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When most people think about multiple-necked guitars, they think of rock music — and probably heavy metal at that.

Images of wild rock stars with long, teased hair and zebra pants come to mind, wielding a skull- or devil-horns-encrusted multiple-necked guitar monstrosity, more for show than anything else.

In fact, Spinal Tap is the first band that pops into my head.

And while yes, mutiple-necked guitars (and basses!) do make for a good stage prop, they actually have been around for musical reasons for a very long time.

Renaissance musicians — the OG rock stars

The first multiple-necked guitars and lutes appeared in the Renaissance, as a matter of fact. These instruments, like their modern-day counterparts, had more than one neck that could vary in strings, length, tuning, and number of frets (including fretless), allowing the musician to quickly switch between or use two “instruments” at once.

One example of such an instrument is the contraguitar, which has a traditional fretted six-string neck and a second, harp-like neck fitted with lower “bass” strings. The player had to tune the bass notes according to the song being played such that they could pluck the correct note with their thumb, since there was no way to fret or capo the lower strings.

Instruments like the contraguitar are still in use today by classical guitarists, since composers wrote works specifically for extended-range instruments like them.

Modern multiple-necked guitars

The most common multiple-necked guitars today, of course, are electric. More often than not, if you see one, it will be a double-neck with a 12-string and a six-string. But there are many variations on the theme: guitars with added bass necks, guitar/mandolin combinations, and fretted and fretless necks on the same body, just to name a few.

These instruments are still best used in a live setting when a musician needs to switch between sounds in the same song (for studio work, a double-neck makes little sense), and many musicians have used multiple-necked guitars to great effect on stage over the last 50 years, such as Jimmy Page (Led Zeppelin), Pat Smear (Foo Fighters), and Joe Bonamassa.

However, two musicians, in my opinion, stand head and shoulders above the rest when it comes to playing multiple-neck guitars. These are the people who have not just used a double-neck in place of a mid-song quick-change but have really embraced this type of guitar for the unique instrument that it can be and have created some of the most innovative music with them to date.

Steve Vai

I’ve written about Steve Vai before, but in just the last few months Vai has partnered with Ibanez to come out with his Hydra guitar.

The Hydra is insane. It boasts three necks — a 7-string and 12-string guitar and a 4-string bass — sympathetic harp strings, and countless knobs, dials, and switches that morph the sound in God-only-knows how many ways.

It’s hard to even know where to begin playing a guitar like this, which is why it is all the more amazing to watch Vai create intricate music with the instrument, which you can do on this video:

Luca Stricagnoli

Now, I have the utmost respect for Steve Vai, but there is one man who can do even crazier things with the guitar. That man is Luca Stricagnoli.

I found out about Luca via YouTube. I was in awe of him the first time I saw him, and I am still just as much in awe of him today. Not only does he play multiple necks at the same time, a la Vai, but he also plays his own backing tracks. He simultaneously mimics a drum set, plays rhythm and lead guitar, and sometimes even whistles or adds harmonica — almost as if to show that what he does isn’t that difficult (for him, at least).

Stricagnoli has a number of different guitar setups that he uses, but perhaps the most interesting and versatile is the three-necked acoustic guitar/bass he plays in the video below.

The future of multiple-necked guitars

Multiple-necked guitars are not exactly commonplace, but they certainly have their place in live music. They have been around for centuries and will likely be around for centuries more.

While many musicians have made use of them over the years, it will be interesting where the next generations of artists inspired by the likes of Steve Vai and Luca Stricagnoli take these instruments in the future.

If you are more than an absolute beginner at the guitar, then you are probably aware of, and maybe even know a little about, those little dots on the neck of your instrument.

These dots are called fret markers, and they are there for a very good reason.

Fret markers are a form of inlay, and they serve as a visual guide so that the guitar player can quickly locate where he or she is on the neck at any time.

Or, to put it simply, they tell you which note you’re playing.

These markers have been added to virtually every guitar neck (with the exception of classical guitars) since at least the 1950s. The first Fenders had them, as did the Gibsons of the time.

But what is the history of these dots? Who invented them? And why are they in the positions they are?

