Why no UK major guitar manufacturers?
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Topic: Why no UK major guitar manufacturers?
Posted By: Gerinski
Subject: Why no UK major guitar manufacturers?
Date Posted: March 22 2013 at 14:38
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With the UK being the cradle of much pop-rock, the beat, psychedelic rock, prog, hard-rock, metal etc, it's kind of surprising that none of the major electric guitar manufacturers came from the UK. Fender, Gibson, Rickenbacker, Paul Reed Smith, BC Rich, Epiphone, Jackson... all from the US. Ibanez, Yamaha or Roland (if we can consider them as guitar builders) from Japan. In fact the same can be extended to keyboards and synths, with perhaps EMS being the only really major UK manufacturer. Why do you think it was so?
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Replies:
Posted By: Ajay
Date Posted: March 22 2013 at 18:50
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Geopolitics. The first electric guitars were developed as an alternative to the steel guitar. The steel guitar was a Hawaiian invention which became popular in the US as a result of cultural diffusion following on from the US annexation of Hawaii. The electric guitar replaced the steel guitar in the American genres in which the steel had found a niche - swing, country and the blues - and became the premier instrument in the new genre of rock and roll. When young post-war Britishers imitated Americans, the music and the guitar came with it. The US head start on the electric guitar industry, plus the British desire for genuine American instruments, ruled out British competition on more than a boutique level. |
Posted By: Gerinski
Date Posted: March 23 2013 at 10:42
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Dean, I never meant to hurt your British pride, it was just a very plain question. You have a point with amps and the Premier drums (which incidentally I had forgotten in my blog article about Prog instruments and I have just edited accordingly) but don't compare Burns or Vox guitars with Gibsons, PRS's or BC Rich's... And are you sure that the Mellotron was genuinely British?
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Posted By: Dean
Date Posted: March 23 2013 at 16:03
fixed  ------------- What? |
Posted By: ESHWOR KC
Date Posted: June 21 2013 at 04:45
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Im don't think the wood or natural resources are as big an issue as it would seem. We have Gordon Smith guitars (currently the longest running guitar maker in the Uk) and of course there was once Burns in the 60-70's. I think its more to do with the lure of Americana for the british public and it also doesn't help that most if not all of our guitar playing idols play/played US instruments, so the allure to be just like your idols surely has something to do with it. Also you have to factor in resale value to the equation as well. For instance Gordon Smith makes fine guitars with a playability and fit & finish more consitent than Gibson or Fender, rarely have I picked up a new Gordon smith and seen fit or even set up issues and on the whole i believe them to be better quality , but here's the thing, you can buy their LP shaped body and it has all the tone you want plus they all come standard with coil taps and brass nuts that need no work but it costs half what a new LP would yet when you come to try and sell them you loose half your money right away where the Gibson will retian most of its value. What should matter to most people is a guitar that made solid,plays great and has the tone you want but unfortunately most people like to gaze at the headstocks to deem a guitars worth. Should there come a time when a band explodes on the scene playing Gordon Smiths then we may see a change but i doubt it. |
Posted By: Gerinski
Date Posted: June 21 2013 at 05:55
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A very cool British guitar was the 1984 Bond Electraglide, 1-piece carbon-fiber body-neck, anodized aluminium fretboard with sawtooth shape instead of frets, adjustable nut height, pickup selection by 5 push-buttons, tone adjustment by 3 digital switches, LED display... Sadly it was a failure and I don't know about its sound, but I find it really cool!   |
Posted By: chopper
Date Posted: June 21 2013 at 06:23
| There are independent guitar makers in the UK but we manufacture very little of anything these days, so why should guitars be any different? |
Posted By: Dean
Date Posted: June 21 2013 at 06:44
http://www.thegearpage.net/board/archive/index.php/t-625104.html" rel="nofollow - http://www.thegearpage.net/board/archive/index.php/t-625104.html nice  ------------- What? |
ESHWOR KC wrote:Posted By: stonebeard
Date Posted: June 21 2013 at 06:45
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You start out niche and if you're lucky you become major. At this stage you'd be lucky to even get that far. Do you think a new company could even try to compete with Gibson, Fender, and Ibanez on their scale? Best they could do is small-business level. ------------- http://soundcloud.com/drewagler" rel="nofollow - My soundcloud. Please give feedback if you want! |
Posted By: Gerinski
Date Posted: June 21 2013 at 06:54
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Posted By: Gerinski
Date Posted: June 21 2013 at 07:02
I know what you mean but you never know that, look at keyboards, the Swedish Nords (Clavia) started in the 90's and they have become very appreciated. Of course guitars are a more traditional instrument than electronics but still...
