MCChris

Not really, guitars mentioned are in the hands of some fine players of recent times that have a fan base. Not many out there in the limelight playing Hamers Also, AFAIK, those brands haven't been bought by a larger entity.

And you, sir, also nailed it with this:

Not naive, just basic marketing. Getting your product in front of people. Two problems with that approach, though, is it related to Hamer: 1. Post-hair band era, the brand was unwilling to do the legwork to put its guitars in the hands of as many prominent players as possible 2. The number of "huge" guitar players out there is dwindling to almost zero Others will suffer the same fate as Hamer, as there simply isn't enough interest in guitars nowadays for the market to support a plethora of smaller, boutique brands. It may seem like it to us, because we're aging guitar nerds, but pop culture at large and younger generations don't associate the instrument with their formative years like people our age do. Sure, some may survive, but the ones that do a.) won't be swallowed up by a huge corporation and b.) will be satisfied with making a modest living doing what they love.

Or someone could buy it tomorrow simply by ponying up enough cash. In business, everything's for sale, and everything has a price. Everything. Commentary to the contrary is naivete at best and outright horseshit at worst.

Anyone that makes that claim would be incorrect. In that case: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F6QC0Z-E82g

I now await the arrival of another in-the-know HFCer to report that this is all preliminary.

Yowza. The news we all knew was coming seems to have arrived. Maybe Paul will buy back the brand and hire yours truly to be the marketing director. A guy can dream, can't he?

Make it a 12-string for redundancy's sake.

Not entirely:

Oh PIZZOW!

Yeah, that's a damn nice one.

There's your answer. Winter born in 1944, Brown born in 1924.

That worn brown LP Traditional is tempting. If only I hadn't just bought back my SuperPro.

I chose "average" on that based on past sales and ebay listings. Hard to tell, though, as they don't come up as often. Cheapest I found in TSO was $900, but that was before shipping. Ones with bigsbys go for over a grand on fleabay, so that's where I based the comment. Actually, I was referring to someone else saying it was "an average price," not that it was "the average price." I content that yours is an exceptional price.

Get you a used Crate Power Block and run it through the Mesa's speakers if the need arises.

Moose listed his Newport Pro (no Bigsby) for $969 shipped and PPd, which I thought was a ridiculously low price. Offline I was informed that was an "average" price, but I'm not buying it. For that to be the case, as many NPs would have to come up for sale for $800 as $1050, and I've personally never noticed that to be the case. Any time you're getting into a USA-made hollowbody for under a grand, you're doing extremely well. Of course, market value and the "cheap fuck" nature of us HFC types dictate that Hamer versions often can be had for less.

Marketing is a helluva drug, Kiznaki.

Yup, and Roy is great people and, I believe, is still a member here. I think Poe banned him for his incessant, inappropriate shilling of Schlabotniks.

What's the reasoning for having one of those if there's only one knob? Regardless, very cool find!

I will say that a lot of the pingyness in the Chap Custom went away when I installed a quintet of these.

Get thee here and poke around a bit: http://www.fu-tone.com/catalog/ Some of those replacement blocks are pricey. I'd start with the cheaper upgrades like springs and/or saddles and go from there.

If people stop buying tickets, Kiss goes away. Simple.

Ha! That's great. And no shorts onstage!

Yes. It's impossible for them to age gracefully, needing the makeup and schtick to fill arenas. Without that, are old farts willing to go see them in huge numbers, much less bringing their kids? I don't think so.