rustystrings
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Posts posted by rustystrings
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The serial number says 2013; a Google search of "2013 Gibson Southern Jumbo" turns up numerous examples with Grover Rotomatics and an LR Baggs pickup system, and they're all marked Custom Shop. I think that for $1500 I'd have already gotten in the truck to drive to wherever it is. I would check it out and make sure it was okay, because I cannot remember the last time I saw a J-45 for sale for under $2k, unless it had serious issues. Apparently they were also marketing a Banner reissue that year, but this isn't that one.
The specs I see suggest a 1.725-in nut width, and the only reference to neck shape I've seen for that year was described as "medium" - whatever that means.
Nice looking Sitka top, btw.
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Oh, that's one of the really NICE Gibson ukuleles! Great song choice for the uke, too! Lots of fun, and thanks for sharing this!
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If we stretch the Gibson Jumbos to include their kissing cousin the Epiphone Texan - well, didn't McCartney use a Texan for "Yesterday?" Before Year of the Cat went on the radio, Al Stewart was a folkie, even working as the compere for Les Cousins, and his axe of choice in those years was also a blonde Epiphone Texan.
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The J-45 gets a lot of the love - but the J-50 is its own beast, historically/culturally speaking. It was the heartbeat of the British folk-baroque guys, and the guitar most associated with both Davy Graham and John Renbourn during the period when their playing was still unconventional for the era. Lots of great players used them, and still do.
Oddly enough, I have never owned one. My acoustic blues mentor, Steve Belew, who was once the eyes-and-driver for both the Rev. Pearly Brown and Buddy Moss, still has and plays his 1962 J-50 he purchased from the late Arthur Motes brand new that year at the now much-missed Bibb Music Center in Macon. John Jackson famously played one.
My personal theory - the J-45 gets the love because of the sunburst, and there have probably always been more 45s than 50s. IF you want a sunburst then you wind up with the BEST sunburst. I bet if you checked out Guild, the majority of their guitars sold were natural tops. Martin sunbursts are out there, but seriously, even Martin fanatics agree Gibson does them better.
Final note - is the jury still out on the natural-topped Gibson Jumbo played by Bob Dylan early in his career? Have any script logo '46 J-50s been located or documented? My perception is that his was a '46 no-banner (ok, maaaaybe early early early '47) J-45 that had been refinished, a perception bolstered by his later use of a Nick Lucas refinished to natural with a Guild bridge ...
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Thank you so much for posting this! It's really cool to see all the steps involved, and the great split between tech/CNC and hand-fitting.
The question I still have is - when does Gibson assign serial numbers to their guitars? At what point in the process is that stamped on the back of the headstock, right before the finish goes on?
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On 1/3/2023 at 9:25 PM, babydaddymusic said:
I’ve learned something in this process. I made a playlist of acoustic based songs that really resonated with me. What I realized is that some songs the player is using a pick, and many songs they are using their fingers. Most of the songs that I connect with have strings on the dead(ish) side but not 100% of the time (depends on the song).I would humble submit that you try some John Pearse Pure Nickel acoustic gauge strings, or perhaps Martin Monels or something similar. They're closer to the strings this guitar would have sold with when new, and they're similar to strings used before the coming of phosphor bronze. My experience with the JP strings over the last nine years has been that after the first day or three, they settle into a state where they are stable and clear sounding for a long, long time. I didn't change strings in 2019 and was just fine with the sound. To my ears, they sound more transparent, like I'm hearing more of the guitar and less of the string coloration, if that makes any sense. My playing is primarily bare fingers for a mix of blues, folk, jazz, folk baroque/American Primitive, etc., and those strings on this J-45 sounds fabulous to me.
Note that the tension on these .012-.054 nickel strings feels lighter than the same size in phosphor bronze; when I switched over I needed to gently loosen the truss rod a quarter-turn or so.
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On 12/25/2022 at 1:28 PM, babydaddymusic said:
...I had never really loved the J45. I had it almost like a museum piece ...
... I’ve come to learn that most in the know about Gibson acoustics say that the real keepers of vintage are 20’s to 1950’s ... I don’t love the 66 J45 like I should. I feel it’s a piece of history, almost like a museum piece. Now that I have this L-00 I feel I have a versatile guitar that I love to play. I feel almost like the J45 is not what I thought it was, which was some infallible harbinger of vintage woody tone that can’t be gotten by anything newer than 1970.
It sure seems like both the 66 J45 and the 2019 L-00 are very well made guitars. ...
FWIW, I spent decades in the vintage guitar catch-and-release program, owned a couple of hundred guitars through the years and played probably thousands more. I had Gibsons built between 1932 or so and 1975, notably including a 1950 J-45 and a 1960 LG-2. I spent a lot of money through the years putting many of them back to rights, and I don't regret doing that, as they taught me a lot about what I like in guitars, and those instruments are probably still going strong for their current owners.
