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Your friend and mine, Matt Smith, left us last night. The clinician for Hamer and Ovation for many years, Matt was an amazing walking vault to musical knowledge and technical skill. He was also one of the warmest and kindest people to ever walk on the planet. He ran Six String Ranch in Austin... I have many fond memories of he and I doing recording work there His seminars with David Grissom were amazing. I have video of us doing sessions, I'll have to find them. He was family. The world just got a little darker.

If I was somewhat younger and still leaning towards acquiring, I would sure check out Shea. FWIW, Barry (Grez) has posted some great video/demos of some of his builds. One that I found very useful was comparing his relatively smaller guitars (Mendocino) to such as a good example of a 335 and to full archtops. He describes his builds and (IMO) shows how that makes the smaller body sounds so much bigger than it actually is. IF that is what a person is going for (as opposed to a solid body guitar) those demos are worth checking out. I am NOT going to say they top my one Shishkov, quality wise. But no slouch. Somewhat different animals, but I can pretty much get to the same place with either the Shishkov or Mendocino......Long ago I had a long conversation with Mike about doing something a few steps beyond and he seemed quite enthusiastic. Of course, that was not to be. I actually chatted with Nik Huber about doing something similar, but that would have been 5 figures and a long wait. Made no sense. The custom order Mendocino, then later the Grand Tour, substituted nicely. Nicely enough that when an older Grez archtop popped up at a fair price, that became a third.....I DO get carried away..... The La Voce does not have the same "airiness" but otherwise pretty much gives me the same voices for live play. I am not there yet, but having a few such instruments in hand has been making me think I may not really need to keep my last two Hamer Artists.....The Ltd Edition 25th and the Ultimate Artist. But not going there just yet......

Dreaming you could play like that?

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz 😴

He joined before the internet was invented?

Make sure you let the mods know about this. They can't help you get your money back, but they can kick this scumbag off of here! Sorry to hear this. This was the only gear site I trusted…

Every self respecting, wanna-be rocker needs to own a V at some point. And yes, I've owned a few but while both had interesting back stories, ultimately they didn't stay. This one aspires to (better) be different. Starting with a 25" PRS scale (my compromise between preferred Fender and traditional Gibby scales) and ending with a Shark tremolo, this is gonna be unique.

Yeah, and the PMs seemed legit too.

All the Hamer pickups are now sold.

Reminds me of Michael Hedges on Harp Guitar.

Here is a slightly different history of the original #0004 from the current auction. A Hamer Standard electric guitar, serial #0004, built in 1975 for Rick Nielsen of Cheap Trick, who played it on stages all over the world from the mid-1970s through the mid-1980s. Rick can be seen playing this guitar at many concerts including on Don Kirchner’s Rock Concert on November 10th, 1977. Rick’s association with luthier Paul Hamer began in 1973 when Rick sold him a sunburst Les Paul Standard, which Paul later sold to fund Hamer Guitars. In 1975, Rick wanted a real, original Gibson Explorer of of his own, but with so few made they were hard to come by; Rick asked Paul to make him one with a flame maple top, the very instrument in this lot. This guitar took quite a long time to produce, so Paul sent Rick his personal guitar, serial #0000, as a loaner until the natural model was finished. Rick liked it so much that he bought them both. 
 Those two initial Hamer Standards are easily some of his most recognizable guitars –– checkerboard patterns and five-neck behemoths notwithstanding –– thanks to their feature set as well as the unique figuring of their flame maple tops. Natural model #0004 appears in innumerable photos and concert footage spanning the 1970s and 1980s and is easily one of the most important guitars of his career. Hamer even ran an ad which featured Rick with this guitar.

I really didn't need to see that......WOW

Since his first release "What Just Happened" in 2013, I've been amazed at what Mike Dawes does: He is playing in town tonight at a place that holds about 130 people. Advanced tickets were $24. Even more astounding, there are still tickets available! My wife and I are going with an old high school guitar buddy and his wife. They have never heard of him. That is really sad because Mike Dawes - and the talent he possesses - should be a household name. At the very least among musicians. For him to not sell out a small club boggles the mind (although my inner hermit is OK with the smaller crowd). Hell, when you order off his website ( https://www.mikedawes.com/ ), his Dad does the actual packaging and shipping! So my mission now is to make anyone who doesn't know who Mike Dawes is aware of his awesomeness. He should be selling out very large venues everywhere he goes. This is the first show I've been truly excited about seeing in a very long time. And if he's anywhere in your neck of the woods you need to go see Mike Dawes. He should definitely be on any guitarist's 'must see' list. Mike Dawes!

Backed. Ted makes incredibly nice guitars and I'd consider him before all others for a superstrat style build.

Damn! Looked legit.

Yeah, 7 years from now.

I do it at the cab block myself. Also depends on how you want it to sound. I do cab block then if I want stereo, put chorus, delay and reverb after, so it gives more of those effects added at a mixer kind of vibe. Or, if I'm doing a mono thing, I'll put everything except reverb ahead of the amp. Usually I'll have like a Twin with a drive, then delay after the drive and move the chorus "pedal" around to see how I like the sound best. But that setup alone can cover a lot of ground. The cool thing to me about the modelers is you can change a bunch of settings in one switch, so if you've got a Plexi model, you can roll down the volumes to be cleaner and roll them up for rhythm and then up more for lead.

Would that be on a global eq setting? Parametric or graphic?

No, a shelf, so you can see them and on a daily basis tell yourself that you'll finish that project someday. 🤣

Thanks for posting this. I like Friedman and Fryette. Haven't seen the others before. I always side eye the YouTube dudes who have like 30 amps behind them and got them for free. I like both tube amps and modelers, but they're just tools. To me it's not that hard to get tones on stuff, yes it might take a little more time because there isn't a knob per function, but that's not a big deal. It's long been known that you just need to create your modeler tones a little dark and roll off down to somewhere between 5k-8k to sound natural. When I dial in a tube amp at a low volume, I have to adjust it when it's turned up too, so I don't see the fuss. Just turn the knobs until you like the sound. I've also not had a problem cleaning up the sound with my volume knob on anything I've used.

The headstock shape and the paint job are the selling points, but the condition does not seem to have factored in. How many USA flag finishes were done on Blitz guitars or basses? Someone I knew got a Blitz bass with that finish in the 80's. They do not show up as often as black and white graphic finishes.

I'm guessing the neck won't be the epiphany that my first Charvel was (John Nelson of the Eddie Money Band's quilted model he played on the MTV video from the Kabuki Theater, when Eddie came back from his drug and alcohol addiction). John and I are friends to this day. An unfinished neck was just fantastic. Our own HamStd Peter had it pass through his hands after me. Less wood touching my hand seems to make sense. I agree that I should look for a used one. It reminds me of the first time I bought a Washburn Nuno mahogany model. Just a fantastic guitar, but I sold it. Bought two more and neither one were near as good as the early first year one. My recent Shea purchases have me hunting in the weeds for really good guitars. I wish Mike was still taking orders. I understand the myriad reasons he's not. Grez seems a lot like Shea. Less than three months for a killer guitar that might cost a good bit more to buy in the future. And God bless these guys. They are sticking their neck's out. Sorry to hear about your thumb. A thinner neck is, most definitely, better for that lack of strength. My father always said, "Getting old sucks". Don't know your age, but we don't heal better tomorrow than we did today. DR