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Martin Barre's Vintage Hamers


LarryC

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Posted

Not sure. I just know that between Pearly Gates, Lifeson's 355, and Martin's Blackburst, that's pretty much the holy trinity of guitardom for me.

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Posted

Good stuff. Thanks for raising the thread back up and welcome to the HFC Moxie!

p.s. Props on the Mystery Men quote in your .sig. That dude can, like, cut guns in half ... with his mind. ;)

Posted

Thanks gents.

Somewhere out there on the web about 10+ years ago I found a video of Martin circa '79 doing an in-store appearance somewhere in the States with his Blackburst, but damned if I can find it now. But I did just find this righteous quote in reaction to TAAB2: "And vocally, Ian can’t really go there anymore. He’s looking at more flute playing. Actually, I don’t know what he’s looking at, but it’s not the heavy Jethro Tull that I want to represent. That’s all my territory. And I shall embrace it with open arms."

http://www.goldminemag.com/article/jethro-tull-guitarist-martin-barre-takes-high-road-on-taab2-rift

  • 2 weeks later...
Posted

Just been re-reading a lot of old Tull interviews from the independent Tull fanzine, A New Day, as collected in Jethro Tull - The A New Day Tapes: Vol. One. OUCH!!! I'd forgotten about this bit...

--------------------

July 1991

IAN: Martin, why have you changed away from Hamer after all this time?

MARTIN: Hmmm...I think it's just they seem to be so motivated by making profit that quality control suffers. It came to a head with Hamer over what is more of a personal thing, where I think they had lost interest in me as an endorsee. I had a big problem with a guitar in Chicago. It was actually just falling to pieces and they wouldn't send anybody down to fix it for me, even though I'd arranged to meet them in Chicago so they could have the guitar for a day. The end result was they sent me a package to the hotel with all the parts in. Like, "Here are the parts. Do it yourself!" So I thought, forget it, you know. If they don't think it's important enough to send anybody from the factory to sort out the guitar then obviously I don't owe them anything.

IAN: It should be said that Paul Hamer was by this stage no longer with the company. He was bought out by his fellow directors and basically got kicked out of his own company, and that was really when things started going downhill. Paul is still a personal friend of all of us, a great guy.

MARTIN: Yes, unfortunately Hamer guitars now have got nothing to do with Paul Hamer, they just have the name.

IAN: Paul will have to change his name now! Paul Fender or something?

MARTIN: He's going to build guitars still. He can make a guitar called a "Paul Hamer" guitar, but not a Hamer guitar, due to copyright.

Posted

Just been re-reading a lot of old Tull interviews from the independent Tull fanzine, A New Day, as collected in Jethro Tull - The A New Day Tapes: Vol. One. OUCH!!! I'd forgotten about this bit...

--------------------

July 1991

IAN: Martin, why have you changed away from Hamer after all this time?

MARTIN: Hmmm...I think it's just they seem to be so motivated by making profit that quality control suffers. It came to a head with Hamer over what is more of a personal thing, where I think they had lost interest in me as an endorsee. I had a big problem with a guitar in Chicago. It was actually just falling to pieces and they wouldn't send anybody down to fix it for me, even though I'd arranged to meet them in Chicago so they could have the guitar for a day. The end result was they sent me a package to the hotel with all the parts in. Like, "Here are the parts. Do it yourself!" So I thought, forget it, you know. If they don't think it's important enough to send anybody from the factory to sort out the guitar then obviously I don't owe them anything.

IAN: It should be said that Paul Hamer was by this stage no longer with the company. He was bought out by his fellow directors and basically got kicked out of his own company, and that was really when things started going downhill. Paul is still a personal friend of all of us, a great guy.

MARTIN: Yes, unfortunately Hamer guitars now have got nothing to do with Paul Hamer, they just have the name.

IAN: Paul will have to change his name now! Paul Fender or something?

MARTIN: He's going to build guitars still. He can make a guitar called a "Paul Hamer" guitar, but not a Hamer guitar, due to copyright.

Quoted for awesomeness.

Posted

^^^

An illustration of the depth of Jol's asshattery, that it would inspire Kizanski to use the word "awesomeness" in association with anything having to do with Jethro Tull.

Posted

^^^

An illustration of the depth of Jol's asshattery, that it would inspire Kizanski to use the word "awesomeness" in association with anything having to do with Jethro Tull.

ALSO quoted for awesomeness... And TRUTH.

Posted

Hard to believe from that interview that Ian and Martin don't even speak anymore...

Jethro_Tull_04.jpg

Martin is still waaaaaay pissed off about Thick as a Brick 2 and Ian's decades-long habit of being, shall we say, challenged in the area of human resources: http://www.goldminemag.com/article/jethro-tull-guitarist-martin-barre-takes-high-road-on-taab2-rift

But did things really go downhill after Paul Hamer left? I mean, I think my '95 Duotone P-90, '96 Standard, and '05 B12M are every bit as good as my '82 Sunburst in materials, build quality, playability...pretty much everything.

  • 1 year later...
  • 2 months later...
Posted

Found this by accident. So apparently, in addition to Martin's black mando with binding, blackburst and whiteburst with crown inlays, as well as his actual sunburst with dot inlays, he had a red one without binding like Andy Summers'...

post-107887-0-74310400-1423533308_thumb.

