Incredible Story: Rare Gibson LP Guitar Found in the UK

Hattigol

@guitars4you I think you have answered your own question there about why Gibson didn't cater to the growing market by producing the guitars people wanted in the colour schemes they wanted.

My impression is that back then, it was pretty much 'you'll have what we make' - akin to the Henry Ford quote about any colour you want as long as it's black. 

Easy for us to look at retail now, with massive market research budgets, and assume retailers have always been aware of customer needs when things have clearly changed vastly. 

PhilKing

guitars4you said:

You started before me Phil - Can you remember any/many 59 Burst in your days on the shop wall 

I never saw a real 50's burst all the time I was at JSG.  We had some early 60's SG/Les Paul's, 330/335's and Fenders (Tele's, Strat's and P-basses), lots of Hofner's, quite a few Epiphones, but I think that when I started in 1972, the cost of a 58-59 Les Paul was about 2,000 and my annual salary was 1,200 (which was a pretty good wage at the time), so they were out of reach of most players.

Brize

This is such a great story and I'm so pleased that Mike and the guys at ATB were involved in this and will have returned a handsome sum to the owner as well as turning a profit themselves.

impmann

I’d like to know who had Alan Pyre’s late 50s burst(s). I saw one of them but he intimated there was more than one.
I do remember a manky mid 50s Goldtop (p90s) in Wing Music back in the 80s. Also there was a similar aged Les Paul Custom that was in the Guitar Factory in Bexley a little later (I very nearly bought a 1960s SG junior they had - fitted with a genuine Zermatis bridge for £325… those were the days).
But you did occasionally see bursts (probably the same ones) in Macaris and Andy’s Guitar workshop back then. I still remember the 1960 335 in Andy’s that was allegedly ex Andy Summers.
And then there was Greenie sat on a guitar stand in Chandlers in Kew having been fixed post Gary’s car crash….
So, no you didn’t see many

GuyR

It's great to read a story where everyone comes out of it well, and with a decent financial return.
As has been said earlier, Mike Long could have potentially paid £5k. It is greatly to his credit he did not. Dealers are often viewed with suspicion- I wonder what proportion of the general public would have made the same choice.
I'm not a particular follower of Jo Bonamassa's music, he's certainly a fine player, but it's gratifying to see these instruments being used for the purpose for which they were manufactured and I'm sure it will be optimally maintained and conserved.
With regard to whether they are good value, or something else might represent better value, the only relevant opinions are those of people with sufficient disposable funds to afford them. 

rlw

If the dealer had bought it for £5k, having given that as a value, and then sold it for £100k, the person who sold it to the dealer would have a very good court case, potentially for fraud or professional negligence, since the owner was relying upon the knowledge and expertise of the dealer. 

A wise move to be totally honest in this case I think.

Lebarque

GuyR said:

It's great to read a story where everyone comes out of it well, and with a decent financial return.
As has been said earlier, Mike Long could have potentially paid £5k. It is greatly to his credit he did not. Dealers are often viewed with suspicion- I wonder what proportion of the general public would have made the same choice.
I'm not a particular follower of Jo Bonamassa's music, he's certainly a fine player, but it's gratifying to see these instruments being used for the purpose for which they were manufactured and I'm sure it will be optimally maintained and conserved.
With regard to whether they are good value, or something else might represent better value, the only relevant opinions are those of people with sufficient disposable funds to afford them. 

The owner's daughter was (initially) just looking for a valuation for insurance, not a sale. They guessed it was worth £5k and Mike set them right.

DefaultM

Nice as a piece of history but I'd rather have a 90's Ibanez RG.

Keiko

CavemanGrogg said:

guitars4you said:

timmypix said:

elstoof said:

How does Jobo afford all this stuff? He’s not exactly Elvis level of popularity is he

He only tours arenas these days, and I think he's bigger in the States than he is here - as in, has-a-full-road-crew-convoy-including-his-own-chef kind of big. He's got multiple large properties stuffed with vintage guitars and amps. He is absolutely raking it in.

 I read a while ago that his touring model and appropriate 'entourage' was all costed, as a profitable business and has been for many years, even in his early days of climbing the ladder

He did an interview about it, there's the bus convoy thing where there are a bunch of blues musicians and bands, an travelling blues festival if you will, him touring with his own band as a seperate thing.  The guy has his fingers in a lot of pies, hats off to him.

A quick look on spotify, he gets over 1 million listens per month, and appears to make 2 or 3 albums per year! I would call that pretty successful and hard working.

