EdwardMarlowe

(It'll be interesting to see if the final auction prices are similar or different to the given hammer prices here. Not quite sure how those work, are they start prices or reserves or something in between?)

Some nice stuff there, especially among the handful of lefties. The 15% buyer's premium up a few just enough to look a little less of a bargain than the hammer price, but yeah unless they charge very little for postage that could quickly eat the rest of the difference in price for buying a lot of the sub-£800 options new. Interesting to see nonetheless. A lot of the prices reinforce my long-held opinion that while a big brand name will definitely help sell something on the used market, proportionate to purchase price having an expensive American guitar alone won't guarantee that it retains more of its new value. Non-limited Gibsons seem to depreciate at about the same rate as Epiphones. My old American Standard Strat would notionally now, after thirty years, sell for more that I paid for it in terms of the figures, but once you adjust for inflation, I'd still only be realising about 60% of the purchase price in real terms. 

Were I local and had a bit of money to burn, there's a few things I'd be sniffing at there... the 74 Strat (always fancied one from my birth year). Those do actually seem to be gonig up in value beyond inflation - in the early 90s you could buy a 70s Strat or Tele for £300, while a pre-CBS Would be about £1500. Even adjusted for inflation ,both of those are far above that value in real terms now. The Godin Kingpin looks great in black (I'm seeing red and ivory pinstriping on that....). I'd love also to try one of those Hendrix Strats - I think that model was originally marketed as the Voodoo Vibe or something along those lines... Always fancied one because it was a left handed guitar sold strung right handed. Wouldn't be any work at all to have the nut flipped, another strap button added, and have it set-up as a lefty. The mirrored logo would look great in that context imo. 

On 02/07/2025 at 09:05, Crusoe said:

Have you ever thought of taking the Fusion to a guitar tech to set up? Maybe they can get the neck closer to the way you want it. I'm surprised that the AS53 doesn't stay in tune. I have an AS73 and it stays in tune pretty well - just the occasional slight tweak needed. I would imagine it has the same hardware as the AS53.

That's where I'd start. Seems a good idea to see if that one can be perfected first rather than going to the expense of another. Particularly given that buying from a brand with a traditional wholesale-retail business model is likely to end up with needing to pay about double what the HB cost to get something of an equivalent quality. 

On 21/07/2025 at 07:15, Kiwi said:

I use a Seymour Duncan 'semi' super switch, I can change position 3 from middle pickup to bridge and neck. 

This set-up (though whether SD provided the hardware I couldn't say) was on the MiM Jimmy Vaughn sig model Strat. five way with the middle position giving neck and bridge instead of the middle pickup. Tone pots were also rearranged, with the middle-tone pot redirected to the bridge instead. As memory serves, the other one remained on the neck alone per vintage spec (by the time of the American Standard from 1988 on, the version I have, Fender were wiring the first tone pot to cover neck and middle both, with the second pot being a passive TBX circuit designed to cut/boost bass / treble as directed, though habitually I've always kept mine in the middle-notched 'off' position....). Lovely, soft V neck on them too. I'd have bought one of those like a shot if they'd done them left handed, but of course no dice from Fender. 

I like the idea of a Gilmour switch. You can of course now buy a seven-way selector switch to add the extra two options without changing the guitar visually, though (aside from not needing to drill an extra hole in the guard and make sure you position the extra switch correctly to fit) I don't think it's any simpler an installation - just a question of preference. 

I'm intrigued by the idea of wiring a Strat as MV/MT with the third pot as a blender switch that sweeps across the pick-up settings, essentially doing what the five-way switch does with a sweep rather than in steps. I've not had the chance to try one, but I suspect (extrapolating conceptually from having a two-pickup P bass with two volume knobs and no selector switch) it would lead me to actually make more use of the different pick-ups for tonal selection. Then - partly in order to have the Neck  / Bridge option - I would hope I could have a regular (pre-77 style) Strat three way switch added to have 1=> standard (as per the sweep pot), 2=> add neck pickup to sweep pot position, 3=> mute all. I have no electrical skills so I don't know if this is possible, but I think that would be the dream if it was. In Custom Shop Dream World, I'd also have a version of this Strat with a three-saddle Telecaster bridge. As is, when the disposable income situation improved in a year orf two, I have my eye on a blue Player 2 that I'll be looking to have at least some of this idea put on. 