The history of fret markers

As for the history of fret markers, it’s often said that they started with the electric guitar revolution in the 1950s. In fact, if you were to ask the big brands (Fender and Gibson), they would probably tell you the same.

While it may be true that fret markers became standard during this time, they weren’t invented by Leo Fender or Ted McCarty. We know that to be true because there are extant examples of much older guitars with fret markers. The oldest known guitar with dots was built around 1805, in fact. (Here’s a similar one from 1850).

Prior to this, guitars and other stringed instruments still featured inlay work on the fretboard, but it was strictly decoration and had no functional value.

So we can say that fret markers were in use as early as 1805 and became commonplace at least by the 1950s, but as to exactly who created them or when they were first used, well, that fact has been lost to history.

But there is another question to consider: Why are they located on certain frets and not others?

Why the standard pattern is standard

The standard pattern for the layout of fret markers is to put them on frets 3, 5, 7, 9, 12, 15, 17, 19, 21, and 24 (where available). But what was the reasoning behind making this the standard?

First, it makes sense to mark the 12th fret — usually done with double dots — because that indicates the octave: the same note, just higher. From there, the pattern just repeats itself, so it makes sense to mark it.

As for the reasoning behind the pattern itself, there is a bit of mystery here as well.

Some have pointed out that the 3rd, 5th, 7th, 9th, and 12th frets, when playing the E string, are all notes of the C major scale. While this makes for a convenient answer, it’s only almost true. The 9th fret on the E string is actually a C#, which of course is not part of the C major scale.

Others have suggested that the dots’ locations are a marriage of functionality and aesthetics. Because standard tuning is not symmetrical, no system of marking frets is going to work for every string. With that being the case, the tradition arose over time to mark certain frets (possibly based on the C major scale) but in a way that added “style points” to the guitar.

That being said, not all guitars follow the “standard” pattern. Russian-made guitars, gypsy-style guitars, and banjos all mark the 10th fret instead, which is a D on the low E string (which is in the C major scale), thus choosing functionality over visuals, if the second explanation above is to be believed.

Fret markers: form and function

Not all guitars use dots for fret markers, either. There is actually quite a lot of variation across guitar makers and styles. Other common styles include rectangles, zig zags, crosses, half moons, and my personal favorite, birds (on PRS Guitars).

Fret markers are a simple yet effective design on modern guitars. They help players orient themselves on the fretboard and find notes quickly, and they can add a bit of flair to make a guitar pop.

And even though we may not know the story of their creation with certainty, they are certainly helpful for players and, when designed well, add to the beauty of the instrument.

The summer after my sophomore year of college, I interned for a summer at a church in Joplin, Missouri. The pay was not great, but to be fair I didn’t really know what I was doing, either.

Exhibit A: I remember one day we had purchased a bunch of food for an event, and I put the food that needed to be in the refrigerator in the freezer instead. Nothing like five gallons of frozen-solid milk on a hot day! Refreshing.

Nevertheless, over the summer I was able to save up enough money from my internship to buy a new guitar. I’d been playing guitar for several years by this point, but I still had my cheap starter Squier and Takamine that badly needed to be upgraded.

There was a local music store in town that I frequented in my search, and I remember walking in one day and seeing an acoustic guitar on display. It was a dreadnaught with a cutaway and a deep-brown cedar top. It caught my eye, and as I picked it up and began to play it, it felt good. Really good.

It was a Seagull S6 guitar, and I had to have it. As soon as I had the cash in hand, I went back and bought it.

I loved that guitar.

I played it all the time.

I knew it inside and out.

I’d play it in my dorm room. I’d sing worship songs with my friends in the chapel. I put on a free concert in the student union with it.

I even won my school’s talent show playing a song I had written on it.

It was my guitar, my companion in life.

Ten years later, and now I’m living in Colorado. I come home from work one day to find the front door of my house wide open. That’s weird, I thought. Maybe my wife didn’t get the door shut all the way when she went to work this morning.

I didn’t think much of it and went inside. I wasn’t in the house for more than a minute when I heard my wife’s car pull up. When she came in, I jokingly teased her about leaving the door open. “I didn’t leave the door open,” she replied.

