Here are the pics:
The guy who sold it lives about 150 km from here, so I gave it a chance and went there on the same day just before the auction had ended. This was on 27th December. The guitar was pictured with a Floyd Rose finetuning bridge, he didn’t even tell that he still had the original wraparound bridge. He bought it in ’83 and had it restored by Hoyer, a german guitar manufacturer in 1985. He thought it was a ’63 but some guy told him it looked like a ’76, so he added that in his ebay auction. But there’s no ’76 with filled holes of a short Maestro… When I went there for the second time he told me that just before the auction had ended, an American had mailed him that it might as well be a ’63.
When I saw and touched the guitar I knew that this is it. It feels like my old one and different than any of the 3 Bicentennials that I had the chance to play in the last years. They all were much heavier, much bigger neck and not so ergonomic. This one is different again. It went through a lot of changes in the past, but the main things are still there – body and neck without any breaks, original tuners, PU’s, and bridge – and that’s what I’m looking for. The first owner was a guy who played Tanzmusik and Disco, so it might have had an overall Golden Mist or Silver finish. The headstock has the original carving but is all mahogany now – maybe it had been one of the models with an all golden headstock. There’s no serial number anymore as well, but I don’t care, I know what it is. The new finish comes without any scratch at all, it’s the standard Hoyer laquer which is no nitro but it’s very hard and comfortable to play too, but all in all the headstock seems a little fragile to me. Tuners and trussrod work fine. Trussrod cover is missing. The neck – well I don’t know enough about slim taper necks, but if THIS is a slim taper neck, this is pretty slim. But what the heck, I live with that too, it’s a ‘63 Firebird and the neck is faster than any on my other guitars. Maybe they reduced the heaviness of the neck… but I can’t see anything. This guitar is quite balanced for a Firebird – my other one was different... The frets still have the fret edge binding and don’t show any signs of intense playing. Nickel PU covers and chrome TPBR compensated tailpiece. New pickguard, pots and switch, but the old ones are still in the case. It plays like butter and has that wailing sound, makes me think of the differences between JW’s sound and Floyd Radford or Clem Clempson playing JW’s licks on a Les Paul or ES. Nice to have that difference right at hand now. This is a beautiful guitar, I can’t put her down.
I'll make some more pictures.