If and when HB bring out a vintage-specced guitar (SSS) to the standard of the ST Modern Plus, I plan to buy one and experiment with having the switch pulled for a three way, wire to give 1=> bridge and middle, 2=> bridge and neck 3=> neck and middle. Effectively the only two sounds I really have ever used on my old American Standard, plus the one sound that owning a Telecaster has always made me wish a Strat had. 

In the process of putting together some pedals for a small board purely to provide an alternative to an amp (not an effects board in the traditional sense, I'll do that separately). The plan currently is to have my Joyo American Sound preamp pedal into a reverb pedal, into an A/B box that splits the signal to have the option of either gonig into my Mooer Baby Bomb power amp pedal, or a headphone amp pedal. Probably will put a rive pedal of some sort ahead of the Joyo as well. 

Question is, would there be any benefit to adding a speaker emulation pedal right before the headphone amp pedal? I won't be doing any recording at all with this, purely for having the option of a small board (likely in the region of 10"x12" or so) that I can take anywhere and use with just a guitar for personal playing, or plug into a speaker if needsbe (the Baby Bomb is rated for 30watts). An alternative to an amp on the move, or when I want headphone practice at home. Considering then acquiring one of those Vintage branded 1 x 10s to go with it as well (I have an old 2 x12" already, but I suspect that might get a bit too loud for the flat). 

14 hours ago, Kiwi said:

Trademarks don't require 'use' because they are validated through rights assigned at registration.  They have to be renewed periodically though and trademarking ideally should be enforced too, in order to safe guard against applications to cancel (due to lack of enforcement action).  Unlike patents, trademarks can exist in perpetuity so long as they are renewed.

If that's how it runs in the US ,they'll have an easier rime of it them. Here in the UK (and I think it's similar across most of Europe), Behringer would be able to apply to have a registered mark revoked if it has not been in use for a period of five years - which is the case with the Centaur. A non-registered mark relies on goodwill / with whom the public would associate the mark in a passing off action, though I'd be very surprised if a UK court was prepared to protect an unregistered mark that hadn't been in use for so long. It'll be interesting to see how this pans out in the US. The general information I've seen is that US courts will still want usage as part of a valid TM (lack of use can undermine the validity of even a registered mark), but it'll be interesting to see if it ends up in court. Either way, both parties have clearly gained a lot of publicity in this whole affair; it'll be interesting to see if it goes all the way or just peters out. 

On 25/07/2025 at 01:54, Kiwi said:

This might be the crux of Behringers defence.  If Klon haven't been selling them and making profit, Behringer might say how can Klon claim damages when they haven't been losing money...and the Behringer circuit is in all likelihood an emulation rather than a copy knowing that timbre can't really be copyrighted or trademarked.

 

In the PRS vs Gibson battle, Gibson's case hinged on there being the potential for confusion between the PRS single cut and Gibson LPs which didn't really stand up to the scrutiny that was eventually applied.  Klon's lawyers may come back and say 'copyright or trademark infringement' based on the potential for confusion (depending on what is actually registered as a trademark)

Or get a Digitech Bad Monkey :lol:

Yeah I went there.

I'm not up on US tm law, but across UK and rest of Europe, a tm is only valid if in use... It'll be interesting to see how it shakes down in the courts. 

https://www.guitarworld.com/music-industry/john-hornby-skewes-to-dissolve

Big news. I hope somebody can at least save some of the brands. Vintage deserves to live on. As would Fret King if they'd do left handers... 

