BDNGD - Belated double new guitar day. Melody maker and 70's Flying Vs!

For guitars of the straight waisted variety (or reverse offset).
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Larry Mal
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Re: BDNGD - Belated double new guitar day. Indulge me with some guesses?

Post by Larry Mal » Sat Oct 01, 2022 1:07 pm

It's a Gibson something or other, everyone. That much is clear.

I would not think Mike would want a 330 since he didn't love the 335's form factor.
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Re: BDNGD - Belated double new guitar day. Indulge me with some guesses?

Post by Embenny » Sat Oct 01, 2022 1:21 pm

Larry Mal wrote:
Sat Oct 01, 2022 11:39 am
Gibson ES-339?

I don't know. You seem to be saying it's another V, but that would seem a little odd. You wouldn't buy a Les Paul. You have an SG and a V. You had a Firebird and ES-335 and sold those...

You love Gibson guitars, is what I'm realizing. I wonder if you have more than Fenders at this point.
It is a little odd, which is why I spent a year trying to "pick one." I can't. And yes, I suppose I do really love Gibsons at this point. They're not outnumbering Fenders yet, but they've multiplied.
Flurko wrote:
Sat Oct 01, 2022 11:35 am
'58 style flying V, even if IIRC you didn't like them as much ? Or just a standard V.
Not a '58, but yeah. They're totally Flying Vs.

The first one I found was the black '67 style. Love it. Totally unexpected.

So I started to be open to trying more. And I happened across this Melody Maker Flying V:

Image

It's got a maple body and baked maple fretboard with a mahogany neck. The whole body is slightly scaled down - thinner, but also a bit narrower and shorter than a standard Flying V.

It's got a nice, chunky neck and the whole thing is finished in a satin nitro that wears quite quickly. It's practically weightless. It's my first one-pickup guitar, and came with a bright but high-output pickup in the bridge. I pulled the six screws to make it more P90-ish, and that's when I realized it's a keeper. I'm going to try dropping the Creamery WRHB-style Baby '71 into it that I pulled from a PRS I got in a previous trade (and moved on, after putting the stock pickups back in), and I'll pick up a proper wraparound bridge for it at some point (for better intonation, and probably a locking one to eliminate the bridge lean).

They were only made for one year (2011) and aren't highly sought-after, and it's honestly such a nice and fun guitar that I kept getting cold feet every time I thought about selling it. The neck is thicker than my other Vs, and it practically floats away like a helium balloon but somehow isn't neck heavy. I kept thinking about how I couldn't find a nicer guitar for the money I might make if I sold it, and I finally realized that that means it's a keeper. It's a lightweight US-made Gibson with a nitro finish that I got thrown in to a trade for Squier money...what's not to love about that?

On the other end of the spectrum, I received another V as part of a trade, and told myself I had to choose between it and my black one. The reality is that letting either go would pain me, and I once again found myself asking the question, "What could I find that I like more than this for the same money?"

It's a 2020 "70's" Flying V, though none of the features actually line up with the 70's Vs. It's just a '67 V with neck binding, and they threw on some pickup rings to make it look more like James Hetfield's V (which was a '70s model, but was a knockoff and not a Gibson).

I just discovered that I don't have any photos on my computer of it, so here's a stock one:

Image

I think I've gone on about how much I love the feel of bound Gibson necks, and I know Larry's voiced a hypothesis that Gibson basically tries harder on any model with binding, and they seem to play better than the lower end models without.

Well, that was exactly the case with this one. The neck is absolutely divine, and it came to me in mint condition with the intense vanilla "new Gibson" smell intact. The guy who traded it to me also had a nice bone nut cut for it, which is a weak point on seemingly any Gibson with strings that exit the nut at an angle. The new nut is perfect, and it plays like an absolute dream.

The thing is, it's got a very "warm, fat Gibson" feel to it acoustically, while my black V is unusually snappy feeling. The net result is that the black on feels closer to my Fenders as I play it, and the white one feels a lot more like the 335 I had (or the couple of Les Pauls that have transiently passed through my collection).