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Posted By: Neelus
Date Posted: June 21 2013 at 07:06
I'm glad you never evaluated my university dissertation.  ------------- 
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Posted By: cstack3
Date Posted: June 21 2013 at 15:09
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The bass I'm holding in my avatar was built by Hugh Manson, of Exeter, Devon UK. He is Steve Howe's luthier and also builds guitars & basses for Matthew Bellamy, John Paul Jones, Martin Barre & many others. Hugh's brother Andy builds acoustic guitars for JPJ and many others. Brilliant chaps! The Brits did lead the revolution with guitars by Burns, and folks like Brian May used Burns pickups in their own guitars. Here are links to some of my favorite "Brit builders" a) Hugh Manson http://www.performing-musician.com/pm/jun09/articles/techthat.htm" rel="nofollow - http://www.performing-musician.com/pm/jun09/articles/techthat.htm b) Giffin Guitars (not all are happy that he moved to the USA!) http://www.destroyallguitars.com/giffin" rel="nofollow - http://www.destroyallguitars.com/giffin c) Status Graphite (carbon fiber guitars made in the U.K., must be seen!!) http://www.status-graphite.com/" rel="nofollow - http://www.status-graphite.com/ etc. etc.! If I could afford it, I'd have Hugh make me a guitar version of my bass!! Some day....the Les Paul will have to suffice until then!
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Posted By: Gerinski
Date Posted: June 22 2013 at 10:17
Thanks, nice guitars there. I'm not a pro player, but I don't understand how come rock guitar builders still stick to building so many 22 fret guitars. This is fine for a lot of jazz and classic-rock-style playing where soloing does not get too wild, but in rock with abundant soloing, keys very frequently used such as E and A have the high E as such an important note (root and 5th) that it's convenient being able to reach it (even if mostly you can get it by bending the D).
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Posted By: Atavachron
Date Posted: June 22 2013 at 18:27
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in the '80s, Celestion was the speaker of choice for headbangers, at least in California. Seems to me if an important guitarist were to endorse a British guitar maker, it would probably help tremendously. No one knew about Charvel Guitars 'till Eddie Van Halen began playing them. |
Posted By: CPicard
Date Posted: June 23 2013 at 04:26
For years, I thought Rickenbacker was a British manufacturer... 
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Posted By: AnnySi
Date Posted: August 06 2013 at 06:23
no!!! the name itself isn't english at all!
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Posted By: Davesax1965
Date Posted: September 24 2014 at 04:37
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However, we do make some rather good amps here. ;-) There have been a few UK guitar manufacturers over the years, but it's all luthier built instruments, now. The market is pretty much sewn up and cheap guitars made in China, etc and resold by US companies as "second line" instruments are always going to be cheap. The UK has no home market, it's expensive to manufacture en masse here, so we'd just be selling to the US market, with all its' import restrictions and taxes, and that's awash with goods already. |
Posted By: Gerinski
Date Posted: September 24 2014 at 13:01
Perhaps the increase in people who use computers to create and record their music is also affecting the sales of real instruments
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Posted By: Davesax1965
Date Posted: September 27 2014 at 09:07
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PS Bond Electraglide. I remember when the first prototypes came out - the necks were stepped - the higher up the neck you went, the lower the frets - like a staircase. However, this made it impossible to play. Run your hand up the neck..... ever watched a dachshund try and run upstairs ? ;-) Gerinski, great post there. ;-) No, all the wannabes are still buying Squier Strats, made out of plywood, learning three open chords and then thinking they'll be Jimi Hendrix.... next week. ;-) PS BC Rich.... ugh. Ditto Kramer ally necks which you had to run a cigarette lighter up and down to warm them up before you went on stage. Mind you, some UK produced guitars from the early 1960's were utter, utter junk. ;-)
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Posted By: Dean
Date Posted: September 27 2014 at 11:00
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Before I threw a tantrum and hid my posts in a fit of pique following (what I thought was) an unnecessarily disparaging remark from Gerard, I mentioned the Vox guitar. Following the undeniable popularity of the Vox AC30, the company launched a range of guitars in the 60s that were moderately successful with the beat-groups like The Rolling Stones and notably Brian Jones. This summer while on holiday in Bath (the town not the bathroom accessory) I spied the headstock of a Vox guitar poking from behind a sofa in a restaurant (Hall & Woodhouse in Old King St.) - these are quite rare and the right model is worth many thousands, so I eagerly walked over to inspect it closer. Imagine my disappointement when I saw this disgrace:      ------------- What? |
Posted By: Triceratopsoil
Date Posted: September 27 2014 at 11:52
| ^ a damn shame |
Posted By: Gerinski
Date Posted: September 27 2014 at 13:14
| Ugh, that's indeed a shame |
Posted By: Daniele Spdavecchia
Date Posted: February 13 2015 at 10:32
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Actually England has featured at least two major brands involved with guitar: Vox, making electric guitars, basses, sitar, organs, amplifiers and effects. Famous is for example the tear drop shaped guitar and the ubiquitous Vox AC30 and AC15 amps, or Wha Wha pedal (Hendrix!) Marshall has always specialized in amplifiers (where would be rock without them?)  And then in the 60's there was a gem: Burns made guitars that rivaled with Fender, at least for the English market. Their instruments -electric guitar and basses- can be recognized by the curl on the ending part of the headstocks, similar to violin. The band The Shadows used those instruments quite a bit, although they eventually endorsed Fender. |
Posted By: TeleStrat
Date Posted: February 13 2015 at 11:40
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I have a Vox Phantom VI (pentagonal shape) that was made in Italy so it would probably be mid sixties. The shape, like the Mark VI teardrop, makes it difficult to play while sitting down but I always play electric standing up so it's not an issue. It has a very interesting bridge set up that makes it more difficult to restring. Overall, it is a great sounding guitar with an easy playing action. There's a photo on pg, 14 of the "list your equipment" thread.
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