Now I'm having lunatic ideas avout seeking out the "new" version. Ironically I might never have gotten round to it had the lawsuit not happened... 

So... My Thomann box arrived a couple of weeks ago. Got around to opening it today. And looky what we have here... 

On 26/06/2025 at 13:33, ezbass said:

I bet that very subtle change in the graphics really pisses Klon off, which makes me smile.  

I should think so. It appears from what the original designer has said that the fairly accurate reproduction of the look of the original in the first version, plus the lack of the Behringer logo what what pushed them to sue over that one rather than the million and one Klones on the market. I mean, I can see their point, but it really does seem petty when they've not put the original out since 2008. It seems an awful lot of expense to go to over a product they haven't offered in the guts of two decades.... 

I have a feeling we've not seen the last of this. Behringer seem to be pretty confident, though, given they're playing the game this way. 

The Klon original team's claims about quality interest me... in truth, having tried effects pedals at all sorts of levels, I've never found a genuinely significant quality difference between pedals once you spend enough to guarantee physical durability. Sure, a difference in *sound* in some cases, but whether that's *better* is subjective. I often find I prefer a much cheaper pedal due to the simplicity off the design: most of the time I'm buying a pedal for a specific sound, and I don't need a million variations built in...

20 hours ago, KingBollock said:

I think Behringer just got a little too close to the original design. I am very much a fan of Behringer, by the way.

 

I ordered mine from Anderton’s, as it was the only place that had them in stock,  two days before the lawsuit was announced.

 

I told my wife that they would start being worth more because of the lawsuit, and the lack of stock in many places (Anderton’s were the only ones that had them in stock and not back order) but that was to justify buying it… I had no idea that the prices really were going up. Maybe I should have ordered two? I certainly won’t be selling mine, it’s a  excellent pedal.

I suppose, what I could do, is build my own (which had always been the plan before the Behringer came out and all the massively positive reviews for it), and if it’s close enough, I could sell the Behringer.

It's fascinating how commonly cloned the Klon is, down to its legendary status. Any number of them out there, really. I got an email in yesterday telling me my pedal from Thomann is now on the way - we'll see if it's the original version or something new. I kinda wish I had ordered a few now! 

According to online reports, this is the new version (which may be what I'll receive): 

https://guitarbomb.com/behringer-rebrands-klon-clone-centara-overdrive/

Same housing, slight change of name and logo. 

It strikes me with some amusement that if this doesn't settle the lawsuit, this could become an even rarer version (maybe we should bot order more of them.... if I had an original couple of Klons now, I'd be selling them to buy a Gretsch!). 

Legalities aside, it still feels to me that Klon are taking the piss suing over an albeit very close lookalike of a pedal they've declined to put on the market for seventeen odd years....

Wouldn't surprise me. The older I get, the more I realise 99% of the electric guitar market is about selling branding an intangibles far over the actual, physical product. It does seem to vary by location, though: players in the US on average still seem to be much more likely to be emotionally invested in the idea that a guitar made in the USA *must* be superior, or is somehow otherwise "the real thing". Which I suppose shouldn't be surprising given that's where the electric guitar boom started, and so there's a sense of "loss" that those aren't dominant in the market any longer - as opposed to being "only" another import product as they are for us in the UK. 

So, as you're doubtless aware, the people behind the original Klon Centaur:

are suing Behringer, for the Behringer Centaur:

It's going to be interesting seeing how this pans out. I think they'll win - or Behringer will back down - change the name and colour. Most legal cases settle before they get close to court. This one is interesting because the Klon hasn't been in production since 2008. They now routinely sell for four to five grand when they do come up for sale, hence the vast army of Klon clones that have been on the market for a long time. The Behringer pedal is just the very latest version of this, albeit  - depending on opinion - blatantly or just more honestly a knock off of the original. I'm not entirely sold on the ethics of this lawsuit, given it's a product that has been unavailable for so long, and they appear to have no intention to bring it back into production. But it is what it is. The intriguing knock-on is what it has done to the second hand market for the Behringer pedals, which are now all over ebay for £500 and upwards. 