Like the black one, the pickups are too hot for my taste, and the white-on-off-white looks aren't to my taste either. I kept trying to convince myself to sell or trade it for those reasons - not loving its looks and knowing I'd need to at least swap the pickups to be happy with it. But I keep finding myself playing it even in its stock configuration, and it's such an exceptional player that I realized I can't let it go. It's the best-playing Gibson I've yet to encounter, and when you have a guitar that feels that inspiring to play, I've learned that you don't look a gift horse in the mouth and just keep it.

So, to celebrate its transition to "keeper," I've gone and ordered a black pickguard and truss rod cover to rid myself of its Hetfield impression it's doing. I've got two sets of nice alnico-poled humbuckers on hand (D'Urbano Big Birds and Fralin Twangmasters) to try in the two Vs, and haven't decided which to put in this vs the black one, but they're both covered so the idea is for it to end up looking kinda like this:

Image

And thus concludes my baring of my dirty, Flying V-loving soul. I have three of them now. I would not have seen this coming a couple of years ago. But a great weight has been lifted, admitting how much I love them. I've kinda been hiding these two, trying to convince myself that they're just trade fodder passing through. But I really think both are going to stick. The odds of finding a guitar that plays better than the 70's V are near-zero, and the odds of finding a more fun guitar than the Melody Maker for the money are similarly low.
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Larry Mal
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Re: BDNGD - Belated double new guitar day. Melody maker and 70's Flying Vs!

Post by Larry Mal » Sat Oct 01, 2022 1:57 pm

Hey, there you go! I had a Les Paul kind of shaped Melody Maker from the run just before that series, where they went with humbuckers instead of the single coils and made them in other classic shapes, like that V type guitar you have there.

I don't know how you like that humbucker on there, frankly probably not a lot, but I can guarantee you like it more than I ever did that single coil. I thought it would sound kind of like a Fender, and that's when I realized that there's more to pickups than just the form factor. It sounded terrible.

You could get those guitars like what you have for $150 if you looked hard enough right when they were first showing up used, I was going to buy a bunch of them. As it is I turned the Melody Maker into an open C dedicated guitar. I later sold it.

Very thick neck on mine. I couldn't really get on with it all that much. They didn't roll the fingerboard edges or anything, it felt kind of raw.

So, I may not be right about them caring more about the guitars with bound necks, but I'm sure you can tell based on that Melody Maker V and your other upscale one that Gibson is absolutely in control of what the playing experience of their guitars is going to be, and they make very sure that the more expensive guitars play better than the lesser ones do.

Not that the lesser ones are bad or anything, it's just that Gibson makes the higher end guitars really excel.

Which what your 70's V looks like. And your mods make it look a lot better, also.

Congrats! I mean you're a weird Gibson Flying V guy now but if you can live with it I can live with it.
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Re: BDNGD - Belated double new guitar day. Melody maker and 70's Flying Vs!

Post by Embenny » Sat Oct 01, 2022 2:22 pm

Hah, thanks.

And yeah, the melody maker definitely feels "unrefined" compared to the black '67, and downright rough compared to the bound 70's V. But the thick neck makes it feel more like an Esquire to me, and fits the whole one-pickup vibe well. I like chunky necks though, and my other Vs are quite slim, so the massive contrast in feel and specs is the whole point of keeping it. If it had two pickups, a stop tailpiece and a slim neck, it would just be an inferior version of what I already have. There's really nothing in common with its big siblings when you close your eyes while playing. It's easily the most expendable of the three, but they still don't fetch much on the used market, even if they've climbed massively from their low 10 years ago. Some day, if I manage to part with every guitar I "don't need," it might end up on the chopping block again, but it's so fun to play that it's made its way to the bottom of that list.

I've heard about those older melody maker single coils, and it sounds like they're essentially just a single PAF bobbin, so they're like a weird, massively underwound version of the import ceramic strat pickups people generally don't like to begin with. It's like someone said, "Hey, you know how everybody complains about how lame most humbuckers sound when coil split? What if we made a guitar where that was the only tone available on the guitar? It'll be the worst of all worlds - the noise of a single coil, and the anemic tone of a split humbucker. But we'll save a few bucks per guitar compared to winding or buying full-fledged single coils!"

This humbucker is actually the "Duncan Designed" equivalent of the Duncan Distortion. It's ok for what it is, but I'm not here to play thrash metal on my V. I'm thinking of changing it to a stacked tone and volume control when I try out the Baby '71, or a spin-a-split, depending on whether I want to be able to take it in a darker or brighter direction.

