Epiphany over an Epiphone

A definite (and somewhat obvious) perk of this job is that i get to get my hands on a LOT of guitars. New, Old, Entry Level and High End… To say it numbers in the thousands wouldn’t be an understatement! Thinking back on all these guitars is like rummaging in the storeroom of the worlds best guitar shop, and when considering the guitars it contains i’ll generally remember a standout feature, perhaps the person who purchased it, or even how it sounded and felt. In the midst of all these instruments are the real standouts. These are guitars that I can describe at length, the ones that make me smile to think about and hope to even just restring them again. More often than not, the guitars I really enjoy to muse over are cheaper mass produced ones. To me, there’s just something special about finding an instrument where “it” just all came together. Where the perfect neck met with the perfect body, and the person doing the fret work was really on top of their game that day. I’m not saying that we should all abandon our dreams of owning that high end instrument made by a genius of a luthier; but what I am saying is that there is a definite beauty in picking up and playing a cheaper mass produced instrument that whether by accident or design, really stands out among its peers.

So what’s inspired this rambling and somewhat whimsical exploration of my thoughts? Well last week one of these guitars that holds “Legendary” status in my memories has come back to us! Read on below….

Somewhere in the very different past.. perhaps 2018 or 2019, we took in part exchange this cracking Epiphone DOT. Its original owner had taken extremely good care of it, and treated it to a whole raft of tasteful upgrades too. Manufactured in 2004, This Epiphone was put together in Korea at the Peerless factory (well known for manufacturing Semi’s on behalf of some of the big names in guitars). Before we get onto what has since happened to this instrument, it’s important to take a look at it’s now 16/17 year old construction. This is one of the heaviest Semi’s i’ve ever known! Just picking it up off a stand to rest on your knee, you can feel that you are dealing with a decent instrument. It feels rock solid, balances nicely and is a comfortable weight nestled under your right arm. Now let’s look at the body and neck….

As you can see, Both the maple top of the body and the mahogany neck are just beautifully figured. For me there is a certain beauty about a finish that incorporates a figured wood where it’s not necessarily meant to be. This kind of “half flamed” feel excites me more than if a AAA maple top was spec’d because of the sheer randomness of it! It gives the instrument character and class that transcends it’s mass produced heritage and reminds me that I could hunt through boxes containing the same stock guitar and not find another one like it!

There’s no doubt in my mind that this was a cracking guitar back in the mid-2000’s when it would have been unboxed for the first time on these shores. The real keen eyed readers out there will by now have been ticking off the various mods that are on show that elevate this cracker into “legendary” status in my mind. First of all, love them or hate them, the bigsby trem system is such a popular addition to semi’s. This one has been fitted well and works an absolute treat. Whether done at the same time or to aid the tuning stability, the roller bridge is also an excellent idea and keeps things as stable as possible when the bigsby is doing its wobbly thing!

This guitar also has quite a unique voice, as the stock humbuckers have been replaced by a pair of Seymour Duncan “Fat Cats”. Another well considered mod that gives this Dot a slightly different voice. It remains warm in the neck position, but switching to the bridge reveals twang and bite you might be fooled into thinking it’s actually a Telecaster in your hands! At the headstock end we find a beautifully fitted bone nut, and a smooth set of grover machine heads (which I believe may be stock?).

So after welcoming this guitar back after its latest owner left with a new Telecaster, i’ve had chance to clean it up and get it set up for its next stay at the shop. I guess I could conclude this blog with an in depth study of my feelings, and look at whether I had built this guitar up in my head to almost un-reachable levels of brilliance. I won’t waste your time for sake of creating content… The short answer is no, it’s flipping brilliant. Whats worth more consideration is in fact whether i’ll let this one go a second time!

Thanks for reading.

Why A Website?

Greetings! and welcome to our small corner of the internet. Those of you who know us will be thinking right now, “Why a website now??”

Well, as I sit with the prospect of having to start adding products to this page i’m beginning to ask myself the same question!

For this of you who don’t know us, we are a family run independent music shop. For many years, we have concentrated on what we do best… an individual service to the customers who come into our store. We embraced social media around ten years ago and have since built a healthy following on Facebook and more recently Instagram. We’ve also embraced online selling tools like Reverb and Ebay.

One of the core beliefs of our business is “If you haven’t got it, you can’t sell it”, and as such we are well known for keeping a huge stockpile of stock in store. In the wake of the Covid 19 outbreak I found myself in quite a new position…. Where many of the big online stores were out of stock, I in fact had great stock levels. Not only did I have the stock, but I also had it available at cheaper prices than online too. However as the shops were allowed to re-open, it felt like no amount of social media posting could make up for the loss of the browsers and people just popping by for quick look. My stock, although varied, plentiful and well priced.. was going unnoticed by the world, and that upset me.

I’ve never wanted to run an online shop. The thought of packing boxes and sending them off into the world wondering if the buyer will be pleased with their purchase is not a role I want to fulfil. Maintaining a website of thousands of products and having a USP of simply being the cheapest around is not what I want for my life. However the thought occurred to me… What if I could make a website that just featured the most interesting and sought after guitars? What if I could still offer the service I love to in store on a small range of a stock on a great looking website? Well it’s time to give it a go! Please consider this website as a window into our shop, a window showing you a choice selection of our favourite things. Do you want to know more about what else we might have? What we do? What our favourite biscuits are? Then get in touch!