NGD! Vintage MIJ Epiphone Riviera

[Gordon]

I love ES333 and the likes because of that back access, but I admit this one is not the best...

[TruckstopChuckie]

I love ES333 and the likes because of that back access, but I admit this one is not the best...

The routing is smaller than on a 333, so it's possible to make this look sort of 'stock'.



Gotta say that this is maybe, visiually, the most appealing guitar I've had so far. It's so classy!

[Shadoweclipse13]

Gotta say that this is maybe, visiually, the most appealing guitar I've had so far. It's so classy!

Never underestimate the power of brown! Seriously underrated color in my opinion

[cbrown]

Never underestimate the power of brown!

[simonhpieman]

I'm SO into wooden guitars at the moment. Unless it's a burst LP I've never been into flame tops or anything, particularly if they have all those blues, greens and purples that aren't fundamentally natural colours, but seen as a guitar is made of wood you might as well show it off for what it is.

Not to hijack the thread but I've had the Hondo on the right for some time and LOVE the walnut 335 look, that's definitely my dream guitar at the moment and yours looks beautiful.

Also picked up my own MIJ Riviera a few weeks ago as you can see on the left. Natural is certainly a more scarce colour but I'd not even seen a walnut one when researching, great find! Note that mine was cheaper than a new Epi dot but needed those nasty holes filling and thanks to some open-chord Oasis wannabe the frets needed heavily dressing despite only the first 4 or 5 being in any way worn. The pickups are also out of phase and that's apparently difficult to remedy due to the wiring, according to the tech I had work on it.



Still, nice score, thanks for sharing!

[TruckstopChuckie]

Blonde 335's are cool! I almost grabbed a blonde Orville by Gibson ES335 Christmss eve. What year is that blond MIJ Riviera? I wouldn't mind the extra leftie-holes.

[Shadoweclipse13]

I wouldn't mind the extra leftie-holes.

Me neither!

[jimboyogi]

I wouldn't mind the extra leftie-holes.

Me neither!

Speed holes!

[simonhpieman]

Speed holes!

It's very difficult to know the year with these Epis as the serial numbers aren't documented anywhere. I bought it from a company who hires out gear for tours. A girl who worked in their office incorrectly listed it on eBay as an ES-339 pro and priced it more than accordingly (and I haggled her down some for the holes in the top and the dents in the frets). When I went in to try it out I asked them where it had come from or who might have used it and they said it just kind of showed up and no-one knew. Finding out how old it was definitely wasn't going to happen.

The best I can tell you is it's somewhere between around 1980 and 1984, I think. The lack of Frequensator tailpiece narrows it down to just a few years in the early 80s but that's about the best we can do these days.

[jimboyogi]

I've got a virtually identical Blonde (minus speed holes) that was sold to me as 1984 production. Awesome guitars.

OP, congratulations on your new Riviera. I think it looks most excellent in that brown stain. Also love the frequensator, these tailpieces do add a beautiful resonance, more than the standard trapeze IMO. Mine is like the Blonde above, with a stoptail. So even less behind the string resonance than a trapeze!

[22danielp]