The white V is basically the type of guitar that proves how good Gibson can be when they get their shit together. I'm excited to get some nice pickups into it when the new pickguard arrives. It's the type of guitar that new songs seem to just spring from. Like, I pick it up, grumble to myself about how muddy the 16k (!!) pickups are, and then all of a sudden it's two hours later and I've written something new. I bet it's going to monopolize a lot of my time if I find the right set of pickups. I'm thinking I might try the Twangmasters in it first, since it's so warm acoustically. I don't think it'll end up sounding Fendery at all, but it'll definitely have the clarity it's currently missing. The snappier black one might get the Big Birds. Or it might become a gametime decision. I flip flop a lot, so the real test will be to just try one way or the other and see if they flatter the guitars. It's easy enough to swap them at that point.
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Re: BDNGD - Belated double new guitar day. Melody maker and 70's Flying Vs!

Post by Surfysonic » Sat Oct 01, 2022 4:26 pm

Congrats and enjoy, Mike! 8)
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Re: BDNGD - Belated double new guitar day. Melody maker and 70's Flying Vs!

Post by Embenny » Sun Oct 02, 2022 12:21 pm

Surfysonic wrote:
Sat Oct 01, 2022 4:26 pm
Congrats and enjoy, Mike! 8)
Thanks!
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Re: BDNGD - Belated double new guitar day. Melody maker and 70's Flying Vs!

Post by BoringPostcards » Sun Oct 02, 2022 12:31 pm

Nice guitars. Enjoy in good health!
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Re: BDNGD - Belated double new guitar day. Melody maker and 70's Flying Vs!

Post by Bradley-Jazz » Mon Oct 03, 2022 5:19 am

They look great!

I find that Melody Maker strangely compelling - it just looks like loads of fun.

By the way, I put a Faber locking stop tail on my Les Paul Special to sort the tilt, which it did very well, but didn't go for any compensation - just embraced the simplicity.
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Re: BDNGD - Belated double new guitar day. Melody maker and 70's Flying Vs!

Post by LVC » Mon Oct 03, 2022 6:49 am

Bradley-Jazz wrote:
Mon Oct 03, 2022 5:19 am
I find that Melody Maker strangely compelling - it just looks like loads of fun
There's something about the slightly off body specs and non-traditional pickguard shape that give off Squier '51 vibes.
Makes me want to pick up a MM Explorer and mod the hell out of it just for fun.
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Re: BDNGD - Belated double new guitar day. Melody maker and 70's Flying Vs!

Post by Embenny » Mon Oct 03, 2022 9:34 am

BoringPostcards wrote:
Sun Oct 02, 2022 12:31 pm
Nice guitars. Enjoy in good health!
Thank you kindly :)
Bradley-Jazz wrote:
Mon Oct 03, 2022 5:19 am
They look great!

I find that Melody Maker strangely compelling - it just looks like loads of fun.

By the way, I put a Faber locking stop tail on my Les Paul Special to sort the tilt, which it did very well, but didn't go for any compensation - just embraced the simplicity.
That's exactly how I feel about it. Despite having my misgivings about its looks (namely the weird, tiny pickguard), I'm glad I gave it a chance. It's just so light and so simple that it's a blast to play.

I haven't made any decisions yet regarding the bridge, but I'll keep the non-adjustable style in mind. It's pretty usable as-is, but I figure if I'm spending money on it, I might as well get it perfect. But leaning into simplicity might be worthwhile too.

I'm currently juggling pickups between guitars, so I'm not 100% sure what I'll try in it next. It deserves a nice pickup though.
LVC wrote:
Mon Oct 03, 2022 6:49 am
There's something about the slightly off body specs and non-traditional pickguard shape that give off Squier '51 vibes.
Makes me want to pick up a MM Explorer and mod the hell out of it just for fun.
I didn't expect the altered shape to be a positive, but it totally is. Light as a feather, super resonant. If you find an Explorer for a decent price, you should absolutely grab it. The prices are climbing online, but local deals can be a different story. They can often be in pretty rough shape cosmetically, since the thin finish wears very easily. Mine was in surprisingly nice shape. Probably wasn't played as much as some. It came with an absolutely horrid setup, so I think the owner just didn't know how to adjust a wraparound bridge.
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