I'm not a fan of his music, but he is an excellent guitarist who knows about tone, and I'm happy to watch him all day long on youtube talking about his passion for vintage guitars and amps.  

Fwiw, buying high value vintage guitars like this is not just "spending money" like Elton John spends money on flowers. If you've got that kind of money, the best thing you can do with it is to invest it rather than have it sitting in the bank. This is probably another big form of income for him.  Unless vintage gear suddenly becomes really uncool, they are not going to drop in value anytime soon, only go up. Some people invest in art, houses etc. This guy invest in guitars, the things he loves. I don't see an issue with it.

Also respect Mike from ATB for not trying to lowball the seller. Not all dealers would have gone that route. Most of them, their eyes would be popping out their sockets at how much they could make on that guitar by lying about the guitars real value and trying to buy it off them.

Philly_Q

I did finally watch the original ATB video.  Nice story, it would be great if we could somehow get to see the guitar when it's restored (seeing the actual restoration process would be even better).

mark123

rlw said:

If the dealer had bought it for £5k, having given that as a value, and then sold it for £100k, the person who sold it to the dealer would have a very good court case, potentially for fraud or professional negligence, since the owner was relying upon the knowledge and expertise of the dealer. 

A wise move to be totally honest in this case I think.

Brize said:

This is such a great story and I'm so pleased that Mike and the guys at ATB were involved in this and will have returned a handsome sum to the owner as well as turning a profit themselves.

a quote from here.

https://www.gloucestershirelive.co.uk/whats-on/music-nightlife/original-early-1960-gibson-les-7065457

Mike has sold the guitar to the American artist Joe Bonamassa who was playing two nights at the Royal Albert Hall last week. He said: “We took it to show him and he bought it on the spot.

“He will take it back to Nashville to get his people to restore it.” He declined to say how much he had paid the woman for the guitar but said he had sold it to Joe for between £150,000 and £200,000.

So the elephant in the room is how much did the woman get ? 50k ? 70k ?

Brize

mark123 said:

So the elephant in the room is how much did the woman get ? 50k ? 70k ?

Not an elephant in the room at all. ATB would have provided a professional valuation service to the client and then reached agreement with her to buy the guitar or sell it on consignment. The details of that arrangement will be confidential.

I would also venture to say that this is probably one of the least attractive Bursts out there in its current state. The top is interesting but not flamey, the top will be scarred from the Bigsby and the other plugged holes, the pickups have been altered and it's generally something of a basket case, however much mojo it appears to have.

It's not at all outside the realms of possibility that ATB purchased the guitar before they had a buyer for it and, for the aforementioned reasons, they would needed to have been conservative in their valuation.

Let's be frank: this is a rare story where everyone wins, apart from the guy who sold the guitar for £50 in the 70s!

mark123

Brize said:

mark123 said:

So the elephant in the room is how much did the woman get ? 50k ? 70k ?

Not an elephant in the room at all. ATB would have provided a professional valuation service to the client and then reached agreement with her to buy the guitar or sell it on consignment. The details of that arrangement will be confidential.

I would also venture to say that this is probably one of the least attractive Bursts out there in its current state. The top is interesting but not flamey, the top will be scarred from the Bigsby and the other plugged holes, the pickups have been altered and it's generally something of a basket case, however much mojo it appears to have.

It's not at all outside the realms of possibility that ATB purchased the guitar before they had a buyer for it and, for the aforementioned reasons, they would needed to have been conservative in their valuation.

Let's be frank: this is a rare story where everyone wins, apart from the guy who sold the guitar for £50 in the 70s!

Firstly i'm not on a Atb witch hunt,he was hohnest and open with her just wondered why the secrecy over the price he bought it for ? if he gave her a fair amount e.g 70k then no problem ,but to not disclose the amount seems a bit strange.
But maybe the women did not want it publicising ?

I was shocked it fetched over 250k in that state,needs a refret ,original parts to be sourced at a premium price , covers missing ,1 zebra,1 double cream doesn't look good to me ,holes when the bigsby is removed and a poor top as mentioned earlier
I would have thought 110k tops.

Musicman20

The top is pretty damn dull. It has some serious 'mojo' (urghhhh) but that needs a LOT of work. 

springhead

mark123 said:

Brize said:

mark123 said:

So the elephant in the room is how much did the woman get ? 50k ? 70k ?

Not an elephant in the room at all. ATB would have provided a professional valuation service to the client and then reached agreement with her to buy the guitar or sell it on consignment. The details of that arrangement will be confidential.

