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NGD Riviera Elite


batwing

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2003 Epiphone Elite Riviera

After years of owning various Riviera's, Japanese, Korean I finally got my hands on this.

Elites, Elitist or original's seldom appear in Australia so I'm wrapped to get this for a good price, $1150.

Neck profile is perfect for me, a little slimmer than others I've owned.

Switched the knobs and truss rod cover apart from that needed nothing needed to done.

 

image-1-1.jpg

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This is a guitar that, imho should be offered and in the lineup.

Very unlikely it would ever happen again as a Terada-made Elitist.

 

Note that the stock model had a Frequensator rather than the Bigsby,

but still a great & rare find!

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That is beautiful! Congrats! I've been after one of those for a while. I've owned Korean and Japanese ones as well. How does it compare?

Comparing it to my MIJ 80s , that one had humbuckers, a chunkier neck, double block inlays, it also sounded flat/dull acoustically.

My other current Riviera is a MIK with gold hardware and Bigsby, a special run made for Yamano, a Japanese Epi distributor I believe.

It's electrics and pickups let it down so I got new pots and Gibson mini-humbuckers installed, made a world of difference, like the MIJ it's neck is a little chunkier than the Elite.

 

The Elite's neck is just perfect, weight and profile, the fret board is smooth with very little fret wear.

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Very unlikely it would ever happen again as a Terada-made Elitist.

 

Note that the stock model had a Frequensator rather than the Bigsby,

but still a great & rare find!

 

I actually prefer the Frequensator to the Bigsby, but I'm not complaining [biggrin]

I' ll keep an eye out for a stock one, in cherry!

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