I don't own any of those guitars anymore, though.
Today, the '05 J-45 I bought new off the wall of a Guitar Center nearly 16 years ago is simply the very best guitar in the world - for ME. I've gotten to play it and hear it develop its own voice, more than fulfilling the potential I heard that first day. It wasn't meant to be a financial investment - though it is worth more now as a used, non-vintage guitar than I paid for it - and it doesn't convey the instant "authenticity" of a heavily worn (or relic'ed) finish. All of its stories are my stories as well. This one is MINE, though, and it feels like it has influenced me into the way I play today. It might not nail all the genres I wander through perfectly, but it sure sounds great trying to.
The renaissance of Gibson acoustics and the creation of the Bozeman facility was all about recapturing the best of the vintage guitars in a more consistent way using the latest technology to create a little more time for final careful assembly of traditional materials, a further evolution of things like when the folks in Kalamazoo started using routers to cut smoother, more even and consistent neck pockets. My perception is that there has been a serious effort to duplicate what worked best in the past and combine it with what works best today.
Earlier in this thread it was mentioned that there are perfect guitars and pig guitars built in any era. Stack onto that the variations between individual guitars of the exact same make and model built in the same week and it gets easier to discount the precise vintage - at least, if the primary goal is to find an instrument you love. Just for fun, check out this video and hear how five identical new J-45 Standards all have their own distinctive voices -
Life is too short to keep guitars you don't really love.
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12 hours ago, Sgt. Pepper said:
I need a protractor for my bracing angle. Guitars are getting to be serious feats of civil engineering. You guys obsess to much. Does anyone actually play or look up specs all day. I know a few things like the scale of my guitar, and what wood it’s made of, but how it’s braced, and what type is totally irrelevant, at least to me. How about how does it sound? Let’s use that as a measuring stick. ...
True enough. Much of my interest is academic, but I am always curious about WHY a particular guitar sounds the way it does, particularly if I fall in love with the sound.
So I went looking for a video I remembered from a decade back and found this -
- and it confirms what zombywoof said earlier about angles vs. location of bracing. Now I'll have to figure out how to do a light inside my J-45 with the room darkened so I can see the bracing pattern - I'm curious about how closely it matches the modern pattern on the left.
As far as my fellow South Carolinian Sgt. Pepper's recommendation that the sound be the yardstick, absolutely. In theory I should be pursuing something with all hot-hide glue and Adirondack Red Spruce and visible sawmarks - or going to some modern boutiquey thing with the perfectly optimized string spacing and a long scale and some other more exotic wood choices, say, or even something built in Nazareth ... but my humble J-45 off the GC wall with the scratches from over-enthusiastic strummers checking it out and the visible glue squeeze-out inside the guitar just makes me happy every single time I play it, and in 44 years of playing NO other guitar has ever come close to matching that.
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3 hours ago, zombywoof said:
As has been noted here, Bozeman does not go with a forward or rear shifted bracing footprint. That is a Martin thing. When they cite AJ or 1930s Style bracing in the specs they are referring to a wider angle X bracing rather than the distance from the soundhole to the center of the X.
Cool. So - my understanding from the old Fabulous Flattops book was that Gibson originally used a 103-degree angle to the X-bracing, and that Ren Ferguson set it to 98-degrees. What was the AJ's bracing like, and what are the measurements more research has uncovered? Truly curious, actually ...
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12 hours ago, RichG said:
Here’s pictures from a reverb listing. There is an email from Gibson that says it is a 2008 J45TV. Also, in 2007 they were Sitka Topped so 2008 could be too.
https://reverb.com/item/63463637-gibson-j-45-true-vintage-2008-vintage-sunburst
Rich.
FWIW, I agree it's a legit relatively early J-45TV. They did initially build them with Sitka, and (heretic that I am) the quality of Sitka will likely be higher than the quality of Adirondack Red Spruce used at the time.
That's right at the point when Gibson decided that rather than build ONE J-45 pattern a year, they could build to different price points; the Modern Classic with a pickup system and Rotomatics and a rolled-edge fingerboard (and allegedly stouter back braces) for those who wanted a working stage-ready guitar and the True Vintage with Kluson-esque tuners, no pickup, more hide glue in the construction, and eventually Red Spruce - along with the ahistorical forward-shifted bracing adapted from the AJ, and a bracing setup that Gibson NEVER did with J-45s before that point. And thence to the whole family of J-45-esque guitars that now spans from the lower-priced G-45 to the J-45 Studio Walnut and the Studio Rosewood to the '50s Faded, itself a budget version of the'50s Original (suspiciously like my 2005 J-45 Historic Collection) to the Standard (today's version of the Modern Classic) to the Slash signature to the '42 Banner - lots and lots of price points.