We stood there and looked at each other.

About five seconds later, it clicked. We’ve been robbed!

I ran upstairs and saw a disheveled mess. The bed mattress was pulled off the frame. Papers were everywhere. Our computer was gone. My wife’s wedding rings were gone. My guitars were gone.

It was an awful, sickening feeling, one I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy.

I immediately bought another Seagull guitar with the insurance money — a different model this time. Actually, I bought two: a six-string M series and a twelve-string S series. But neither felt right. Yes, they were Seagulls; yes, they were high-quality; but neither of them was my guitar.

I ended up selling them both after a year or two. I tried out a few more Seagulls over the years, including an Entourage, which was the newer version of that original S6 I had bought back in Missouri. But it didn’t matter: none of them played or felt like my guitar.

Fast forward another ten years, and now I’m living in the Puget Sound area. I was browsing on Reverb one day when I saw an older Seagull Artist Series guitar for sale for a very reasonable price.

This guitar looked just like my guitar.

It was the same model year as my guitar — 2001.

It had the same look as my guitar, down to the same wear on the sound hole.

It even came with the same case as my guitar had.

The only difference was that this guitar was the higher-end version of the one I had owned. It had a different inlay pattern, slightly different hardware, and a better preamp. But it cost just about the same amount that I had paid for my guitar in the summer of 2001. (In fact, I think it may have even been a little less.)

After I overcame the initial shock of what I was looking at, I made the decision to pull the trigger — how could I not?

As soon as I had it in my hands and played a chord, I knew this was the one. It played right, it felt right, it sounded right.

Everything about it was perfect.

It took ten years, lots of patience, and not a little bit of luck, but I finally got my guitar back.

Ibanez has a long and storied history as one of the premier guitar brands on the planet.

Steve Vai is a guitar virtuoso, and one of the best instrumental rockers of all time.

When the two came together in the 1980s, it was surely a match made in heaven. Vai worked with Ibanez to create revolutionary new guitars that would help propel the company forward and even help create a new genre of music.

But how exactly did Steve Vai end up collaborating with Ibanez to create the iconic, longstanding JEM lineup of electric guitars?

If you want something done right…

As a 20-year-old, a young Steve Vai had begun his professional music career (after learning from the master, Joe Satriani), by joining Frank Zappa’s band.

Up to that point in time, Steve had been a Stratocaster player, but he didn’t really like the way the Fender guitars sounded. He preferred the humbucker sound from a Les Paul, but he didn’t feel the look of the Gibsons was right, either.

After joining Frank Zappa, he began to learn about innovation. Zappa himself would heavily modify his own guitars to get the kind of playability and sounds he wanted out of them. Vai also observed as the new “superstrats” began to appear in the wild, especially EVH’s Frankenstrat.

That was when Vai realized that he could have any guitar he wanted; he just had to do it himself.

The proto-JEMs

He immediately began working with local guitar shops to create the instrument he wanted to play. First and foremost, he wanted 24 frets on the neck, with the last four frets scalloped. Second, he wanted a more angular, stark Strat-style body, complete with deep cutaways to allow access to all of his new upper frets.

The finished products were four proto-JEM models, although “finished” should be in quotes. He still heavily modified them over time. The most unusual mod he performed involved the tremolo system. Like many guitarists at the time, he used a Floyd Rose system, but he didn’t like the fact that he could only bend the notes down — not up. Not one to be deterred, Steve took a hammer and a screwdriver and beat down the wood underneath the tailpiece until they were no longer touching. Vai had invented, however crudely, the first floating tremolo system.

He also experimented heavily with the guitars’ electronics — presumably without using a hammer — until he found a combination of pickups and controls he liked: DiMarzio humbuckers and a five-way switch that included a coil-split option.

Now he had a guitar that he was satisfied with — one that could do and play the things he wanted to do and play.

A match made in heaven

He next wondered if perhaps other guitarists would want to play a guitar like his. After all, if he was satisfied with it, then maybe other people would be too.

He sent his design to a number of guitar companies, but what he got back were just their own stock guitars with some minor tweaks — not his guitar.

