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grovers are imports- silent conspiracy !

jvi

By jvi
in Gibson Acoustic

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Col Mustard

Col Mustard

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you people win-these tuners are fine by you- all you folks seem to have twisted and missed my point just to defend import over non and kept the thread alive with bs,imo

 

As soon as I heard that Gibson was in trouble, I decided to pounce on an instrument that I'd been

drooling over: The Gibson J-45 AG (which stands for Avante Guarde).

 

My motivations were complicated and mixed, of course.

 

First: do we really need an excuse to buy a guitar? ...uh, no.

 

Second: I am a fan of Gibson, and wanted to help them the only way I could.

I like to live in a world where Gibson is possible. In spite of all of their poor

judgement, wrong decisions and corporate stinkitude.

 

Third: I've always wanted a J-45, and when I heard they were going to be bankrupt in the

near future, I made my decision: Get it now. Don't wait for the new "Norlin" period to begin.

Sell some other instruments to fund it if necessary. Sometimes you have to pounce.

 

Fourth: Why the J-45 AG? Why not a vintage replica? ...or a real one from the used market?

Because the J-45 AG is made of a Walnut body, Maple neck, Spruce top, Walnut bridge, Walnut fretboard...

And I was very curious.

A Gibson made of all North American tone wood... nothing from third world countries

with dicey political environments. What a good idea! I decided I would support this in

the best way I know how.

 

Fifth: Price... the J-45 AG was offered by Sweetwater for about $1800 including setup.

I decided I couldn't pass it up. With the features listed above, and the 4" body depth, many

would say that this model isn't a J-45 at all. I don't care. It's a 21st century J-45, with only

the remotest connections to its aulde origins. (like maybe where it really counts, in the

bracing and the spruce top).

 

My new J-45 AG came with mini-Grovers, another step away from tradition. Traddie J-45s

came with Klusons and white buttons. Okay, just play the thing, and see. I knew I had taken

a leap of curiosity by buying it unplayed and unseen... but I know a guy at Sweetwater,

Alan Finkbeiner, and I asked him to pick me a good one. I have utmost respect for Alan as

a musician and a knowledgable Sweetwater rep, so the leap was an assisted leap. *grins

 

Anyway, my new Gibson is very shiny! I've been playing it for about eight months now,

and toured with it from Boston to Baton Rouge, up into Wisconsin and the Michigan Upper

Peninsula. I've actually never owned a NEW acoustic guitar before. All my others were

bought used. I'm not a rich kind of musician, and I have actually ZERO interest in 'vintage"

Gibsons... feeling that the "vintage" arena is a circus of strange. So for me, taking this new

and interesting Gibson on the road has been an adventure of discovery.

 

I don't expect a guitar I buy to sound like someone else's, or even like an earlier version

of itself. I expect it to sound like me when I play it, and so I'm open to where a different guitar

can take my tone. I read a lot of posts where a new owner is disappointed because his new

guitar doesn't sound like some other one. And I never understand this.

 

But I'm with the OP partly... I would NEVER pay two to three thousand for a Gibson that might

have substandard or foreign made parts. But that's because I would never pay more than

two thousand for any guitar. When I pounced on my new Gibson, I wanted THAT guitar and

at THAT price. The rest is up to me.

 

So in accordance with other wisdom on this thread, I ended up removing the Grover tuners from

my brand new guitar. Not because they didn't work... they did. Grovers always do. But the more

I played my new Gibson, the more in love with it I became. And then StewMac offered a set of

Waverly tuners for a reduced (but still expensive) price, and offered to throw in an ebony end pin and

bridge pin set, so I took the bait and bought the best.

 

We see so many arguments about tuners on guitar fora... Many players seem to worship Grovers, and

write posts as if everyone KNEW that Grovers are the best. It's actually not so.

 

Waverlys are the best. Most players, especially the not-rich kind like me, are unwilling to pay

the cost of USA made tuners. But in the case of my prized Gibson acoustic, I wanted the best and

was willing to pay, once StewMac marked them down temporarily. Sometimes you just have to pounce.

