Your first vintage.

[howdo3313]

That strat is gorgeous.
I just got this over Christmas.
Not a vintage to me.
But apparently there’s a market now.lol

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1-OoUr ... re896FqBv7

[bluenote23]

Back in 1986 I was making home recordings and wanted to add some guitar to my tracks. I tried borrowing an electric but that didn't work out so I figured I would buy one.

Stratocasters were 'in' at the time so I wanted one of those. I looked in the newspaper want ads (!!) and found someone selling a couple of 70s Stratocasters. So I took the underground and a couple of buses and ended up at this guy's house. He had this beat up, what he called a 71 ("I was there when the guitar player bought it!") and a new looking 77. The 77 was $50 cheaper than the beat up one but I wanted to get the oldest guitar I could afford so I bought the beat up one.

These were priced as used guitars so, in retrospect, I should have bought both but I had enough trouble scraping up the money just for one. It wasn't a 71 but a 1973 model.

The green one is a 57 AVRI which is the one I play the most.

[Surfysonic]

I'll paraphrase my "Buried Treasure" thread where I acquired my first vintage guitar:

Waaay back in 2014, I headed out on my monthly excursion to Atomic Music in Beltsville, Maryland, home of all used guitar and amp gear. I hadn't really needed another amp or guitar, but since I had some tax refund money, I'd thought it would be fun to have a look around. I played several different guitars and amps for fun. They had two very gnarly, poorly re-finished Fender Mustangs (listed on their eBay store as from early '70s). I tried both (one black one and a blue sparkle). The black one didn't play or sound as good as the blue sparkle Mustang, which played and sounded really great. The blue sparkle Mustang was fairly gross as it was sticky, likely due to being a smoker's guitar for decades.

So I decided to buy the blue one for $630. The store manager mentioned that he thought guitar might be a little older than what they listed it as. The SN on the neck played said 100727 - I definitely couldn't wait to do some research.

After consulting the Fender Mustang Story and entering the SN# in one of these online Fender databases, it said '65, but I couldn't wait to look at the stamp on the bottom of the neck.

Long story short, it turned out to be a '65 Fender Mustang with a Pat. Pending tremolo and clay dots on the fretboard. I originally thought the blue sparkle was a bad refin job, but after consulting with my guitar tech who does amazing refin work, said it was the original finish. We did a bit of Google research and discovered that the blue sparkle finish was on special order and promotional Fender guitars back in the '60s. Two very pristine models at the time were listed on eBay, one selling for $10,500 and the other for $9,000. I couldn't tell you if they ever sold, but after paying $630 for mine, at the time, I felt a little lightheaded. Realistically, I'd probably value mine around $2500 or so, maybe a little higher since Mustang prices seem to be going up lately. As I felt then and as I do now, I have no plans to ever put it up for sale unless some severe financial crisis forces me to.

The guitar had been "upgraded" with Sperzel lock tuners and a modern tort guard. I removed both and bought vintage '60s tuners and a vintage '65 pearloid guard, getting it back to stock as best I could. Pickups, thankfully, are original graybottoms.

















The '65 Fender Mustang whetted my appetite to go on a quest for a vintage '63 (birth year) Fender, evenutally resulting in my recent '63 Fender Jazzmaster and '63 Fender Jaguar acquisitions. I have picked up a few other vintage guitars as well: Gretsch Astro Jet body from '65 - '68 resulting in my surfy Astro Jet with TV Jones T-Armond pickups and Mastery bridge & tremolo. A very near future NBD will be about my recent '66 Mosrite Ventures bass and a recent trade deal for a '66 Fender Mustang (loaded body) to combine with a '66 Fender Mustang neck I bought off my guitar tech last year. I also got into vintage amps - I now have a '60 Fender Vibrasonic, a '62 Fender Bassman, a '67 Fender Showman, and a '64 Fender Reverb Unit.

[Mechanical Birds]

I'll paraphrase my "Buried Treasure" thread where I acquired my first vintage guitar:

Waaay back in 2014, I headed out on my monthly excursion to Atomic Music in Beltsville, Maryland, home of all used guitar and amp gear. I hadn't really needed another amp or guitar, but since I had some tax refund money, I'd thought it would be fun to have a look around. I played several different guitars and amps for fun. They had two very gnarly, poorly re-finished Fender Mustangs (listed on their eBay store as from early '70s). I tried both (one black one and a blue sparkle). The black one didn't play or sound as good as the blue sparkle Mustang, which played and sounded really great. The blue sparkle Mustang was fairly gross as it was sticky, likely due to being a smoker's guitar for decades.