Unbeknownst to Steve Vai, the Ibanez company was scheming. They, like Vai, had seen the ascension of the superstrat and wanted to get in on the action. Although they had some significant artist endorsements, they didn’t have a ringer. What they wanted was their own version of Eddie Van Halen. They knew exactly who that was too: Steve Vai.

They reached out to him about the same time he was shopping his guitar around at the major brands. They sent him a guitar with some educated guesses about what Vai would want. In response, Vai sent them his prototype guitar and said, “No, make this.”

And they did.

The JEM is born

Within three weeks, Steve had an Ibanez in his hands that exactly matched the specs on his own guitar. Steve would later recall about the instrument, “That was the guitar. It was just a killer machine.”

Thus began the partnership between Ibanez and Vai that resulted in the JEM series of guitars that are still being made 30 years later.

The JEM has featured many unique characteristics over the years. From the floral design on the fretboard to the day-glo colors, a JEM is often easy to pick out of a guitar lineup.

At one point, they made a model called the “DNA” that had Steve’s actual blood(!) mixed in with the paint.

They also released a floral-finish JEM that was based on the pattern of the virtuoso guitarist’s living room curtains.

The Ibanez JEM has become a very good-selling guitar for the company. Sales have always been strong for the line, but when they released a lower-end version called the RG, the numbers took off. The RG has sold similar numbers as Gibson’s Les Pauls and only trails the Stratocaster in terms of pure numbers.

But why the monkey grip?

There is one question, however, that still needs to be answered. One of the most obvious characteristics of the JEM guitar is the handle cut out of the upper bout — the so-called “monkey grip.” What purpose does it serve? Why did Vai insist on this feature being included on his guitar?

It turns out, the monkey grip has absolutely no function. It is there for one reason, and one reason alone: to stop other companies from ripping off his design.

Steve knew that other companies would likely “borrow” many of his innovations on the JEM, so he decided to add one element that no one would copy because doing so would be too obvious — thus the monkey grip was born.

It was 1957, and Gibson had a problem.

Specifically, they were losing ground to Fender, whose new-fangled Stratocasters were taking the guitar world by storm. Fender’s flagship guitar sported a space-aged name and a futuristic and innovative body style. At the height of the Space Race, this resonated with the public.

By contrast, the Les Paul seemed like a throwback to the older Spanish and archtop guitars from the previous half-century. While now we view Les Pauls as iconic, Gibson felt that consumers saw the design as outdated at the time.

The guitar of the future…except it wasn’t (yet)

Gibson CEO Ted McCarty gathered together a team of designers to create their own line of futuristic guitars to level the playing field. The team designed and prototyped three different products: the Moderne (which never made it into production), the Explorer, and the Flying V.

The Flying V body style was the brainchild of Seth Lover, who was also responsible for designing Gibson’s first humbucking pickups. He sketched out several designs that were a departure from previous guitars. When he showed McCarty, the Gibson head laughed and said it “looked like a flying V.” The name stuck, and after prototyping, the guitar went into production in 1958.

Initial sales, unfortunately, were abysmal. Fewer than 100 of the first production run of Flying Vs were shipped and sold. Dealers mostly thought the design was too far-fetched, and those who did order them often only purchased a single instrument to display in their window as a curiosity to draw in customers.

As a result of the lack of demand, production was halted shortly afterward.

Lonnie Mack, Albert King, and the British Invasion

Not all was lost, however. Of that first run, several ended up in the hands of professional musicians. Blues legend Lonnie Mack owned an original Flying V that he used as his main guitar for decades. Albert King also played on one. As a lefty, he played a right-handed guitar “upside down,” and the symmetrical body style made it easy for him to play.

Dave Davies from the band The Kinks also purchased an original Flying V. He found the guitar languishing in storage in a shop. The owner pulled it out of its dusty case, and Davies bought it on the spot for $60.

In the mid-1960s, The Kinks would make it big as part of the British Invasion, and Davies’ Flying V brought about a renewed interest in the unique guitar.

Gibson attempted to capitalize on the free advertising by reissuing the guitar in 1966. But the new version fared about as well as the original — only 111 guitars shipped the first year, and it went downhill from there. The second-generation Flying V was discontinued in 1970.