Full disclosure, the lawsuit announcement a couple of weeks ago finally prompted me to get around to ordering my own Behringer Centaur from Thomann. It was on back order, and has now shipped today, so it's going to be interesting to see what I get. Will it be the original knock-off style, or a new, altered version? TBH, if I was sure it was the original, at the prices they're now going for used, I'd have ordered half a dozen and sold most of them on... Could have funded a very nice new guitar that way! Eh, well. 

Welcome to the era of Lawsuit pedals!

On 26/09/2022 at 14:16, police squad said:

I didn't even know they did a Paisley JV. Excellent. Gotta be worth £1500 I would say, maybe more

Sounds a good ballpark to me. I remember when you could buy one for about £400. In those days a new MIJ was about £300, and a 70s US model went for about £300. Time change! 

Squiers in general seem to vary a lot in value as popular notions about certain series ebb and flow; I remember a time when you couldn't give a used Korean Squier away, now certain series like the ProTone are selling for £400 and up, similar money to their MiM Fender contemporaries. You do see a lot of 80s MiJ Squiers with some overly optimistic prices, but anything with a genuine JV series number tends to sell well, constantly. *Especially* these early Squier Series ones, which really were what evolved into MIJ Fender, with the Squier brand being later applied to a lower price-point guitar. The Paisley is definitely a rare birdy. I remember it being considered deeply uncool for a long time, even after James Burton's US built signature model came out. The popular view has really come around to it now, same as happened with Antigua burst. Be interesting to see if this happens with the Blue Floral (which was a contemporary of the original pink paisley Fenders, though I don't think it ever made it across to the Squier range). 

The guitarplayer that made me want to learn was Marty McFly, guesting with Marvin Berry and the Starlighters, playing Johnny B Goode. True story! 

When I actually started playing a few years later, though, I started on acoustic and had recently discovered Dylan (yeah - Bob Dylan turned me acoustic, there's a definite irony in there!), and so that impact the way I play Still does thirty years later - I'm not much in the habit of fooling around with different pickup selections on any one guitar or even using the tone knob much. Just find the sound I like best and then vary that by how I hit it... 

Mick and Steve Jones with their respective bands had a big influence when I looked back at their influences, which led me variously to early Alice Cooper (so much better than the Trash era!), early 70s Bowie, and old rockabilly. now, though I can't yet sound anything like them, the guitarists I'm most love to sound like and who influence my guitar thinking, at least, are people like Link Wray (who is a huge influence on my liking for oddball guitars, even if most of mine are fairly conventional due to the limits of being a left hander), Joe Moretti (especially on Brand New Cadlliac - that's the Mick Jones influence once removed), the Johnny Burnette Trio, and - full circle - Chuck Berry. Of those, I only had the privilege of seeing Chuck Berry live, but the recordings are immortal. 

This Vox is a *close* but just slightly too big for carry-on for me - the symmetrical body could be flipped left handed, though the controls would still be in the way: 

https://www.voxamps.co.uk/products/sdc1

Good body shape, though. And I like the idea of it being ready to play when I pop the case. I'm leery of the reliability of anything folding and affordable, and once you get into having to reattached and retune necks after travel, it starts to be a lot of hassle for something where I just want a grab and go that might get lifted for a few minutes here and there in a hotel room on a week long worktrip. 

I often looked at the Traveler range, https://travelerguitar.com Ugly AF, BUT that's offset by practicality. Years ago, I bought a Steinberger Spirit for using as a travel option. Wouldn't have been my first choice. HSH is just about everything I hate in a guitar set up, but that was the only left handed model they did. It's an ugly guitar, but I really came to appreciate the cleverness of the design. The neck being full scale is a huge plus as that makes it feel like a 'real' guitar. But then they clamped down on sizes of hand luggage for all airlines, and it was just too big. It's largely collected dust ever since, and I should sell it on. It's one of the GU style that have a body shaped like a guitar rather than a paddle, from the Music Yo era. One of only two I've ever seen in the UK, as MY never officially sold here, and the then UK distributor didn't take any of the left handed options. 

