NaMM: the best gear from this year’s show
It’s the biggest show on Earth, as far as guitar gear goes – a deafening, disorienting circus of all that is new in music technology. In the following pages, you’ll find our pick of the most tone worthy new arrivals. Be warned – GAS lies ahead...
ELECTRICS 1 CHAPMAN BRITISH STANDARD SERIES Approx. £3,500
Chapman announced the new British Standard Series of UK made guitars “beautifully handcrafted boutique instruments of an exceptional standard made by a very small team of highly experienced luthiers in a small British workshop,” they tell us. Four prototype models were unveiled at the show: the ML1 Modern in Vadar, ML2 Modern in Sapphire, ML3 Traditional in Ruby and Ghost Fret in Dragon Skin.
“This new line will be made one at a time, by hand, in extremely limited numbers and all will feature premium hardware, woods and electronics and they will also be nitrocellulose-finished,” added Chapman Guitars MD, Matt Hornby. We’ve ordered ours already!
2 DANELECTRO 59XT £TBA
The good people at Danelectro must be smirking to themselves when they see (yet) another brand from the past resurrected. As Dano has found, once you’ve exhausted past glories, whaddya do? For this year Dano’s melting pot has produced the XT, based on their classic double cut platform but with an offset P90-style single coil at neck and a dual lipstick humbucker (also offset) at the bridge available with either a Wilkinson VS series vibrato (the 59XT) or Badass-style adjustable wrapover (the 59X). Add a bit of semi-solid offset Mosrite flavor, with the same pickups and vibrato, and we get the new 66T that’s also available in a longer scale baritone version – but still with the Wilkinson vibrato. Once upon a time, of course, the Wilkinson VS-100 was the state of the art modern vibrato; now it’s ‘retro’. How times change, eh?
3 D’ANGELICO SOLIDBODIES £TBA
Mixing it up with new designs is definitely a theme for this year as illustrated by D’Angelico’s new Premier and Deluxe Series solidbodies: the Bedford, Atlantic
and Ludlow – the Premier series adding a Grateful Dead Bedford too. While that guitar adopts an offset outline with HS pickup configuration, the Atlantic goes for a more Les Paul-style single-cut vibe with dual humbuckers and four controls. The Ludlow? Again twin humbucking with four controls, a Strat-style vibrato and a body shape that looks like it was designed by St Vincent’s dad.
Check out too the new Premiere Series DC 12-string, the first 12-string to be offered by D’Angelico, based on the semi-hollow, ES-335-style standard DC.
4 EASTMAN 2018 SB59/V GB £1,999
While boutique brands abound in the current climate, Eastman illustrate how that mindset can be made affordable and in China. The big news here is the tie up with Jason Lollar – “We are the only ‘chosen’ ones outside of the USA,” beamed Eastman’s designer, Pepijn‘t Hart – to provide pickups on the brand’s latest electric models including a custom-wound Imperial. “It’s a proprietary design made specially for Eastman,” says Jason. “It has the tone you would expect from a vintage humbucker with a smoother attack with clarity so you can easily hear the beating when you play close intervals. They have a woody and natural sound that complements the guitar’s design and construction.”
And along with improved electronics there’s a new Antique Goldburst ’burst finish in the Antique Series augmenting the existing Amber and Classic hues. “We spray a ’burst top in nitrocellulose, then antique the instrument and then finish with a handrubbed clear violin varnish.” It’s on the new 2018 SB59/v (£1,999) single-cut with custom Lollar Imperials and the T64/v (£1,769) thinline semi with Lollar dog-ear P-90s and is also added to the “new and improved” all-solid 14-inch hollow thinline, the T184mx Goldburst.
Another new finish – Vintage Nitro – appears on the SB56 Goldtop (£1,769) and SB57 Black (£1,950), again both with Lollars, respectively Imperials and soapbar P90s. The Vintage Nitro is “a very thin satin kind of finish”, says Pepijn, “with all the patina, but not the wear and tear.”
5 FENDER PARALLEL UNIVERSE £1,609
With the very mainstream American Original Series as their primary thrust this year, Fender hasn’t forgotten us tweakers who like to mix up the styles a bit. Enter the month-specific Parallel Universe range.
