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JC and Gibson


Dave F

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I read somewhere that he didn't particularly like his Gibson(s). Can't remember where, but it wasn't long ago. I saw one of his J200s in Nashville last fall. There were tvs playing videos through the museum and when I snapped this pic, Johnny's reflection showed up in the pic.

IMG-4629.jpg

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1 hour ago, ksdaddy said:

I read somewhere that he didn't particularly like his Gibson(s). Can't remember where, but it wasn't long ago. I saw one of his J200s in Nashville last fall. There were tvs playing videos through the museum and when I snapped this pic, Johnny's reflection showed up in the pic.

IMG-4629.jpg

The photo looks cool.  Im sure the guitars neat to look at. But you wont see either one of those in my collection .  
 

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2 hours ago, ksdaddy said:

I read somewhere that he didn't particularly like his Gibson(s). Can't remember where, but it wasn't long ago. I saw one of his J200s in Nashville last fall. There were tvs playing videos through the museum and when I snapped this pic, Johnny's reflection showed up in the pic.

 

    Excellent photo ^

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There's a classic episode of "Columbo" starring Johnny Cash, where he kills his wife and a girl he had an affair with by drugging them and bailing out of his airplane while flying them home after a concert. His guitar is a big clue, because he sends it back with somebody else in a car so it won't be destroyed in the plane crash. He makes a big deal about how long he's had the guitar and how important it is, it looked like a black Martin with white binding. 

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0071351/

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Johnny and June were also in an episode of Little House on the Prairie. He played a conman and took the identity of the local preacher, stole his pocket watch. Of course Charles Ingalls persuaded Johnny to go legit. There is a good scene where Johnny was riding a horse and was singing a gospel song.

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Interesting, I've always had Johnny Cash in mind with a D35 - even hanging on his back. 


The Rosanne Cash J-185 is almost inexpensive at €5,399 on the Gibson website compared to the Johnny Cash SJ-200 at €14,999 ... 
Beautiful guitars, but in this price range they are more collector's items.

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My new next door neighbor plays in a JC tribute band, first I’ve ever heard of actually. Guess I should point these out to him. But as docr stated, these seem more like collectors items for those who wish to drop the money than working instruments.

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For the kind of scratch that the Cash J200 brings, Bozeman is going to have to give me something other than premium tonewoods and a different pickguard.  I will stick with my 1960 J200.  Not a collector's piece as the guitar was at some time in its history shipped off to Gibson for repairs and a refinish. I laid out $3,250 for it.  At the time it was the most I had ever spent on a guitar.  But considering the $15K price tag attached to the Cash model, I can relate to Lou Gehrig's "luckiest man" speech.  

Edited by zombywoof
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9 hours ago, Boyd said:

it looked like a black Martin with white binding. 

8 hours ago, docr said:

Interesting, I've always had Johnny Cash in mind with a D35

This looks like the one in the Columbo episode

"Perhaps Johnny Cash’s most favorite Martin guitar (and he played many) was a specially made D-35, his – and Martin’s – first guitar with a polished black finish. Perfect for "the man in black," Cash played this guitar on stage for nearly 20 years."

https://www.martinguitar.com/guitars/custom-special-editions/D-35-Johnny-Cash.html?cgid=limited-and-special-edition-guitars

 

 

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On 8/28/2024 at 2:57 PM, Boyd said:

This looks like the one in the Columbo episode

"Perhaps Johnny Cash’s most favorite Martin guitar (and he played many) was a specially made D-35, his – and Martin’s – first guitar with a polished black finish. Perfect for "the man in black," Cash played this guitar on stage for nearly 20 years."

https://www.martinguitar.com/guitars/custom-special-editions/D-35-Johnny-Cash.html?cgid=limited-and-special-edition-guitars

 

 

I'll always remember the way he put his D-35 down on the counter top (that one's out of tune now). Good Fender guitar {bass} and amp spotting in the vid, as well as seeing the guitar taking a tumble along with Johnny - 'hope it was the D-35 stunt double):

Happy Sunday morning.

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14 minutes ago, ksdaddy said:

Sometime between 2:12 and 2:14 the guitar switched positions by 180 degrees.

Good one. 'Just noticed- it did definitely did a 180° .  I was too busy checking out the Fender Tele bass (?)

and the bikinis seemed to be made more from cloth. 🙂.

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I won’t defend that guitar but consider this: if you watch old tv footage from the 50s, you’ll see that people had this crazy idea of replacing the stock guards with big oversized monstrosities. Kitty Wells, Faron Young, Marty Robbins, just to name a few. Even Wilf Carter had a horrible oversized guard on his early 30s Martin. People just DID it, like they put sissy bars on every motorcycle in the 70s. 

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Cash was still playing J200s in 1959, but Martins were also being used.  Then, Martin made him an offer that he couldn’t refuse and he played them almost exclusively.  Occasionally, you’d see him playing June’s Hummingbird (we’re talking about her guitar).😎😎
 

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On 8/29/2024 at 6:56 AM, slimt said:

Tom petty left over pick guards. So who had there guitar first? 😁

Tom requested a Johnny Cash style pickguard for his custom "Wildflower" SJ-200 that he ordered from Gibson in the early 90s and that we released as a limited edition a few years ago. That pickguard shape was designed by Johnny Cash in the late 1950s. Apparently, Tom also really liked it.  

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6 hours ago, Phil OKeefe said:

Tom requested a Johnny Cash style pickguard for his custom "Wildflower" SJ-200 that he ordered from Gibson in the early 90s and that we released as a limited edition a few years ago. That pickguard shape was designed by Johnny Cash in the late 1950s. Apparently, Tom also really liked it.  

Good to know.  

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