Third time’s the charm

For Gibson, however, the third time was the charm. They released a Flying V yet again in 1975, and this time it stuck. It has been a staple in the company’s electric lineup ever since.

The list of famous guitarists who have played a Flying V is long and illustrious. Metallica’s James Hetfield bought one for $200 while still a teenager as used it as his main guitar during the band’s ascension to stardom. As mentioned, Lonnie Mack and Albert King both owned them. Other guitar greats with a connection to the Flying V include Tom Petty, Billy Gibbons, and even Jimi Hendrix, who ordered a custom left-handed version in 1969.

The popularity of the Flying V is evident in that not only does Gibson still produce them some 65 years after they were first introduced, but many other companies have Flying V-inspired guitars too. It’s a common occurrence to see this kind of guitar being used in many genres, from blues to metal.

While it may have started off life as a not-so-successful attempt to knock the Stratocaster off its throne, the Flying V has endured and made its own unique impact on the history of guitar and rock music.

You might be cool, but you will never be Buddy Guy cool.

If you are a student of the blues, you know that Buddy Guy is one of its elder statesmen. Part of his appeal is his signature guitar, a polka-dot Fender Stratocaster, a unique instrument. No one else has a guitar that looks anything like it. But why polka dots?

As a Black person born in Lettsworth, Louisiana, in 1936, Buddy learned the blues the hard way.

His parents were sharecroppers, so his childhood consisted primarily of picking cotton. He first began playing the guitar on a Diddley bow that he made himself.

When he was in his early teens, he graduated to playing an actual guitar that a friendly man in his neighborhood bought for him. The man saw him sitting on his porch each day, trying to figure out how to play the dilapidated or homemade instruments that he had available to him, and he took pity on the young Buddy, buying him a Harmony acoustic guitar.

Buddy used this gift to full effect. As he became older, he began to play with bands in and around Baton Rouge, but he eventually decided to move to the city with, at the time, the biggest blues music scene — Chicago.

This was a tough decision for Buddy, since his father had recently died and his mother, Isabell, had fallen ill. In fact, in the late 1950s, as Buddy was preparing to move to Illinois to pursue music as a career, he had a discussion about it with his mother.

Her health was failing by this point, so to make the blow of leaving softer, he promised her that he was going to go to Chicago, make a lot of money, and come back to buy her a polka-dot Cadillac.

Buddy moved to Chicago and soon fell in with blues legend Muddy Waters, who hired him and helped jump-start his career. Unfortunately, his career didn’t take off in time. Isabell passed away in 1968, just a few years before Buddy made it big.

As a way of honoring his promise to his mother, many years later he contacted Fender and started ordering polka-dot guitars. He can also be seen wearing polka-dot shirts in many live shows.

Buddy Guy eventually made it big. He worked with such greats as Muddy, Howlin’ Wolf, and Koko Taylor. He influenced an entire generation of bluesmen such as Eric Clapton, SRV, and Jimi Hendrix. He continues to have a successful career even in his mid-80s. He even owns a popular blues club in Chicago, Buddy Guy’s Legends.

Buddy Guy is a true blues legend, but the coolest thing about him? He never forgot his mamma.

Number One is quite possibly the most iconic guitar in the blues, belonging to the most iconic blues player, Stevie Ray Vaughan.

Stevie played many guitars over the years, but there was just something special about the Fender Stratocaster that he played in every show and on every album from the moment he acquired it. His relationship with Number One was almost romantic in nature — he even called the guitar his “first wife.”

He received the guitar in 1973 from Ray Henning, the owner of the Heart of Texas music shop in Austin. The story goes that SRV saw the sunburst Fender in Ray’s shop and immediately knew it was special, without even playing it. He arranged a trade with the owner, switching it out for a 1963 Stratocaster. Henning happily traded guitars, since the ’63 was in much better condition than the soon-to-be Number One.

In an interesting twist, the previous owner of SRV’s new Strat was a big name in music at the time, Christopher Cross. He supposedly traded the instrument for a Les Paul because he was looking for a thicker sound. (Stevie, by contrast, had no problem finding a thick sound with it!)