Starting in April, the nine models will run through to December – all priced at £1,609. First off the blocks is the Strat-Tele Hybrid: yup, a Stratocaster with a comfort-contoured Tele body and a trio of Custom Shop ’69 Aged Strat pickups. Next up, in May, is the Elite Nashville Telecaster HSS with a bridge-placed Shawbucker humbucker, with Pure Vintage ’64 slanted single coil in mid position and Tele-style neck pickups. It gets nicely bonkers as the year progresses. The Jazz Tele? Single circuit Jazzmaster on a Tele body, of course,
while the Troublemaker Tele aims for a single-cut vibe with a mahogany/maple body, Shawbucker 1T and 2T humbuckers again with four controls. November’s release is probably the most polarizing, the Meteora: a new offset body design, a Jazzmaster neck and Tele-style pickups.
Oh, and a shout out to the 60th Anniversary of the classic offset Jazzmaster. Check out the 60th Anniversary ’58 Jazzmaster (£1,919) while the 60th Anniversary Triple Jazzmaster (approx. £1,800) installs three Gretsch-y looking Tim Shaw-designed pickups and the Classic Series version (approx. £1,026) comes in four nitro colours.
6 GODINSTADIUM ’59 £1,125
Hardworking Godin released a slew of new models and updates. The new Stadium ’59 takes over from the Session Custom T59 with its stylized Tele-inspired body and marries a Seymour Duncan ’59 at neck with Godin Cajun Custom at bridge. New to the 2018 version is the Hard Rock maple neck with its dark shadow finish and a glossy Desert Green colour for the Canadian Laurentian basswood body. A lot of Canadian-made guitar for the money.
In a similar style the new Summit Classic SG range distils the Core and Empire models into a mini range of 24.75-inch scale guitars that channel Gibson single-cut Juniors and Specials. Godin humbuckers – covered and uncovered – are offered along with a single P90-style version (Godin Kingpin) in a dog-ear cover; all have maple necks, rosewood ’boards and Canadian Laurentian basswood slab bodies.
7 GUILD NEWARK ST. JETSTAR £TBA
We saw the prototype of this guitar two years ago and finally it’s available! “In terms of style, this reissue remains faithful to the first iteration of the S-50 Jetstar,” says Guild although this 2018 version uses a Fender-style 648mm scale length. Along with its distinct six-ina-line headstock the set-neck, like the body, is all mahogany. Pickups are Guild’s LB-1 small footprint humbuckers with simple volume and tone plus, of course, a Gibson-esque tune-o-matic and stud tailpiece. It’s the most cost-effective model in the Newark St range and is available in Sea Foam Green with a cream pickguard, or Vintage White or Black with a tortoiseshell pickguard. It includes Guild’s deluxe padded gigbag.
8 HARMONY PROTOYPE SOLIDBODIES £TBA
Last year Supro made a return to our music stores, and this year it’s the turn – albeit in quite a toe-in-the-water feel – of Harmony, once upon a time the largest manufacturer of electric guitars in the USA. The brand is being resurrected by Singapore-based BandLab Technologies and we saw three prototype solidbodies – the Silhouette, Rebel and Jupiter – all, of course very retro-inspired with essentials like Gold Foil pickups.
There are amps too while Teisco – also being relaunched by BandLab - introduced some effects. As to the Harmony guitars, exactly when, where and how much we don’t know – expect more news as the year progresses.
9 HUBER 20TH ANNIVERSARY DOLPHIN £TBA
Can it really be 20 years since Nik Huber first offered his Dolphin? Apparently so and two decades on – initially tutored via fax by none other than Paul Reed Smith – he’s up there with the best makers anywhere in the world. The Dolphin’s PRS-meetsTelecaster design is a perfect vehicle to show off Huber’s craft and the spec on number 72522 in Starry Night Burst (priced at $13,530) – one of two 20th Anniversary models at the show – includes, burl maple carved top, Brazilian rosewood fingerboard, head-facing, knobs, pickup rings and toggle switch tip, mother-of-pearl, abalone and sterling silver inlays plus a set of Haussel 1959 humbuckers.
10 IBANEZ AZ SERIES FROM £1,199
Despite launching some 50 new models it’s the high-end ‘boutique’ style AZ that took centre stage at Ibanez. It’s a project that started back in 2014 and reins back a classic RG into a cross genre ‘superstrat’ style instrument for players of virtually any genre. In the Premium range there’s the twin humbucking AZ242BC and AZ242F plus the HSS AZ224F. The AZ242F, for example, which comes in TSG (Tequila Sunrise Graduation) finish boasts a roasted maple bolt-on neck (with Super All Access Neck Joint), with luminescent side dot position marks, a flame maple topped basswood body, jumbo stainless steel frets, Gotoh T1502 tremolo bridge (and Height Adjustable Post tuners) and Seymour Duncan Hyperion humbuckers, which are controlled by the dyna-MIX 10 switching system (with ‘Alter’ switch) to offer 10 sounds from the five-way lever and two-way Alter switch.