And what the hell is THIS?!..

post-107887-0-26702500-1423533570_thumb.

http://jethrotull.proboards.com/post/8451

The inscription reads: "This guitar was the first 'Sunburst' Hamer ever made. [?!] It was customized for Jethro Tull guitarist Martin Barre and used to record the 'A' lp."

Posted

The first BLACK Sunburst...

Posted

The first BLACK Sunburst...

Just going on what the user posted because I can't read the plaque. I hope you're right. In any case, next to Lifeson's ES-355, this is the on'y other axe I'd consider stealing.

Posted

Andrew, on 10 Mar 2013 - 05:32 AM, said:

The stand-in bass player for 79 (forgot his name) also had a sunburst Sunburst (not to play onstage)

You mean Tony Williams or Dave Pegg? Pegg played on the '79 American Stormwatch tour. Williams filled in on the '78 Heavy Horses tour, as John Glascock was shuffling off the mortal coil.

------

There was a photo floating around from 1978 of Tony Williams with an early Hamer Standard Bass backstage at the Madison Square Garden Jethro Tull concert. Since most of those J. Tull guys had beards and looked somewhat similar..and Tull juggling bassists alot during that time...it took me a while,to figure out the year and who the guy with the bass was. After I figured it out, I tracked Tony down and he was kind enough to clarify a few things about the Hamer Bass. As it turned out, that bass was actually John Entwistle's and John loaned it to him as a backup bass for the tour...PROVIDED HE DROP IT OFF TO HAMER FOR SOME WORK TO BE DONE ON IT WHEN THE TOUR HIT CHICAGO AREA. Tony said his main bass was normally a Fender Tele and that Entwistle's Hamer had a really huge neck, so he didn't use it much.

Posted

The first BLACK Sunburst...

Just going on what the user posted because I can't read the plaque. I hope you're right. In any case, next to Lifeson's ES-355, this is the on'y other axe I'd consider stealing.

Yeah, Serial, I hope you're right.

Posted

The first BLACK Sunburst...

Just going on what the user posted because I can't read the plaque. I hope you're right. In any case, next to Lifeson's ES-355, this is the on'y other axe I'd consider stealing.

Yeah, Serial, I hope you're right.

Brian Williams will vouch for him, I think he was there when they painted it... :ph34r:

Posted

Andrew, on 10 Mar 2013 - 05:32 AM, said:

The stand-in bass player for 79 (forgot his name) also had a sunburst Sunburst (not to play onstage)

You mean Tony Williams or Dave Pegg? Pegg played on the '79 American Stormwatch tour. Williams filled in on the '78 Heavy Horses tour, as John Glascock was shuffling off the mortal coil.

------

There was a photo floating around from 1978 of Tony Williams with an early Hamer Standard Bass backstage at the Madison Square Garden Jethro Tull concert. Since most of those J. Tull guys had beards and looked somewhat similar..and Tull juggling bassists alot during that time...it took me a while,to figure out the year and who the guy with the bass was. After I figured it out, I tracked Tony down and he was kind enough to clarify a few things about the Hamer Bass. As it turned out, that bass was actually John Entwistle's and John loaned it to him as a backup bass for the tour...PROVIDED HE DROP IT OFF TO HAMER FOR SOME WORK TO BE DONE ON IT WHEN THE TOUR HIT CHICAGO AREA. Tony said his main bass was normally a Fender Tele and that Entwistle's Hamer had a really huge neck, so he didn't use it much.

Egad, I'm showing my age, but I was at the MSG gig. Tony played a T-Bass...

post-107887-0-24627300-1423593018_thumb.

...but also played a P-bass on a few gigs...

post-107887-0-52138900-1423593099_thumb.

I think this is the Hamer mentioned above...

post-107887-0-22695200-1423593181_thumb.

Posted

Yep.....I own another early one just like it, so I was wondering what happened to the one he was holding.

I was surprised when he said it was Entwistle's. Had I known that Entwistle had a couple of early Hamer Basses back when I sold him my white '63 Fender Bass VI back in the 80s, I would have insisted on a trade rather than a straight sale.

Oh well......

Posted

Had I known that Entwistle had a couple of early Hamer Basses back when I sold him my white '63 Fender Bass VI back in the 80s, I would have insisted on a trade rather than a straight sale.

I'm surprised you of all people didn't know that.

His name is in all of the early catalogs where they listed all of their famous customers.

Posted

He was supposed to have used this 12 String Hamer "Quad" Bass back in 1979 for the Quadophinia Soundtrack. I have the book "Bass Culture" that shows many of the basses and guitars Entwistle owned and I just looked................no Hamers are shown or mentioned in the text................he obviously used them. Small PIC of said bass. 5xvfpg.jpg

Posted

He was supposed to have used this 12 String Hamer "Quad" Bass back in 1979 for the Quadophinia Soundtrack. I have the book "Bass Culture" that shows many of the basses and guitars Entwistle owned and I just looked................no Hamers are shown or mentioned in the text................he obviously used them. Small PIC of said bass. 5xvfpg.jpg

Any pix available of Entwistle playing his Hamer?

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