The guitar itself was a mix-and-match affair. It comprised a 1962 body, a 1963 neck, and pickups from 1959. The instrument was also well used by the time Stevie put his hands on it in ’73, notwithstanding the nightly abuse he put it through over the next 27 years.

Stevie Ray and his guitar tech, Rene Martinez, modified the guitar quite a bit over the years, usually because of necessary repairs. SRV was quoted as saying, “[Number One] was rebuilt more times than a custom Chevy.”

The neck took the brunt of the abuse. SRV was not a tall man, standing only 5’5”, but he had large, strong hands. The chunky, D-shaped neck was a perfect fit for him, but his heavy playing and finger strength, combined with the ridiculously heavy-gauge strings he used (generally 13s or even thicker!), were no match for the fretboard. The neck was refretted so many times, in fact, that the fretboard had to be re-profiled just to continue using the guitar.

Eventually, the neck was damaged beyond repair. (The time that SRV threw it against a wall, breaking the headstock, did not help.) Martinez replaced the neck with one from another of Stevie’s Strats, but that neck broke a month before Stevie’s death when a piece of stage rigging fell on it!

Another mass casualty of Stevie’s guitar playing were tremolo arms, which he would break constantly. From the heavy strings and extra springs in the tremolo, it took so much force to use the bars that they would just break.

Stevie also replaced the stock tremolo unit for a left-handed one at some point early on, with the result that the arm’s pivot point was above the strings and not below them. He did this to emulate Jimi Hendrix and Otis Rush, both of whom were lefties who played right-handed guitars upside down.

Perhaps the most distinctive feature on Number One, and many of his other guitars, were the “SRV” decals he stuck to the pickguard. These, too, had to be replaced often due to wear and tear, and changed in appearance over the years. Rene stated that he often had to scour truck stops to find just the right kind of stickers.

Stevie used and abused Number One until his death in 1990. The guitar was responsible for many of the most memorable blues songs of all time, and for many of us, it still only takes hearing one note to know it’s SRV playing his beloved “first wife.”

After his death, Rene reinstalled the original 1963 neck and gave the guitar to SRV’s brother, Jimmie Vaughan, who still has the iconic instrument. According to Jimmie, it’s locked away in a bank vault with Stevie Ray’s other equipment, because “every time I go back to that stuff, it kicks my ass, because I have to go through it all again.” I feel for you, Jimmie.

While SRV’s Number One is securely locked away, Fender did work with Jimmie to authorize 100 replicas to be made in the early 1990s. Originally sold for $10,000, their selling price now reaches upward of $50,000.

Every guitarist knows Epiphone, Gibson’s “little brother” brand for beginners and people who can’t afford The Real Thing(TM).

Or at least that is a common view of the brand. In actuality, Epiphone does make more budget-friendly guitars, but they also make high-quality, unique instrument models, and some guitarists even prefer the feel of Epiphone over their Gibson counterparts.

One thing remains true, however: Gibson and its budget brand Epiphone share a lot of commonalities. Epiphone has its own versions of Les Pauls, SGs, and 335s. The brands have worked together to create a guitar empire and have quality instruments at every conceivable price point.

But things weren’t always so cozy between Epiphone and its parent company Gibson. In fact, for the first half of the 20th century, they were fierce rivals.

Anastasios Stathopoulos, Greek Instrument Maker

Epiphone can trace its roots back almost 150 years to the town of Smyrna, Turkey. It was there in 1873 that the Greek immigrant Anastasios Stathopoulos first set up shop, making and selling lutes, violins, and traditional Greek instruments.

Stathopoulos continued to grow his instrument shop until the turn of the century. By that time, the government was imposing high taxes on Greeks in Turkey, which made life difficult for Anastasios and his family.

In 1903, he decided to move his family to America, and soon after moving to New York City, he reopened his shop in his new country. In addition to lutes and violins, they began to make mandolins, which were in high demand at the time.

Epi Takes the Helm

Unfortunately, after 12 years in New York, Anastasios died, leaving the business in the hands of his 22-year-old son Epimanondas, or Epi for short. Thankfully, Epi was a natural businessman and knew his father’s business well.