I've considered other options over the years. Basically for a carry-on item, best as I can make out it now needs to be no bigger than a violin. I think the Traveler guitars are fractionally too big, and I wouldn't carry an instrument if I risked being told it was going in the hold. I would very much welcome an option ,though, as currently I'm reduced to taking a harmonic with me when I travel, and my harmonica playing is *even* *worse* than my guitar... 

The killer app for me, I think, would be something sized closer to a Ukelele, that was either six or 12 string and tuned like a guitar. Brandoni used to make 12 string electric Mandolins which were, essentially, a guitar neck that was tuned to and played like a regular guitar with a capo on the 12th fret. Something like that the right size - even a six string -  would appeal as it could have a purpose when not travelling as well. Not trying to make it a full-neck guitar would mean you could avoid odd scale lengths and have it be something with its own character but which feels like a guitar. A solid body ukelele seems like a good solution for a travel item, but it's also a whole new tuning, set-up, chord pattern thing. Shorter learning curve for a guitar player, but still not quite a grab and go. 


Might also help justify the money to have something that is just different enough to provide something else at home too... As well as concerns about being hand-baggage sized, the Traveler is just expensive enough that I might think twice about taking it on holiday in case of loss or damage, plus its' not something I would lift to play in the house as an alternative to one of my other guitars. 

So... Maybe a six-string, solid body Ukulele which has a much beefier neck that feels like the top ten frets of a Strat and tunes an octave up from a regular guitar? Bolt on neck, one single coil pickup in the neck position. Or, better:  a bottle-top style bugmount** that came with it would be grand by me as long as it was a reliable sound. That would also save significantly on production costs, as it would mean no need to rout the body for pickups or wiring, just give it a decent fixed bridge, something like a Junior style wraparound, though the fully adjustable Wilkinson style. And cut the body to a symmetrical shape. That way you don't need to have a separate left handed version for those of us that need that...   If somebody could produce something like that than came in under £200, and for which I could also buy a hard case that was smaller than 55cm x 40cm x 20cm would be the killer app. Chosen those dimensions specifically because a] that's the max size for cabin baggage in Ryanair, the stingiest of all airlines (I'd rather swim, personally, but they're a good guide as to what the extremes are here). 


** This sort of thing, though there are a lot of them on the market. https://www.webemusic.com/products/The-Original-Bottle-Cap-Guitar-Pick-Up-18336.html

Eeps. Be interesting to hear what it sounded like.... if he'd played it anyhow and it had sounded good, the web wold be full or people arguing about how best to melt the wax in your pickups, and what tonal difference it made to do it with them still in the guitar, whether to let the wax stay on the sound board because mojo tonez....

On 27/05/2025 at 14:27, ezbass said:

That looks great. Gordon Smith make superb guitars; I owned a single pickup Gypsy many moons ago, an absolute Gibson Junior killer.

They really are great. It's a shame they shot up in price when the business changed hands, though I gather they have upped the detail in the finishing process and as instruments they remain as great as they always were. I believe they still have the secret process by which they make maple, one-piece necks with no skunkstripe. 

On 23/01/2025 at 17:39, knirirr said:

I wonder how much Fender's digital modelling versions of their valve amps will catch on. Those were quite tempting but more expensive and I'm also not sure about the repair situation.

On the amateur jazz scene all I'd need would be a simple amp (ideally 12" speaker(s)) with volume, tone and reverb controls. There's no need for effects and I'm very unlikely to encounter a PA in the rural pubs where I get to play.