And in the end I wonder how much the price points matter. I've played lots of very expensive top of the line guitars that left me cold, and some surprisingly awesome guitars that were budget models.
It's sobering to ponder that the J-45 was the next evolutionary step from the J-35, which was the BUDGET jumbo-body Gibson. And the J-35 and the Advanced Jumbo were themselves the result of Gibson dividing one model (the Original Jumbo, priced at $60) into TWO models selling for $35 and $80, respectively.
Just for fun, here's a gratuitous photo of my 2005 J-45 Historic Collection, a guitar on the evolutionary path between this thread's original subject the Early J-45 and the current discussion of the early variants of the J-45 True Vintage ....
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I LOVE my J-45 for fingerstyle. After years of pondering if I needed an LG-2 to augment it, to have the smaller, more projecting guitar for the more technical, instrumental stuff, I realized I can shift my right hand back a fraction of an inch or so closer to the bridge and get really close to that sound. Meanwhile, the J-45 has warmth, presence and the low end thump that I adore.
When I started playing c.1978, I was split between formal classical guitar and slopping folkie strumming. The two extremes grew somewhat closer together through the years, but it wasn't until I got my current J-45 that I found I could dispense with flatpicks and arrange pretty much my whole 40-odd years of songs into a barehanded (bareknuckle?) playing style that uses three fingers, the backs of fingernails, the Wes Montgomery thumb, etc.
The questions you get to answer for yourself are -
1. Does the J-45 string spacing work for YOU? That is a very subjective and personal thing, and your own body geometry and mechanics and adaptability are factors only you can answer.
2. Does the resulting sound work for YOU? You're just going to have to play it and listen, and see where you come down on the balancing of projection, presence, low mid-range vs. high midrange, sustain, etc.
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That is a STUNNING guitar with a wonderful story!
You mentioned the action being higher than you would prefer. I will throw out the idea of trying John Pearse Pure Nickel acoustic strings, the .012-.054 set. Allegedly the nickel is less dense than bronze; I have noted that whenever I replace a set of bronze strings with these, I need to gently loosen the truss rod a touch, as they really do feel like they have less tension. My perception (fwiw) is that the nickel strings give a more transparent sound, i.e., less hyped. They certainly retain the same tonal qualities for a long time.
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Zero desire to play the P-40 Warhawk guitar, though it does make me wonder what fellow Sydney Lanier High School graduate Gen. Robert L. Scott would have to say about it. Maybe Martin should send one to the Museum of Aviation in Warner Robins, Georgia to hang near the P-40 in Flying Tigers colors they have there.
As far as the inlaid pieces that started this conversation - no. I can appreciate the skill and the technique, but they remind me that while Martin made a range of serious ukuleles, the very best sounding ones are apparently the plain, unadorned Style 0.
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On 11/15/2022 at 6:35 AM, jt said:
The maple J-45s date to 1944 and 1945. As you already know, they are rare and wonderful guitars.
That said, does that indicate the top on this one is likely to be Sitka, being post-CMI acquisition? I'm not accustomed to seeing Adirondack Red Spruce tops with grain and silking like that one.
I am hoping the OP posts a soundfile of some sort when it returns from repair!
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My view of the LG-2 is that it is to the J-45 what the Martin 00-18 is to the D-18; it's the grand concert version, as opposed to the Jumbo/Dreadnaught version. Same woods, comparable bracing, same neck and scale, etc. My experience with a '60 LG-2 cured me of any thinking of it as a student guitar, and I would argue the the only "student" guitars Gibson offered were the postwar LG-1 and LG-0 because of their ladder bracing, and perhaps the L-48 with its laminated arched top. But even then, all of those guitars had the same neck as a J-45 or an LG-2 and they could all be set up to play well and continue to do so, as opposed to a Harmony or a Kay.
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Thank you! The day I met my J-45, I was actually looking for an ES-165, some sort of hollowbody single-pickup jazz box. That was not to be - the moment I laid a hand on this guitar, I thought, "I'm home." It was kind of eerie, a feeling of "why is my guitar on the wall of this Guitar Center?" coupled with the same strange sensation of being influenced that comes when you pick up a well-worn vintage guitar and feel guided to play things you normally wouldn't, like you're being steered into a new direction by the guitar itself. This one had that effect the very first night I got it home, and it is the ONLY new guitar I have ever experienced that with.
Years later, I understand now that J-45s have that archtop DNA baked into their design, created by guys whose hearts were still into carved arches enough that they worked in the same parabolic arch into their nominal flat top instruments.