Soon after Epi took control, the company began to focus itself on manufacturing banjos, which were starting to grow in popularity in the 1920s. By 1928, the business had gone all-in, renaming itself the “Epiphone Banjo Company” and later just “Epiphone.” Epi had taken his own name and added the Greek word for sound, phōnē, to create the new moniker.

In the same year, the company started to build and sell archtop guitars. This was the beginning of their rivalry with the biggest guitar company at the time: Gibson.

Rivalry with Gibson

Initially Epiphone’s guitars did not stack up well against the competition. The first Epiphones were too quiet, which in a world without amplifiers was a huge deal. By the early ’30s, however, the company was producing comparable guitars to Gibson. Throughout the decade that followed, both brands competed fiercely with one another for market dominance.

In 1943, Epi died of leukemia, leaving his younger brothers Orphie and Frixo to run the company. The two brothers continued to grow the company until the early ’50s, when family and financial problems caused significant issues with the company. They attempted to move the company to Philadelphia during this time, but many of their employees wouldn’t go. The resulting lack of trained staff in the new location caused quality issues and damaged the brand.

Merger with Gibson

In 1957, former rival Gibson offered to buy the struggling Epiphone. The deal was actually suggested by none other than Les Paul. Gibson, of course, by that time was producing Les Paul guitars, but the famous musician had first built his “log” electric guitar in the Epiphone factory.

Les suggested to Gibson CEO Ted McCarty that he should offer to buy Epiphone. McCarty decided to reach out to Orphie, who sold the entire company to Gibson for $20,000 — about $200,000 today.

Gibson brought the Epiphone brand in house and over time developed it into the massive budget brand that it is today, and it’s safe to say they made their money back! Yet in 2022, even knowing the backstory, it’s hard to imagine that these brands that share so much started out vying against one another.

We all know the big two guitar companies are Fender and Gibson. Many of us who play guitar also have our smaller favorite companies: Godin, G&L — heck, even Harley Benton.

There is one company, however, that is often overlooked, even though it has a “seat at the big boy table.” In fact, Ibanez is the third-largest guitar manufacturer on the planet, and yet (in my opinion) they don’t get the love they deserve.

Let’s do our part to fix that.

The Hoshino Gakki Company

Ibanez didn’t start out life as Ibanez. The company began in 1908 as Hoshino Gakki. Initially Hoshino Gakki was a division of the larger Hoshino Shoten, a bookstore chain headquartered in Nagoya, Japan.

Hoshino Gakki sold sheet music but soon began importing Spanish-style acoustic guitars as well. One of the most popular imported guitar brands during this pre-WWII era were those designed and built by Spanish luthier Salvador Ibáñez.

In 1935, Hoshino Gakki decided that an even better plan than importing guitars would be making their own. It’s a bit unclear if the company imported Ibáñez’s guitars or just knew about them, but in any event the company was soon manufacturing their own “Ibanez Salvador” acoustic guitars. (It does not appear the actual Ibáñez had any awareness of this.) The brand name was later shortened to Ibanez, and it stuck.

The Era of the Lawsuit Guitars

In the late 1950s, Ibanez decided to enter the US guitar market. At that time, both Fender and Gibson were dealing with quality issues, leaving many musicians frustrated and looking for better instruments. The Japanese company saw an opening. They began to build and sell copies of popular American-made guitars, including Fenders, Gibsons, and Rickenbackers.

These Ibanez copies were less expensive than their American counterparts, but they were often better made. They were constructed well, performed well, and had better electronics, all for less money than the original. In the ’60s and ’70s, business was booming for Ibanez.

Eventually, Gibson took notice and in 1977 filed a lawsuit against Ibanez for copying their guitars. The suit was settled out of court the next year.

The Era of Innovation and Diversity

Normally, a lawsuit like this would have had major implications for a company, but this didn’t stop Ibanez; it didn’t even slow them down. By the late ’70s, enough players had gotten their hands on the Japanese guitars that their quality was well known. All Ibanez had to do was come up with original designs and continue to make great guitars — which is exactly what they did.

