I lined up for a couple of hours at Kurosawa Gakki in Shibuya on January 2 for their New Year's sale. There was a rare "Limited Edition" Greco from 1979 with a solid flametop and a cracked neck - only 42000 yen. I was number 6 in line and it turns out that number 3 was going for the Greco. Lucky for me as I ended up getting this lovely 1981 Tokai LS-80 goldtop as a consolation prize. In retrospect I think I may have gotten the better deal as the Greco was not that good looking and had a 3pc back and no Dry-Zs.
The Tokai came with original green-lined case, some Greco Grover-style tuners, newer Dimarzio DP103 pickups, chrome aluminum tailpiece and chrome ABR-style bridge. I ended up putting in a Tom Holmes H453 in the bridge and H450 in the neck, replacing the tuners with Gotohs and then replacing the tailpiece and bridge with all-parts nickel hardware.
With a nice fat neck and great sustain this LS-80 is one of the best LPs I have ever played. I ended up getting a new Nikon as well so here are a few shots through a D5300.
Great Peter Frampton concert from 2008 with Audley Freed on second fiddle! Go to the 54:30 second mark to see Audley give a good lesson on sparking up a solo slowly and then turning it up to 10....
Peter Frampton is one of those guys who don't get their due, and Audley Freed is another one.
The mystery V I purchased way back in September finally made its way to Singapore. It is a bit of a player's piece for sure with some good honest wear on the frets and the board but the neck is straight and fat which makes for a good flying V.
Mirrored pickguard
There are lots of bumps and dents on this one but it all looks like it belongs. I changed the radio knobs to the dish ones as I just like the look better.
Nicely aged hardware
Scream'in 1982 pickups under the hood.
The Scream'in 1982 measure around 7.6 k each and with the pickguard you have to keep them a bit lower than I would usually have humbuckers or the covers will come out of the pickguard. They sound pretty good as is and I think they will stay where they are.
Invisible tenon (under the paint?) and a nice rosewood slab board.
Fujigen used some nice woods on these 1982 Mint Collections. I'd guess the board is Indian Rosewood. No veneers here, you get a full slab board.
Hard to say what this model was supposed to be. I think Paul Stanley had a V with a mirrored guard so maybe that is what this is supposed to be.
Happy New Year everyone. Aoyama Oyaji spent the holidays in Japan as usual and had fun going around to some of the great music stores in Japan. Even if I didn't really find many interesting deals in the stores this time it is always great to go and visit some of the good people who work at Japanese music stores. Taku-san at Nico Nico Guitars, Akiyama-san at Studio102 and the great little vintage shop Nancy in Shibuya. Unfortunately Kishida-san wasn't there when I dropped by but I did pick up his CD Northern Song from 2014. I haven't listened to it yet but am sure it is up there with all his other stuff. Here is a YT video of Kishida-san from 2013 playing his 1959 burst "Jessica", previously owned by Dickey Betts who played it on the Allman Brothers "Brothers and Sisters" album.
One more from Kishida-san, playing one of my favourite ABB songs, "Jessica", on the Les Paul "Jessica".
I also popped into Shibuya Ishibashi today and chatted with Jason who does a stellar job in making it easy for non-Japanese people to shop for guitars at Ishibashi. He is also an amazing video producer and pointed me to the multi-cam GoPro video he did of Steve Vai in Tokyo. While I am not a big Steve Vai fan per se the video gave me a new appreciation of his playing and is just a cool piece of work from Jason.
It is time to go to sleep in Yokohama, but before I do I will check out some more of this video.
Happy New Year everyone, have a great 2015 and may your guitars never be left unplayed.
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