I loved the chords, and I love songs like this that present me with new chords to learn. The E+5 and the descending Am - AmMaj7 - Am7 - Am6 felt swoony once I got comfortable with them, and the Am/F# just feels really satisfying to play.
The REAL challenge was this -
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Really lovely rendition - thank you!
And yes, the J-45 was absolutely the right guitar!
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I couldn't sleep the other night, so I sat down and recorded this - complete with Titus the Cat voicing his commentary around 1:40 ...
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I would expect to see VINTAGE guitars come back from Japan. The last time I went to a guitar show, Gary Burnette/Bee Three's show in Spartanburg SC c.2000, I walked in two hours after the doors opened. There was a dealer from Tokyo right inside the door and he already had two chest-high stacks of guitars that were outbound. That sight, and the then-outrageous $3k price on a rebuilt and refinished Gibson built Ray Whitley Recording King (same model John Fahey played!), convinced me that there was too much money involved for vintage guitars to be fun for me anymore.
I hate to think of how much that Ray Whitley would bring today ....
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If Epiphone followed Gibson's peghead angle change from 17 to 14 degrees, then a '66 will have the shallower version. That may make for slightly less string tension.
It occurs to me - what strings are you running? I mention this because I have noticed that I don't perceive any volume loss since switching from John Pearse Phosphor Bronze to Pearse's Pure Nickel wound strings, but they have noticeably lower tension, so much so that I always have to tweak the truss rod a little looser when I switch a guitar over to them.
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I will put another data point before you - I have been playing the same 2005 J-45 Historic Collection for 15 years now. One of the things that struck me the moment I took it off the peg at GC was how much the neck felt like my memory of the neck of my long-gone '60 LG-2. I have since measured the nut width and found it to be 1.704-inches, a whisker wider than the 1.68 they allegedly were spec'ed at, but noticeably narrower than the 1.725 Gibson has specified for several years now. I'll have to start asking questions about nut width and neck depth whenever I gather data for the J-45 HC database I've been assembling ...
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Just lovely. Thank you for sharing part of what was an amazing time!
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Looking for this guitar as an LG-2 ADJ is the reason you're not finding any information - with that reddish finish, the reverse belly/adjustable bridge and a serial number stamped in ink on the back of the headstock, you have a B-25. I would say 1962.
Internally, it should be pretty much identical to the LG-2s built 1955-1961, and probably still has the smaller maple bridgeplate. I would suspect this guitar left the factory with a plastic bridge, but that serial number makes me think it's early enough that it might be original rosewood - I don't know enough about that to say for certain.
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I'm fresh from reading Jeff Noonan's book The Guitar in America, which is centered on the BMG (banjo-mandolin-guitar) movement c.1880-1930. One of the points that emerges is that the early guitar heros like Eddie Lang and Nick Lucas, who were both of Italian extraction, started out as mandolinists who adapted mandolin technique (using hard plectrums) on archtop guitars were essentially large mandolin-construction bodies fitted with guitar necks. (We DO note that Nick Lucas would go to flattops later, but still used the same playing techniques) And we recall that in 1902 it was the Gibson Mandolin-Guitar Mfg. Co., which would have been in line with the BMG world, which never really got past guitar-as-backing-instrument mindset.
The book is interesting - the whole mandolin orchestra thing that Gibson was focused on was very much about creating an upper-middle-class music world, more refined than the common man or woman playing what would later become blues or country, but borrowing styling cues and even attire and organization from "foreign" classical musical groups while being somewhat distrustful of it. Even the mandolin-mandola-mandocello-mandobass thing copied the violin-viola-cello-string bass format, but as "plectral" instruments of a distinctly American type.
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There is an "acoustic in your head" perfect guitar after all...
in Gibson Acoustic
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The whole quest for Excalibur is a strange thing. I think you chose the right guitar, and to my ears the HB was the best one - in your hands. Though the standard J-45 ticked a lot of boxes with me, but that particular HB in your hands was lovely.
I spent years chasing the perfect guitar, first playing primal roots rock and rockabilly, then playing solo acoustic gigs. I had a bunch of Telecasters of varying vintages, multiple Gretsches, assorted vintage Gibson flattops, several archtops, a steel-bodied National Duolian, both used and new Taylors, and lots and lots of Guilds. In the end, it was while looking for a single-pickup archtop that I stumbled onto MY J-45, which announced itself as such the moment I touched it. And 16 years later I still marvel at how it sounds under my hands, I still feel better every time I settle it against me to start playing, I still delay putting it away, and I still feel a little sad when I have to put it back in its case.
May you have the same enjoyment of your new Hummingbird!