Ibanez continued to grow in the 1980s and 1990s by creating their own take on traditional Fender and Gibson designs. They began to focus on innovation and diversity, which led them to design and build guitars for jazz, progressive rock, and even nu metal players.

Some of the more famous Ibanez players over the years are household names in the guitar world: Steve Vai (who created the iconic JEM series), Joe Satriani, Paul Gilbert, Marty Friedman, Pat Metheny, and Paul Stanley. And not to be outdone, the band Korn first popularized Ibanez’s seven-string guitar.

The TS808 Tube Screamer

While there is much more Ibanez history that could be told, no story would be complete without mentioning the company’s revolutionary TS808 overdrive pedal. Created during the tail end of the lawsuit era, it is seen by many guitarists as the “holy grail” of guitar pedals. Such guitar greats as Eric Johnson and Carlos Santana popularized the pedal, and of course, Stevie Ray Vaughan used a Tube Screamer when building his iconic sound.

Ibanez has a rich and storied history, and although they may have originally copied guitars and even “borrowed” their name, they have transformed into creating some of the most innovative, top-quality guitars on the market today.

For guitar aficionados, 1965 is an important year.

Specifically, January 5, 1965, marks the fateful day when Leo Fender sold his guitar company to, of all people…CBS?

Yep, the Columbia Broadcasting System. The same people who brought us such hits as Survivor and NCIS bought a guitar company because…well, why would a TV company want to make musical instruments, anyway?

Leo Fender thought he was dying

Leo Fender was a sick man. At least that’s what he told himself. In the 1950s, he went to the doctor due to ongoing health concerns and was diagnosed with a streptococcal sinus infection. The effects of his illness lingered on for years and were so bad, it seems, that by 1964 Leo thought the end was near.* He decided to get his affairs in order, which meant selling Fender.

He first went to his business partner, Donald Randall, and offered him a deal to buy the company for a cool $1.5 million. Randall didn’t have that kind of money, but he told Leo that he would attempt to find a buyer.

Randall eventually found CBS and they became interested in buying the company. Leo agreed to sell Fender for $13 million (that’s $118 million in 2022 dollars), and the contract was signed just after the turn of the new year in 1965.

A more diverse CBS, but not in a good way

In the 1960s, CBS was on a mission. That mission could be described in one word: diversification.

CBS’s goal was to treat their business like the stock market by purchasing holdings in a number of different industries, which is exactly what they did. During this time they acquired such varied holdings as Woman’s Day magazine, Steinway pianos, Fender, and —yes, really — the New York Yankees baseball team.

Diversification is a good idea in a financial portfolio, but it’s not always the best business strategy, something CBS found out the hard way.

Prioritizing cost over quality

Once they purchased Fender, it was clear that they did not understand the guitar market or what players actually wanted. CBS’s main goal was to cut costs and maximize profits, which resulted in changes over the next 20 years that led to a significant decrease in the quality of Fender guitars.

The material used to fabricate pick guards was changed. They changed the finish on guitars from nitrocellulose to polyester, resulting in a less natural feel. Name-brand tuning machines and quality nickel hardware were replaced with cheaper alternatives. The traditional four-bolt neck pocket was redesigned with just three bolts.

Buying back the brand

The result of changes like this and additional cost-cutting measures caused a series of quality issues with Fender guitars. By the mid 1980s, the brand was hurting. In 1985, Fender employees took the matter into their own hands by buying the company back from CBS, and the present-day Fender Musical Instruments Corporation was born.

Fender started over again. They literally closed down the factory and retrained every employee, and in the ensuing years they began to see an increase in quality. Today, of course, they have a very good reputation among players and are back to being one of the top guitar brands in the world.

As for CBS, they also divested themselves of Steinway and several other musical instrument companies when they sold Fender. (And they sold the Yankees to George Steinbrenner in 1973.)

Leo Fender and others believed that the CBS acquisition would help the guitar company by bringing in more money and personnel. Instead, the “CBS years” became a dark stain on the Fender company because of their shift to focus on mass production over quality.

*Leo Fender ended up going on to start Music Man and G&L guitars. He passed away in 1991.