The Japanese Prestige versions – the twin humbucking AZ2402 and the HSS AZ2204F and AZ2204 – up the ante with an
oil-finish S-TECH WOOD roasted maple neck, alder body, an oil-impregnated bone nut (as opposed to Graph Tech XL of the Premiere models) and the Gotoh T1802 vibrato that features machined titanium saddles and a machined steel tremolo block plus the dyna-MIX 9 switching system (with Alter switch), which offers nine sounds including series single-coil links. Serious stuff. If Ibanez had drifted off your radar, we suggest you put ‘em back on.
11 LOWDEN GL10 £2,995
It’s apparently 40 years since George Lowden made a solidbody electric guitar and for 2018 Lowden has introduced the GL-10. The single-cut design, with a very relaxed acoustic-like cutaway, utilises master grade woods – the body features a mahogany back central maple or rosewood veneer and a choice of nicely figured top woods. The neck follows Lowden’s mahogany with rosewood spliced five-piece style and a 630mm (24.8-inch) scale, with a 305mm fingerboard radius and 43mm nut width. The finish is hand-rubbed oil and the pickups of choice are Lollar Imperials with a two volume, master tone configuration. Options include a lefty version, maple neck and m-o-p fingerboard dot markers. Effortlessly classy.
12 PATRICK JAMES EGGLE OZ APPROX. £3K
Having already reimagined the Les Paul Special (Macon), Les Paul Standard (Macon Single Cut) and the super-Strat (96) with stunning results, Patrick has turned his attention to the good ol’ Telecaster. As with the electrics we’ve seen so far the Oz will be available in numerous wood combinations – solid or semi-hollow – with plenty of options including singlecoil or humbuckers. Aside from some great neck shapes, the updated design features a contoured heel and rib-cage cutaway along with a carved top for the single f-holed semi-hollow models. One of the world’s finest ‘boutique’ makers, right on our doorstep.
13 PRS S2 STUDIO £1,589
Many PRS fans were hoping NAMM 2018 would see the launch of the longanticipated John Mayer bolt-on/three single coil signature. Well, it still ain’t here. In fact, PRS had no Core-line introductions at all. However, the S2 Studio (£1,589), based on the S2 Standard, has hopped into pole position with its trio of pickups (the Vela’s Type-D single coils in neck and middle position with a Starla Treble, with coil-split, at bridge), PRS-designed vibrato and all mahogany construction.
In other launches Mark Tremonti gets a new Indonesian-made SE 245 signature (£545); and Dustie Waring, of US metal band Between The Buried And Me, gets a Floyd Rose-equipped signature, the DW CE 24 (£2,735) featuring Mojotone DW Tomahawk pickups, a maple ’board, satin black hardware in either Gray Black or Waring Burst. Like the S2 Studio it has a limited order window. Get buying.
If you’ve got the cash there’s a limited run ( just 60 pieces) Private Stock Hollowbody
II 594 (£lots!) that, as we’ve seen with other limited edition PS models, might well make it into the Core production line. Maybe.
14 SUPRO DAVID BOWIE LIMITED EDITION DUAL TONE £1,099
Based on the main guitar David Bowie played on the Reality album and throughout his final 2003-2004 world tour, this 2018 limited edition (300 pieces) repro is based on a Supro modified by master luthier Flip Scipio, who inlaid the top five fret slots with rainbow colors after installing a Bigsby vibrato at Bowie’s request. Featuring a 24.75-inch scale maple neck with a rosewood fretboard, the alder body has a ribcage contour plus an ergonomic neck joint. Hardware includes a Bigsby with roller bridge, butterfly tulip tuning pegs and a matched set of vintage-correct Vistatone pickups.
Also new from Supro are the Island Series baritones, specifically the Supro Hampton and Westbury guitar models with 679mm (26.75 inch) scales designed to be tuned to low A, B or C. Other features include a satin-finished maple neck with a rosewood fretboard, and a choice of either ash or mahogany for the body.