I would also venture to say that this is probably one of the least attractive Bursts out there in its current state. The top is interesting but not flamey, the top will be scarred from the Bigsby and the other plugged holes, the pickups have been altered and it's generally something of a basket case, however much mojo it appears to have.

It's not at all outside the realms of possibility that ATB purchased the guitar before they had a buyer for it and, for the aforementioned reasons, they would needed to have been conservative in their valuation.

Let's be frank: this is a rare story where everyone wins, apart from the guy who sold the guitar for £50 in the 70s!

Firstly i'm not on a Atb wich hunt,he was hohnest andbopen with her ,so why the secrecy over the price he bought it for ? if he gave her a fair amount e.g 70k then no problem ,but to not disclose the amount seems a bit strange.

I was shocked it fetched over 250k in that state,needs a refret ,original parts to be sourced at a premium price , covers missing ,1 zebra,1 double cream doesn't look good to me ,holes when the bigsby is removed and a poor top as mentioned earlier
I would have thought 110k tops.

Entirely upto her if she wants to disclose how much she was paid for it, Mike is respecting that confidentiality. And it didn't fetch over 250K:

“He will take it back to Nashville to get his people to restore it.” He declined to say how much he had paid the woman for the guitar but said he had sold it to Joe for between £150,000 and £200,000.

guitars4you

Brize said:

mark123 said:

So the elephant in the room is how much did the woman get ? 50k ? 70k ?

Not an elephant in the room at all. ATB would have provided a professional valuation service to the client and then reached agreement with her to buy the guitar or sell it on consignment. The details of that arrangement will be confidential.

100% agree 

If and a huge IF at that, that the woman acquired £50K then it is still far more than she ever thought it was worth prior to getting some professional help - But that is not what has happened and not a credible point

 Few comments on this post imply a rob dogging capitalist thief has taken advantage of an unaware owner - That is not the case - With ATB's contacts in the USA, he could have purchased it for 5K ish, got it to the USA to a major show - effectively sold it behind the scenes to another dealer/guitar collector and no one would have ever known about the whole story and how it got from an unaware father/daughter to an international rock star - It would have just been Jo's acquired another guitar with no info as to where it came from - Actually I believe J likes such history to go with his purchases - But my point is that many USA dealers/collectors would have purchased it at a show from Mike and no one on FB etc etc would have ever ever known about it 

As others have implied on this post, if it was advertised for 5K in a local paper and/or even on a social buying/selling site, how many 'of us' would have purchased it for 5K and taken full advantage of the situation - I dare say quite a few would have done so 

Mike and ATB have been upfront regarding the whole process, be it via social media and/or local press - The lady/father owner will see all this - Know the score and be paid an acceptable fee accordingly - Not sure what the issue is here  with some basic upfront capitalism

Brize

mark123 said:

Firstly i'm not on a Atb wich hunt,he was hohnest andbopen with her ,so why the secrecy over the price he bought it for ? if he gave her a fair amount e.g 70k then no problem ,but to not disclose the amount seems a bit strange.

Could you please upload a copy of your payslip or tax return so that we can pry into your financial affairs?

mark123

Brize said:

mark123 said:

Firstly i'm not on a Atb wich hunt,he was hohnest andbopen with her ,so why the secrecy over the price he bought it for ? if he gave her a fair amount e.g 70k then no problem ,but to not disclose the amount seems a bit strange.

Could you please upload a copy of your payslip or tax return so that we can pry into your financial affairs?

oooooooooohh..... touched a nerve ?

downbytheriver

I do think there are some rather extraordinary opinions being expressed in this thread - nothing wrong with that as long you respect different views. 

I find it hard to think that the reputation of the burst was established at any time other than pre-68. What happened in the 70s only happened because of what happened pre-68. 

Also to say that nothing could be made in the 50s that couldn’t be made today misses a rather large point - not only were guitars made differently then, but if you are convinced that’s true let’s drop back a couple of hundred years and by the same argument make me a Stradivarius. Good luck 

by the way, I’ve played three bursts over the years, one was incredible, one was meh and the other was actually utter crap (but had had some of the greatest music ever recorded played on it). My experience of pre-CBS Strats is pretty much in line with this (although more extensive). The best Strat I have ever owned (or played) came out of Fullerton in 1972. Go figure. 

mark123

Well the pitchforks are well and truly out for me can i just clarify a few points.
1. I have never accused atb  of anything .

2. Just a genuine question wondering how much the lady got,which has turned me into public enemy no1.

3. I'll mind my own business and not come back to this thread.