Japanese Surf Mania: Guyatone LG-350T "Sharp 5" Guitar

Here's a cool obscure Japanese guitar - one I found a few years ago on Ebay by searching under the term "project"- which is how I have found some of the weirder instruments I own!

Guyatone was one of the many Japanese manufacturers that cranked out all sorts of creative, wacky guitars during the 1960s, though not in the quantities that Teisco did. I had seen some fairly mundane Guyatones over the years, and a few that were pretty weird - they had been of OK quality - probably about the same as the better Teiscos. In fact, one of the ugliest basses I own is a 1966 Guyatone EB-8 - I promise I'll write a post on it someday!



When I saw the listing for this blue sparkle 350-T, I could tell it was a bit more of a "serious" instrument than the other Guyatones I had seen - it looked like it was built more to the quality of the 1960s Yamaha guitars, which are excellent instruments.

The guitar was listed as a project for a few reasons:
- there was a small crack showing in the finish behind the headstock, sign of either a repaired headstock break or a hard hit
- the control electronics were missing, though the knobs and pickup selector switch were present
- two saddles were missing from the bridge



But the instrument was really COOL looking - and at the end of the auction it was mine - for less than $100 !!

I have done some research on this guitar - and found that this style of Guyatone was associated with a Japanese guitar band from the 60s named The Sharp 5 - who were at one point Japan's answer to the Ventures. Guyatone built the members of the band guitars, though apparently their instruments were of a set-neck construction, as opposed to the bolt-on construction of my 350-T. There are some set-neck examples out there, but these are hugely sought after in Japan and very expensive. But I did find a catalog page from 1968 pointing out the Sharp 5 connection:



I have no idea how many of these instruments were made nor how much 35,000 yen was in US $ in 1968. But by comparison, the simpler Guyatone LG-125T and LG-127T are priced at 12,000 and 12,700 yen respectively. And I doubt many were exported to the US, since I haven't seen another one in my many years of guitar hunting!

Note the matching EB-9 bass !! OOOOO!!!!!

Once I got the guitar in my hands, the Mosrite and Fender influence became very obvious.

The two single coil pickups look almost like copies of Jaguar pickups, down to the metal "claw" surrounds. The bridge and tremelo are somewhat similar to those on the Jaguar as well, though the tailpiece is bit more substantial, and the bridge has roller saddles instead of Fenders "rocking" mechanism.





The deep German-carve and binding around the edge is pure Mosrite - beautifully done as is the binding. The back of the body has a Fender style rear scoop. The zero fret and chromed string nut are once again very Mosrite - but the headstock is pure Guyatone.



The body is fairly heavy, though I wouldn't be surprised if its carved from solid mahogany - as was used on the nicer Teiscos. The pickguard is thick dark blue plexiglas, in the style of Rickenbacker.



I managed to find some saddles that I could adapt to the bridge at a guitar show - I think from a Kawai or Telstar guitar bridge - and I strung up the guitar with some heavy-weight flatwounds - and after about an hours worth of soldering and fidgeting - I had it up and running!

The guitar is quite Jaguar like, though with a bassier-tone to it. The guitar sounds really good with an overdrive or fuzz pedal - a nice crunchy sound and not too prone to feedback it seems. The neck pickup is VERY bassy and loud - I may need to adjust the respective pickup heights to better balance the sound.

The string spacing is a bit narrow for my tastes, though that sensation may also be due to the very heavy strings I have on the guitar. The neck is dead straight - even with the heavy strings and no adjustment of the truss-rod - which I believe adjusts at the base of the neck (forget if I looked when I had it opened up - was a while ago!).

So who has the matching bass for me ???



UPDATE - 3/09/2010

This is a Guyatone LG-350T DX - DX for deluxe I assume !

I came across this instrument in an Ebay auction recently - it was in Japan, not surprisingly.

This appears to be the same guitar though in excellent condition and with the original hard shell case. The differences are that this instrument is equiped with gold-plated hardware (worn in the pics), fitted with three of single coil pickups, and actually has "Sharp 5" graphics on the headstock and case.

Very cool - not sure how the single coils are wired, but the listing noted that 7 combinations were possible with the combination of the regular and mini-toggle switch.

This auction did end at the astronomical price of US $1820 !!!