’d won it in a local auction and while the bracing let my guitar really sing it did torment me with intonation issues over the years as the bridge tilted. I actually had the fretboard planed down twice to correct it.

It was a wonderful guitar by all accounts, not just mine. I played with guys who owned some nice guitars, even vintage stuff and my Hummingbird got a lotta comments on its tone and one offer to trade right there for a guys D-35. No way! I played that guitar from MI to NM and back and took it on every camping trip, to trout camp, everywhere. It sat beside me in diner & truck stop booths because I wouldn’t leave it in a parking lot. I loved it to death.

In the late ‘80s a famous guitar repair guy took it to correct its latest intonation issue and without my permission or knowledge ruined my guitar. It had a fresh fretboard and could have easily been replaned etc but instead he press flattened the top & glued a gigantic bridgeplate in place to keep it flat. What I got back was a guitar with multiple cracks around the bridge, a flat top and no tone or volume. I was devastated but what he’d done couldn’t reasonably be fixed so I took Elderly’s advice and sold it. My pet of twenty years was gone. I never said even a word to the repair guy as he was the good friend of one of mine, and it just wasn’t gonna do any good.

I went on a long search for a replacement that included two very nice ‘65 Hummingbirds and finally a whole slew of Gibsons, Martins, and Taylors. I loved a Martin HD-35 for ten years and for the past fifteen+ love my AJRI and ‘52 J-45. They are just tremendous guitars and probably walk all over about any Hummingbird...but I still look nearly every day to see what Hummingbirds are out there. It’s hard to believe just how deep & lasting your first guitar love can be.

 

Search among my guitars and you'll find a beat to heck 1989 Ibanez RG550 that looks like it came through a war not unscathed, an Acoustic Control Corp Black Widow from the early '70s and an Ibanez GIO AX from 2000. All sentimental and filled with parts of my history.

 

a war not unscathed...like the ric 360 i had to sell....looked like it had been through 2 world wars...great guitar...want that back...most of the jetglo was off it...looked like a leopard gone wonky
and the 330 i sold at same time...all to keep up to date with bills and such
the 330 was best part of 25 yrs old and looked like it was made last tuesday.
both in original cases...they were my babies and i sorely miss them.
had to sell like NOW...bloody cash converters got 2 for the price of one...vultures feeding off peoples poverty

 

I sometimes think about the guitars that I used to have. Do I want them back? No. If I saw them for sale would I reach out? No.

I could download a picture of them and be fine.

 

Mine was a 73 tele deluxe that I missed for a long time. Bought many guitars with trying to get back to it. Finally got the real thing a couple years ago.



It’s a 75, but has the neck I remember — but this one doesn’t move like the 73 did. Overall it’s a better guitar than the one I bought in 91. Only cost 4 times more.

It’s hard to say how much money I would have saved if I had just bought what I really wanted from the get go.

At the same time I wouldn’t have as much experience with different types of guitars or taking them apart and putting different things in them.

So win-win, I guess.

 

yeah?



and what's the next itch?

 

I (inexplicably) still have my first acoustic (Fender F250), electric (G&L F-100) and amplifier (Gibson G-20) that I bought way back in 1989...

I quickly amassed a pretty nice herd of instruments after that, but outside of that first acoustic, that first electric, that first amp, a 63RIVV acquired in 1992 and the Fiesta Red Stratocaster (acquired in 1993), all the others (7 guitars, four amps) went to mortgage payments...
Oh well, life is hard, can’t live inside those guitar cases and wasn’t making a living with music and by 1998 I still had a very impressive herd of three instruments and two amps.
Real first world problems I was experiencing back then.

Of all the instruments I sold/lost/whatever in that Massacre, there was only one that bugged me...

A 1983 G&L Nighthawk.

I sold it without knowing there were only about 246 of them made...but I figured I’d run across another at some point...I was wrong.

15 years later, when circumstances aligned that I had the cash at the same time I found another Nighthawk for sale, I snatched it up...and it wasn’t the same.

I never bonded with the replacement, so I dinked around with it for a couple of years and sold it to someone who will (hopefully) appreciate it.

So, while I keep the G&L F-100 for (mostly) sentimental reasons—I’m no longer actively in the market to recapture a lost guitar or bass.

 

I do miss my '71 Gibson SG Deluxe. My dad let me pick it out and bought it for me and it was the first real American made electric I ever owned. I'd had multiple oversea builds but never a guitar of this quality. While trying out the different guitars that day I guess I impressed the management because even though I wouldn't be 16 for another month they asked me to tryout for a guitar teacher position they had open. I'd had music stores offer me lessons before but never a teaching position I hadn't even applied for. I worked at that music store for the next two years and got to meet many of the bands that were hot at the time. For example ..... one day I was between lessons so was sitting behind the display counter with my SG plugged in just playing away when I looked up and the shop tech had two dudes standing there with him watching me. Both of them said something like "Look. He's playing our guitar". And then to me one of them said "You've got good taste in guitars kid and your pretty good on that thing". Next thing I knew they grabbed a couple of other SGs hanging on the wall behind me and just started playing. We laughed and joked around for a while and then they left. A while later the shop tech came back out and told they had both come in because apparently their amps hadn't shown up in time for that nights show so our store had agreed to supply the same amps they usually played on stage for free for their performance. I then knew exactly who they were because I had tickets for their concert that night at the Arena in St. Louis. Glen Buxton and Michael Bruce. The twin guitarists in the original Alice Cooper Band. That store just opened up so many opportunities for me. Job offers from a couple of studio's, meeting some of the managers musician friends from Las Vegas passing through, etc. etc. It all started with the purchase of that Gibson SG Deluxe. The last guitar my dad would buy me growing up. That's one guitar I should have never ever traded away.

 

yeah kind of, my first half decent guitar was an Aria Pro II - TA40 in cherry, I would quite like one now, it would bring back a lot of memories.

 

Not anymore. There was one, specific, individual guitar that I jonesed after for like 35 years. When it suddenly appeared on the market, I could totally afford it, but I just didn't feel like going after it, so I let it go. Then a few years later another one of my holy grail guitars showed up, and I ignored it, too.

I guess I just don't care much about the world anymore. I can take it or leave it.

 

Burny, Greco, Tokai, Orville etc. Gibson quality at half the price

 

Only one, with a half-assed interest in another.

My 'sentimental search' guitar is a 1960's Harmony Sovereign 1260, but I would want it to be in very nice original condition, or expertly restored. I would expect to have to pay out between $750-$1200 for a very nice 1260, and right now there's just no way to come up with that much without selling a couple of other guitars that I am very reluctant to let go.

My other 'desirable re-aquisition' is nothing very special or expensive, it is a mid-2000's Jay Turser JT-141 'Monterey' in the transparent red/maroon finish. This is a single-pickup, full-hollow, archtop. I see one pop up every year or so, and they seem to go for $400-$500.