Gibson Melody Maker on Amazon

thecolourbox

Has anybody tried one? Anybody have any thoughts? I especially like the red or blue ones to look at but was wondering how they were to play etc and whether they'd need a pickup change it anything like that.

Also if anybody knows if the Gibson G Force or Tronical tuners fit them that would also be very interesting (they don't seem to be listed on the tronical site to check

Thanks

JezWynd

I bookmarked those. You could have had a new (return) Strawberry Milk for 249.00 the other day. There appear to be issues with the bridge, getting the action low enough and the bridge tips forward but that shouldn't stop it intonating. A Gibson body/neck in nitro finish for 250.00 could be a deal worth doing. I'm very taken with the thin bodies, I imagine they're very resonant. If they get to 200ish I may be tempted.

Rocker

I have a single pickup model, volume control and no tone pot, and I think it is a great guitar. Punk Rock sound is perfect and it can be a passable country guitar through a powerful clean amp.

thecolourbox

Thanks guys. I'd use it for garage rock and related indie type stuff so sounds like it night work, though I'm going when u do some listening research later on they don't quite have the fat beefiness of a normal les Paul and are more jangly for want of a better word?

Question is, are they better than the same price epiphone, branding aside?

I know the firebird ones get a lot of stick

JezWynd

I think they use Epiphone pickups, so no difference there. Internet wisdom says all the metal is far eastern cheap stuff and the switch is prone to issues. The main thing is the finish, I'd take a thin nitro finish over an Epiphone (with their horrid headstock) every time.

thecolourbox

Sorry to bump this on, does anybody happen to know (or have one to check) whether the G Force tuners would fit on one of these? Tronical are not answering emails

Thanks

Chris_J

Worth buying to change the hardware and pickups? 

Funkfingers

The Gibson G Force comes as a complete assembly with the machinehead posts spaced to fit directly into a typical Gibson headstock.

The Gibson Melody Maker has a narrower than standard headstock with parallel edges. Consequently, the G Force system cannot possibly fit.


Looking at the list of guitars for which the Tronical system is applicable, no variants of the Gibson Melody Maker appear.


Personally, the only lump of electronics that I would countenance on the rear of my guitar headstock would be an original Sustainiac transducer.

In my opinion, the cost of these products would be better spent on a professional quality guitar tuner. Develop an ear for pitch.

suspiciousminds

This M series version of the melody maker on amazon looks like it has a LP style headstock.

Funkfingers

That still looks a little narrower towards the nut than a traditional Les Paul headstock. 

Your money. Your risk.

The Amazon pics appear to illustrate Ping or Jin-Ho clones of Gotoh SG381 machineheads. 

thecolourbox

Thanks guys you're probably right, I do tune by ear normally so I have the ears and relative pitch enough to do it what I lack is a non-clicking wrist to keep retuning to different things quickly which I quite fancy.

Plus I have a set of g force tuners I bought for my kit guitar but which didn't fit Haha

No, I should probably not bother as they don't actually look all that awesome actually in any case and I could poetically do better for the money

Thanks all

underdog

Funkfingers said:

The Gibson G Force comes as a complete assembly with the machinehead posts spaced to fit directly into a typical Gibson headstock.

The Gibson Melody Maker has a narrower than standard headstock with parallel edges. Consequently, the G Force system cannot possibly fit.


Looking at the list of guitars for which the Tronical system is applicable, no variants of the Gibson Melody Maker appear.


Personally, the only lump of electronics that I would countenance on the rear of my guitar headstock would be an original Sustainiac transducer.

In my opinion, the cost of these products would be better spent on a professional quality guitar tuner. Develop an ear for pitch.

Why stop there? An electric tuner, why not a tuning fork?

imalrightjack

@thecolourbox G Force is shite for anything other than recording. Know by ear your G is out? Gotta go through every string, unless you have a spare minute to reverse wind by hand through the massively high gear ratio. Not good between songs, at all. Hated it on stage.

thecolourbox

imalrightjack said:

@thecolourbox G Force is shite for anything other than recording. Know by ear your G is out? Gotta go through every string, unless you have a spare minute to reverse wind by hand through the massively high gear ratio. Not good between songs, at all. Hated it on stage.

I'm not going to be playing in public, only at home or recording. Nobody needs to hear me or see me!!

Funkfingers

Most of the time, it is wiser to choose hardware to fit the body and neck that you already have rather than the other way around. Thus, buying a guitar to use up a surplus set of tuners does seem extravagant.

If you want to get seriously retentive about tuning accuracy, where fret positions are determined by a Pythagorean ratio, intonation will be a compromise. Almost every fretted note will be a fraction off true pitch. (This is before you factor in a vibrato bridge of any description.) Hence, it is necessary to apply fractional string bends almost all of the time. Alternatively, hand over a lot of money to have the Buzz Feiten Tuning System modifications.

underdog

I love the g force tuners, it beats the crap out of tuning every string with a tuner when you want to practice something in an opening tuning.

A few times I've plugged in my (non gforce equipped) Les Paul's and strummed waiting for the machine heads to do their thing and then be disappointed

stimpsonslostson

underdog said:

I love the g force tuners, it beats the crap out of tuning every string with a tuner when you want to practice something in an opening tuning.

A few times I've plugged in my (non gforce equipped) Les Paul's and strummed waiting for the machine heads to do their thing and then be disappointed

I've had the same experience. I've had a G-force equipped guitar for about two weeks & have found it to be excellent (& my expectations were rather low based on all the internet "wisdom"). 
I only took one guitar to my last jam & despite the set list involving standard, open d and d standard I was in tune really quickly. 

I'm not sure I'd retrofit it to another guitar, but I won't be removing it anytime soon. 

thecolourbox

Lol I know it seems to be the wrong way around the be seeing what guitars for tuners but it's not that. I need a guitar as I don't have a playable one at the moment only my diy kit one which is like playing a small ironing board.

I'm looking for a guitar that I'll keep for a while not just temporarily, but as I can't afford the one I want I'm looking for cheap alternatives that I might not normally consider and this is one of them, because whilst I'm not a fan of the LP shape, I'd thought it might allow me to potentially use my otherwise useless g force tuners. 

Doesn't look like it's going to be any good though as they won't fit by the sound of it, so the only advantage this model has is Amazon prime delivery Haha

Funkfingers

thecolourbox said:

like playing a small ironing board.

That would be the tenor Chapman Stick.

tony99

thecolourbox said:

Lol I know it seems to be the wrong way around the be seeing what guitars for tuners but it's not that. I need a guitar as I don't have a playable one at the moment only my diy kit one which is like playing a small ironing board.

I'm looking for a guitar that I'll keep for a while not just temporarily, but as I can't afford the one I want I'm looking for cheap alternatives that I might not normally consider and this is one of them, because whilst I'm not a fan of the LP shape, I'd thought it might allow me to potentially use my otherwise useless g force tuners. 

Doesn't look like it's going to be any good though as they won't fit by the sound of it, so the only advantage this model has is Amazon prime delivery Haha

Think I just seen one of these in warehouse deals at £250

EDIT: yup, I did . . 

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Gibson-USA-2017-Melody-Maker/dp/B01LRWJPR8/ref=sr_1_4?m=A2OAJ7377F756P&s=warehouse-deals&ie=UTF8&qid=1495296601&sr=8-4&keywords=gibson

Funkfingers

Read the published specification carefully. "Probucker" pickups. That's Probucker as in Epiphone.  http://www.epiphone.com/News/Features/2013/Take-the-Epiphone-ProBucker-Challenge.aspx

Having said that, for this money, the average modifier could afford to upgrade to the American pickups of his or her choice.