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Iconic acoustic guitars


Desolationrow

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A bit of difference between 'Iconic' and 'Must have' which is personal.

 

Must haves' seem to change over time, in terms of Iconic these one come to mind as pick of the bunch.

 

D-28, D-18

J-45, J-200, Hummingbird

 

 

Agree exactly with your reasoning and conclusions. You want "iconic"? There they are.

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Agree exactly with your reasoning and conclusions. You want "iconic"? There they are.

 

I agree with the above, except I would also like to add the Martin OM-28, which I believe among other things was the first model with a 14-fret neck and square shoulders, making it essentially the first modern guitar. Further, I would put J-45/Southern Jumbo, since they are essentially the same.

 

If someone should also suggest the Martin D-45, I would not protest.

 

Lars

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In terms of golden era flat tops from the mid-to-late 30s, most of these are at least iconic. The are great guitars too.

 

30bigs.jpg

 

Back row -- D-28s

Next row -- D-18s

Side left -- Roy Smeck Radio Grande, Jumbo35 Trojan

Side right -- Roy Smeck Stage Deluxe, Advanced Jumbo

Front -- Jumbo

 

Let's pick

-Tom

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In terms of golden era flat tops from the mid-to-late 30s, most of these are at least iconic. The are great guitars too.

 

 

Back row -- D-28s

Next row -- D-18s

Side left -- Roy Smeck Radio Grande, Jumbo35 Trojan

Side right -- Roy Smeck Stage Deluxe, Advanced Jumbo

Front -- Jumbo

 

Let's pick

-Tom

 

 

That's some serious guitar porn!

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My personal opinion of Iconic is a specific guitar, not a model. When I think iconic I think of Willies Trigger, BB King's Lucille, Eric Clapton's Blackie, Lefty Frizzell's J200 Bigsby, Elvis' Leather Covered Martin, Lonnie Mack's Flying V, SRV's Lenny and so on.

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D-28, D-18

J-45, J-200, Hummingbird

 

Back that - and could add the Mart. D-45 and the Dove as well.

 

Then I think we need the Ovation in the pic. Opposed to the others not a favorite here, but the creature sure manifested itself in its golden 70's era

 

 

 

 

 

And this one too plays a humble yet solid role.

 

http://www.bigmusics.../40vs-0018v.jpg

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We're getting lost in the weeds here.

 

An icon is defined as "a person or thing regarded as a representative symbol of something." The initial reaction to the question "what is the thing that is a representative symbol of the Martin guitar", you could really pare it down to the Dreadnought guitar if you wanted. Whether it's a D-18, D-28, or D-45 is really a matter of commentary: they're all Dreadnoughts.

 

Less simple with Gibson, but the J-45 is probably the first acoustic guitar you think of.

 

Once you start including every guitar under the sun, the "icon" status pretty much loses its meaning.

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Iconic

 

Made me think of you asked a person who didn't play guitar to draw one , well they'd draw a d28 wouldn't they ?

Probably depends on their, ummm, musical orientation. They might execute a crude representation of some relatively non-descript solid body electric😎

For the folks who prefer the artist-association thing, I'll nominate Woody Guthrie's Southern Jumbo!

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.

Iconic is more like -

 

Robert Johnson's Gibson L-1

Screen%2Bshot%2B2011-02-01%2Bat%2B7.22.37%2BPM.png

 

Willie's Martin N-20

Willie_Trigger-Promo.jpg

 

McCartney's Epiphone Texan

tumblr_lvlzld93rh1qjk7wso1_1280.jpg

 

Johnny's Martin D-35

cash17b.jpg

 

Elvis's Gibson '56 J-200 after 1960 mods

elvis-j200-front-back.jpg

 

Woody's Gibson '45 Southern Jumbo 'This machine kills facists'

woody_guthrie.jpg

 

Everly's J-180/5

Gibson_Everly_Guitar.jpg

 

Kurt Cobain's Martin D-18e

big_kurt-cobain-on-mtv-unplugged-with-his-acoustic-martin-d-18e.jpg

 

 

Most of these are available as sig/tribute models.

 

.

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This seems more like iconic people with guitars.

Signature guitars of iconic people, perhaps?

Lately, it seems like the reissues from both Gibson and Martin are piling up pretty rapidly, almost out of control in some instances, but a lot of money is being made by supplying reissues to folks for whom originals are - for various reasons - unattainable. To me, that suggests an iconic stature assigned to certain models by the consumer base.

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