So I decided to buy the blue one for $630. The store manager mentioned that he thought guitar might be a little older than what they listed it as. The SN on the neck played said 100727 - I definitely couldn't wait to do some research.

After consulting the Fender Mustang Story and entering the SN# in one of these online Fender databases, it said '65, but I couldn't wait to look at the stamp on the bottom of the neck.

Long story short, it turned out to be a '65 Fender Mustang with a Pat. Pending tremolo and clay dots on the fretboard. I originally thought the blue sparkle was a bad refin job, but after consulting with my guitar tech who does amazing refin work, said it was the original finish. We did a bit of Google research and discovered that the blue sparkle finish was on special order and promotional Fender guitars back in the '60s. Two very pristine models at the time were listed on eBay, one selling for $10,500 and the other for $9,000. I couldn't tell you if they ever sold, but after paying $630 for mine, at the time, I felt a little lightheaded. Realistically, I'd probably value mine around $2500 or so, maybe a little higher since Mustang prices seem to be going up lately. As I felt then and as I do now, I have no plans to ever put it up for sale unless some severe financial crisis forces me to.

The guitar had been "upgraded" with Sperzel lock tuners and a modern tort guard. I removed both and bought vintage '60s tuners and a vintage '65 pearloid guard, getting it back to stock as best I could. Pickups, thankfully, are original graybottoms.

















The '65 Fender Mustang whetted my appetite to go on a quest for a vintage '63 (birth year) Fender, evenutally resulting in my recent '63 Fender Jazzmaster and '63 Fender Jaguar acquisitions. I have picked up a few other vintage guitars as well: Gretsch Astro Jet body from '65 - '68 resulting in my surfy Astro Jet with TV Jones T-Armond pickups and Mastery bridge & tremolo. A very near future NBD will be about my recent '66 Mosrite Ventures bass and a recent trade deal for a '66 Fender Mustang (loaded body) to combine with a '66 Fender Mustang neck I bought off my guitar tech last year. I also got into vintage amps - I now have a '60 Fender Vibrasonic, a '62 Fender Bassman, a '67 Fender Showman, and a '64 Fender Reverb Unit.

This story makes me so happy. Atomic is my happy place, I’d give anything to be able to work there. I live in West Virginia and we have nothing even remotely close to that place so when I go to DC it’s always a special time getting to go there. They always treat us well and we always end up getting a great deal on something, but I’ve never gotten to run into any cool offsets there. They had a pretty wicked Coronado XII last summer that I got to play and it was great, but the coolest stuff I usually find in there are the amps. They sell a model T reissue for like $700 or the old Sunn solid states for $250 or so, you know, how they should be priced. They had a really cool probably one of a kind Tyrant Tone amp packed with 4 6550s for like $800. Didn’t have the cash at the time

[Surfysonic]

Cheers, Mechanical Birds! Yeah, I don't get out there as much as I'd like, but I do peruse their offerings via eBay at least once a week. My most recent trek to Atomic allowed me to trade in some gear that I didn't feel like throwing on Reverb (Fender Deluxe Reverb, Fender '63 Reissue Vibroverb (which was one of the first things I bought at Atomic a few years back, and some cheapie guitars). Trading in that gear allowed me to get the'62 Fender Bassman head and cab they had. The original speakers were shot, so until I get them re-coned, I bought a pair of new Jensen replacements - sounds wonderful.

[Kinx]

I started out on '62 Jolana Marina hollowbody, but that definitely wasn't considered vintage at the time it was passed to me by my dad and it was in very sorry shape - however I managed to learn some basics on that, even though it had strings about an inch above the frets and the pickups made it sound more like a man howling through a plastic tube than a electric guitar


My first "proper" vintage guitar was a '65 Vox Student Prince I bought in Toronto. I was originally going after an old 70s Ibanez ES137 copy, but I didn't like the way it sounded, so I started to play random stuff they've had in the store in my price range. I played the Student Prince as a last one and it blew me away! What I loved about it the most was the way it fed back on stage - I only had to tilt it a bit against the monitor to get awesome musical feedback, it was overall very controllable and I didn't had any trouble with it on stage, even though it's a full hollowbody and we play at sheer volumes. I eventually sold it to a friend of mine because I needed money for a hi end acoustic guitar at the time and I never really bonded with it.


right now I own heavily modded '65 mustang I bought in the states and '72 jazzmaster, which is stock aside from switch tip and staytrem bridge.