 

They seem to be doing well enough to stay in production. They're not going to fly out the door as a cheap alternative - there's very little price difference. But I wouldn't be entirely surprised if they did start to catch on more broadly. It'll be interesting. I suspect there are a lot more ofc them out there being used on the road than we're aware of. You know the drill - established acts / operations who've had enough of the weight / hassle of a tube amp on tour, these look close enough the average punter isn't gonig to notice.... (on some scenes, the look is as important as the sound. I've seen acts get dismissed on certain scenes for not having the right look - can be especially so on the rockabilly scene where a lot of acts put out vinyl because some of their fanbase won't buy CDs). Younger kids now seem to have come up with a range of new bands that have gone beyond the "tube good, else bad" mindset, so we'll see what they go for.

If that's amps at all, that is. We've speculated on this elsewhere on this site as well, but it's not unthinkable that amps as we know them could be out-evolved by alternatives. PAs now are better and cheaper than ever before. The old, macho idea of The Big Amp comes from the days hen you needed that be heard and PAS weren't great. That's no longer the case. I've seen a number of acts recently who used pedal format pre and power amps on footboards, and plugged right into the PA. In the West End musicals in London, a lot of the guitar players have been using stuff like Line 6 Pods for years (when Buddy was last in town, they had empty cabs out front for the look, and were all hooked up to Line 6 pods out of sight). Maybe if younger bands and their audiences get past certain visual expectations, we'll see bands arrive with pedalboards under their arms, and set-up / tear down becoming vastly quicker for everyone. If it still sounds great, I'm not at all opposed to it. My own next move no is, I think, gonig to be a small pedal board with pedals for reverb, gain, preamp, into an A/B box that leads to a headphone pedal amp and a Mooer Baby Bomb preamp. Thinking of tying one of those tweed JHS Vintage 1x12" cabs at about £100 with that, could end up being a solid rig for me as a home player. In the unlikely event I ever played out again, the cab could then go or not depending on availability of monitors. I could see that becoming a norm. The tech is already there - it just needs to convince guitar players who have a tendency to luddism. 

Gordon Smith, although better known for their Gibson types, also do a very nice Tele - https://www.gordonsmithguitars.com/shop/stock-guitars/blaggards/ 

TBH, though, I'm not sure that's how I would go. Clearly you're not looking for a more affordable alternative to Fender's US or CS ranges if you're thinking of spending that sort of custom money anyhow. Now, this is only a personal opinion, but.... for me it would depend a lot on what you want. A tele is such a utilitarian design that if what you want is the standard set-up Tele, it seems to me madness to spend custom-built money on it. If that's the only way - you want something really offbeat like the Jack White signature, or a Trussant Steelcaster, or you have an original 52 that you want to clone so you can leave the vintage piece at home and play a facsimilie out.... then, sure. But if what you want is "just" a Tele, it seems to be it's hard to justify spending vast sums on it.... I'd buy whatever MIM / Tokai / whatever you like and maybe rewired if you want, or track down a CIJ Fender that's good to go as is. (IMO, the top end Japanese Fenders are as good as anything form the US, typically wired the same with the same specs, and usually cheaper - nut much harder to find.) Unless you want something that's just not available otherwise, imo having a custom built Tele is a bit like having a Saville Row tailor copy a pair of 501s for you. They'll be an exquisite example, but.... 

Lovely job on that. You clearly had the patience to go gently with the clean-up, especially on the headstock, and it has paid dividends. 

The 6xxx 'Professional' series are the dream, but they're also crazy money. If the big lotter win came in, of course, I'd tart with a White Falcon, a trad 6120 and maybe of the Brian Setzer Hot Rod types... 

More realistically, the 5xxx series are great guitars, and fully, imo, capture the spirit of the Gretsch sound. The 2xxx series are nice if, imo, a little more generic in sound. That of course will appeal to some folks if they want something that's a more mainstream sound. If you wanted something that you already new you'd be rewiring and changing pickups in, I'd go for a nice, used 2xxx.