Ventura Highway

Late 1970's Ventura  Les Paul "lawsuit era" Gison copy. Highly sought after rendition is owned by Chris Barth of Monroe WI. Block inlay, fully bound neck & inlayed head stock are just a few reasons these come off as desirable reproductions. Upgrade the pick ups & tuners & you would really have something here. 

Tribute City

Happy St Pat's Day From Minneapolis Guitars. Viking Rocker's classic rock tribute show was a great success Friday night at Pickle Park. The featured acts Poisened (Poisen), Crown Jewels (Queen), & Top Jimmy (Van Halen) were all very entertaining, & as you can see by the photo's the guitars were all fairly authentic too. One of these axes has been previously featured on this website, but is so cool I thought it worthy of a repost. All these guitarists are top players & consistently perform stylistically authentic to give you a taste of the original artists.

Gretsch Silver Ann

This Gretsch hollow body guitar is from 1986, & it's a silver anniversary of the historic 1961 model. Darcel Jones of Coon Rapids is the current owner & player of this fine vintage axe. It's been in his family since new, & has been handed down from his grandfather. The condition is fine but this one's not for sale, so you can stop drooling now.

Emperor's New Clothes

1997 Epiphone Emperor Regent archtop jazz guitar, fondly dubbed "Goldfingers" by owner George Paulos of Little Canada. This is a true hollow body guitar with a laminated spruce top & stunning sparkle gold finish. Once again George has reworked this axe to taste by refitting with a lot of new hardware, including an ebony bridge, Kent Armstrong pickup, Wilkinson Keystone tuners, and a harp trapeze tailpiece to replace the traditional Epiphone "Frequensator" tailpiece which would not fit his strings. George loves freaking out stuck-up jazz snobs with this ultra gaudy glitter axe. Although it is primarily a jazz guitar, it can get a real gnarly sound when run into a rock amp, just don't get too close! Check out George's band Rhythm Engine to see this axe, along with his other unique guitars performing live locally in the twin cities.

Electric Mandobird VIII

Our show at the St Croix casino yesterday allowed me the opportunity once again to view a portion of the collection of Steve Lindstrom from Amery, WI. Here's his Epiphone Electric Mandobird VIII (8 String Mandolin in vintage sunburst finish). It's not every day that you run across these, so it's nice when someone generously shares their odd instrument. I snapped a few pics of some of his other axes, & I'll post them at a later time. Here's looking forward to featuring more specimens from Steve's collection & getting additional pics when we return to Turtle Lake for our next big show on new years eve. We'll be dropping hundreds of balloons from the sky at midnight, with THOUSANDS of DOLLARS tucked inside to make this the greatest party ever. Hope to see you at the show to check what cool guitars we're using.

Flock of T-Birds

I found a rather impressive display of Epiphone Thunderbirds hanging around a local used music shop last week & thought I'd share it. Music go Round in Roseville had these Ultra cool Nikki Sixx Blackbirds with traditional goth theme & maltese cross inlay. What's really unique about these is the absence of volume & tone pots; just one over sized toggle switch! Need more info of these? Call the store: 651 487-5600. Pick up one of these basses & It'll be your picture posted here next time.

Tonight: St Croix casino in Turtle Lake, WI.

Goldilocks

Shiny, sparkling, & downright glitzy. Original finish 1999 Epiphone Sorrento, owned, operated, & maintained by George Paulos of Little Canada. As always, a few mods were necessary to get this up to pro standards; note the new Gibson Nashville tune-0-matic bridge. George has installed an upgrade of new cts pots, & of course he puts jumbo frets on everything he plays. George was the luthier at Torp's Music for ten years, so getting the mods right the first time was quick, easy & painless. George can currently be seen using this axe frequently around town with his steady gig Rythm Engine, a five piece rock, soul, & pop combo complete with keys & sax. Click HERE for a list of their current scheduled performance dates

Can you correctly identify this Mystery Axe?

Freak of the Week
Comment on this post, or send me a message if you think that you can correctly identify this fine axe.


Here's some cool links to vintage guitars for the enthusiast:
http://www.vintageguitar.com/
http://www.solidbodyguitar.com/
http://www.gruhn.com/
http://vintagecityguitars.com/
http://www.elderly.com/
http://www.vintageguitars.net/
Let me know if you find any of these sites particularly cool to browse.