[Domm]

my first guitar was a vintage guitar! I join the many of you with mustang first vintage guitars! bought a 1964 mustang all original with orig hardshell case for $220 in 1992. finish was beat but everything else was good. funny thing was I was a drummer and could barely play guitar at all. it was a better guitar than my two bandmates had so they used it for years.

[BoringPostcards]

I don't have a photo, but my first instrument was a 60s Musicmaster Bass. Only other vintage I've owned so far were Harmonys and Kays.

EDIT: Love the stang posted above with teh G&L saddle lock bridge. Also, is that a Russian copy of Daydream Nation on the desk?

[howdo3313]

I kinda love that EVH'ified mustang too.
But that blue sparkle mustang. And that bassman.
Stunners:)

And that single pickup Vox is pretty wonderful too. They all are.

Did any of you have a parent that collected guitars? One of my friends in school did.
He was allowed to play an Ibanez LP custom, and an old musicmaster(might've been tan or stripped, memory's slipping).
If he touched any of the others there'd be hell to pay.lol
We got in trouble once for messing around with one of the others...I couldn't tell you which...just too long ago. Maybe a strat. Probably the old Black Beauty LP.

Anyway for his 16th birthday, his Dad gave him his first vintage.
A 68 sg custom in brown with gold hardware, and a lyre? trem(the long one with the etching on it). That guitar sat with me for a time. Not very long. Maybe 6 weeks-ish. I can't remember why. But whoa...that was my first time spending any time with an old Gibby. Quite a stunning guitar to play and listen to. I would've been 15 or 16 then.

[Surfysonic]

But that blue sparkle mustang. And that bassman.
Stunners:)

Cheers, howdo3313! Thanks!

[Kinx]

EDIT: Love the stang posted above with teh G&L saddle lock bridge. Also, is that a Russian copy of Daydream Nation on the desk?

thanks it is indeed. I bought it on a marketplace in Lviv, mainly because the artwork - record quality is below average, but I think that's because of the pressing quality.

I kinda love that EVH'ified mustang too.

thanks I have written more about that guitar in "why did you do this to me?" thread. Definitely one of my best sounding guitars.

[Plumerai]

65 JM w/ dots & binding via ebay. The price was rather low & when it arrived I found out why. What I thought would be stickers of the owner's initials that I can easily peel off were glued on, and what I thought was the glare of the camera flash turned out to be an attempt at creating a sunburst effect on a red finish. I believe the seller said it was originally white.

[Ursa Minor]

'75 or so Ibanez Les Paul Custom copy. Maple finish, maple board with black blocks and binding. Really sharp looking guitar. Got it at a pawn shop for next to nothing. At the time it was more like "the oldest guitar I had owned" rather than anything "vintage".

My first truly "vintage" guitar was a '66 B+B Jag I got via a member on here year ago. It was the one that started it all.

[PJazzmaster]

basically a copy/paste of "my story" from another thread ( sorry):
A Hagstrom Viking I from '65! For free - by the father of a drummer friend! I was 12 or 13, my friends father was a bit drunk that afternoon. The Guitar was not playable at that time and restoring such a guitar was not easy back then (basically before the internet). That guy's father was actually a tuba player who used to play guitar only for a couple of years in the late 60's. I guess he was even glad to get rid of that "broken" old guitar. A big chunk of fretboard binding was missing, the plasic knob inlays were gone, one "tailpiece stringholder claw" was broken off as well as one tuner missing. Restoration meant I had to give the guitar away for almost one year. The guy who restored it was the owner of the only local 2nd hand guitar and repair shop so basically the only chance. And yes, restoration also meant overspraying the back of the neck and parts of the headstock. I didn't ask for that but that's how it was (long before 'relic' was a thing) And actually I was really really happy because he did not ask much for making it playable again. The Hagstrom was much much better playing and feeling than my only other guitar which was a damn heavy non-vintage Hohner Stat copy. A few years after a got the Hagstrom restored I found a nice old Mustang as my first real Fender guitar.

[SaulBadman]

My first vintage guitar was actually my first electric, bought for me by my mom back in the early 80's. It was a Vox Spitfire. Probably a '66 with a vintage Pignose amp.

I didn't really appreciate the guitar very much at the time. It was sort of good enough to learn on, but not really what I wanted. I modified it to the point that by the time I got rid of it, it probably would have been really great in the "Why did you do it? Why did you do this thing to me?" thread.

I hadn't even thought about the Vox until recently. I still have the Pignose amp, but both the Vox and my mom are long gone and I miss both of them dearly.