Waverly tuners ought to end all the arguments. If you want American made high quality, there it is.

 

I can't wait for the outrage to bubble forth when someone admits that all Gibson's vaunted hum bucking pickups

have been made in China for the last fifteen years... AS FAR AS I KNOW, this is NOT TRUE. But Gibson owns

their own plant in Tsingtao, the Epiphone plant. Maybe the new corporate masterminds who take over Gibson

from good ol' Henry J. will make this decision. *shrugs

 

I hope not. I like to keep my countrymen working, and keep Gibson inside its traditions (with a few remarkable

exceptions).

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Col Mustard

Col Mustard

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Its a J-45 cause that is what it is called, but is it really?

 

Whatever they called it, I wanted that guitar.

The one made of walnut and maple and spruce.

It isn't like anything else that I know of. It's been fascinating

listening to its tone change as it gets played a lot. It started

out sounding very bright, but has gained depth and resonance

over the last seven months or so.

 

Mine was made in January 2018, so just before the shite hit the fan.

 

And yes, Ebony bridge pins are my favorite.

The new J-45 came with tusq... which work fine.

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Col Mustard

Col Mustard

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What country did the ebony come from?

 

check out this video from Bob Taylor, it tells the interesting story

of Ebony in our time.

 

 

Granted, this video is like six years old, but Taylor has done some

updates on it, and tells the story of the Ebony harvesting company he

owns in Cameroon.

 

He says in this video that Cameroon is the last place to legally harvest Ebony.

Maybe that (political) situation has changed since then, but the things he

discusses in this video are still current IMHO.

 

My Martin XC1T has a bridge and a fretboard made of striped ebony. Mine was

made in Nazareth Pa in 2006. (production on this model has since been moved to Mexico).

I actually love the look and feel of striped ebony.

 

But my ebony bridge pins are black. *shrugs.

We get what we get, I think that's the truth for these times.

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jvi

jvi

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Hey LM, I checked out a few songs from Bull, Budda, Foreigner, and Mona. Gonna have to dedicate some time to give them a proper listen. Right now for me it is all about The White Album.

check "the great white north" by bob and doug mckenzie, great song you could do the tab for ...and seasonally appropriate...."take off eh !"

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ksdaddy

ksdaddy

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Right now for me it is all about The White Album.

 

We took my stepdaughter back to college yesterday (3 hour drive). At some point in the drive down, I mentioned how Abbey Road mesmerized me like no other album and how it is one of the few albums that I insist be played from beginning to end... as luck would have it, we stopped at WalMart to pick my stepdaughter up some junk food and whatnot, and even though they only had a couple hundred cds of ANY kind, Abbey Road happened to be one of them.

 

So Penny got the full Abbey Road treatment during the drive back, headed north on I-95 in a snowstorm. She is a believer now.

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blindboygrunt

blindboygrunt

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We took my stepdaughter back to college yesterday (3 hour drive). At some point in the drive down, I mentioned how Abbey Road mesmerized me like no other album and how it is one of the few albums that I insist be played from beginning to end... as luck would have it, we stopped at WalMart to pick my stepdaughter up some junk food and whatnot, and even though they only had a couple hundred cds of ANY kind, Abbey Road happened to be one of them.

 

So Penny got the full Abbey Road treatment during the drive back, headed north on I-95 in a snowstorm. She is a believer now.

 

Al great until octopus garden comes on , then I want to start screaming

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ksdaddy

ksdaddy

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My sisters (6 and 7 years older than me) bought the White Album when it first came out. They had the 8x10 glossy individual pics on their bedroom wall. I used to sneak in and play "Wild Honey Pie" and marvel at the weird tones they got from their guitars...hey, I was 8 years old...

 

I bought my own copy in 1976, right about when the whole Manson Helter Skelter book and tv movie came out. It was not a good combination with a brooding rebellious 16 year old who liked to sit in his bedroom and think about things. However I survived and so did the neighborhood. About that same time the double album "Beatles Rock n Roll Music" came out, they released "Got to Get You Into My Life" as a single and there were rumors of them reuniting. Those were heady times.

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