开了门之后s in 2021, theGibsonGarage in Nashville has fast become one of the must-see destinations on any sightseeing tour of Music City. Just a 10-minute walk from the neon glow and raucous nightlife of Broadway – call it 15 minutes in the summer heat – the Gibson Garage offers players and fans much more than a purely transactional retail experience, with lessons, historical exhibits and frequent live performances on offer in addition to hundreds of guitars.
As if that wasn’t enough, if you are lucky enough to head behind the velvet rope and go backstage, you might even get a VIP tour of Gibson’s secret vault containing historic instruments from the Gibson archive. Featuring original examples of the company’s most iconic designs, it’s something of a greatest hits set from the late 1950s and early 1960s, and a reminder of a period when the pace of change in popular music was both mirrored and fuelled by dizzying innovations in the guitar industry.
Our guide today is Gibson’s Brand President Cesar Gueikian. Born in Argentina to Armenian parents, Gueikian’s passion for music and guitars was cemented at an early age. These days, in addition to guiding the fortunes of Gibson Brands Inc, he’s a serious guitar collector. Indeed, one of the instruments he’s brought along for us to photograph today is in danger of stealing the show altogether.
格林的双胞胎
Even among the exalted ranks of sunburst GibsonLes Paul从1958 - 60年制造的标准，有少数吉他具有特殊的崇敬。序列号9 2208，又名“ Greeny”，就是这样的乐器。永生Peter Green后来由加里·摩尔现在Kirk Hammett, its beautiful faded flametop and ‘out of phase’ middle-position tone are instantly recognisable to millions. And yet, unique as it seems, Greeny has a twin.
In mid-2021, when Gueikian added another Burst to his collection, he shared the news with Hammett and the pair discovered that Cesar’s Les Paul – 9 2204 – is within four serial numbers of Greeny. Further research revealed that no guitars were produced between them, with the intervening serial numbers likely used for Skylark amps.
的确，由于两次爆发的火焰图案和矿物条纹似乎都非常相似，甚至有可能他们的顶部是由同一枫树制造的。在我们拍摄时，尚未给9 2204个名字。我们的摄影师对“双子座”的建议显然引起了共鸣，因为这就是Gueikian和Hammett从那以后所说的。
Fitted with Grovers decades ago, at some point Gemini also wore a non-factory Bigsby, and it’s also been refretted. Gueikian argues that, if you intend to play it, refretting a vintage guitar with worn frets is a perfectly acceptable modification. After all, you can’t drive around on bald tyres. And, make no mistake, this guitar is going to getplayed。
塞萨尔（Cesar）兴奋地说：“听起来很特别。”“我从我的一个亲爱的朋友那里得到了25年。我们开始在大流行之前谈论这把吉他，最后变成了现实。我也真的很喜欢我的深色’58金顶，但是就我在黄金时代制作的吉布森（Gibson）而言，我觉得这很快就会成为我的最爱。我首先播放了一段时间。这是最有声音的吉他 - 您可以在体内感觉到它。您可以说这将是一种非常清晰的乐器。
“And then when I plugged it in, it was magical. If you talk to Mark Agnesi, Mat Koehler, Jason Davidson – all of our team at Gibson – we all play them acoustically first. Sometimes for hours! Then, once we’ve had a chance to really experience that acoustic sound of a solidbody electric guitar, we plug it in.”
Before we enter the Gibson Vault, Cesar pulls out another brown Lifton case from his personal collection. The Burst inside, serial number 9 0418, is remarkably clean with lots of unfaded red pigment on its top. Look closely and you can even see a tan line from the original toggle-switch tag, which was presumably left on the guitar while it was displayed in-store.
“这是我已经有一段时间了，”格韦基安说。“它在The Collection与马克阿涅西Gibson TV这就是生日爆发。我从德鲁·柏林（Drew Berlin）那里得到了这个 - 它是在莱斯·保罗（Les Paul）的100岁生日庆祝活动中播放的BB King’s纽约的布鲁斯俱乐部。我一直在寻找一些清洁的东西，这些东西仍然有红色，当我看到这张照片时，我看到了图片和出处，我感到非常自在。”
拥有超级清洁的老式仪器，例如，对吉布森的研发过程，尤其是在墨菲实验室中，必须非常有用。塞萨尔说：“这些吉他不会在这种情况下坐着。”“我们在这里使用了很多东西 - 我们扫描了它，团队有机会通过它，它去了实验室。这对我们来说绝对非常有用，尤其是在历史悠久的收藏和定制商店的背景下。”
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Now we delve into the Vault, and from its display case comes yet another 1959 Les Paul, serial number 9 0871 and Gibson-owned. The guitar’s maple cap features vivid figuring, and is a real head-turner. “We got this one as part of our quest as a team to get some of the instruments that we made back in the golden era,” Cesar explains. “We got it through戴维·戴维森（David Davidson）。这是爆发的壮观例子，上面有美丽的火焰 - 更宽，更多的散开火焰。它有很多魔力。
“这是第一个我们在追求了Bursts. We use all of the guitars, all of the Bursts, all of the Black Beauties as references for the Historic Collection. Scanning, photographing, Murphy Lab detailing, capturing everything in the Murphy Lab. It will probably be a never-ending quest to try to get more specimens in and have the ability to see more, to scan more and to photograph more.”
The next guitar we check out is a 1957 Les Paul Goldtop with the kind of wear that can only be the result of decades on the road. “We got this one fromAlbert Molinaro，他是一名收藏家和老式经销商，” Gueikian说。“我们正在寻找一个Vibey Goldtop。马克·阿格尼西（Mark Agnesi），马特·科勒（Mat Koehler），我本人和团队正在寻找真正的氛围。说将来我们想做一个Gibson Vault Collection？我们不会做薄荷复制品。我们想在墨菲实验室中进行Vibey Gibson Vault娱乐活动。”
We wonder if Cesar thinks that the Murphy Lab’s advances in guitar ageing technology could make future collections of vintage recreations more accurate, and more popular even, than Gibson’s acclaimed Collector’s Choice series. “I think so,” he says. “I think we’re definitely able to do more accurate representations with Tom leading the Murphy Lab, especially with the new reverse-engineered lacquer. We thought, ‘Oh man, it’s going to be a sin to scrape a little bit of lacquer off a golden-era guitar’. But that was really the only way to chemically re-engineer it.”
我们当天的最后一把吉他是塞萨尔（Cesar）的另一个吉他，现在是吉布森金库（Gibson）金库系列的一部分 - 这是一个非常酷的三件挑战Les Paul与Factory Bigsby的Custom。他解释说：“我能够从德鲁·柏林（Drew Berlin）获得1956年的Goldtop，这把吉他作为包装。”“我们需要吉布森金库（Gibson Vault）收藏中的黑人美女，该团队对这个拥有工厂Bigsby的事实感到非常兴奋。因此，我们将其放在Gibson Vault中，作为标本，我们将继续用作参考点。这是一个'58，很酷 - 它靠近我们现在正在重新发行的57岁。”
We’ve spend far too much time noodling on the Gemini Burst, so the remaining guitars from the Gibson Vault – a Les Paul Special, an original ’58 Flying V and several SG and ES models – will have to wait for another shoot on another day. If we had to choose one to sneak out of the door and smuggle onto an aeroplane? As breathtaking as those Bursts are, it would have to be the Les Paul Custom. Three PAFs… a factory Bigsby… more is more, right?
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