https://reverb.com/item/2728176-alembic-big-red-l-guitar-pre-owned


Priced way too high, even if the guitar was all original... Love the color of the top & back woods though!

Ouch!  Quite an amateurish job on routing out the pickup cavities for the humbuckers.

Bill, tgo

Aww, and it's right in the middle of Alembic country too (Bananas at Large has two stores, one in San Rafael and one in Santa Rosa)

Truly a shame with such a nice guitar...

I wonder if it's this one.

Quote from: jazzyvee on August 15, 2016, 02:59:00 PM
I wonder if it's this one.

Same one. I hate even hazard a guess as to which pickups the moron thought were superior to Alembic, but they have odd crescent shaped divots in the pole pieces that resemble Bill Lawrence models from the early 80s. I could be wrong, but it doesn't matter.

In this case it's like a coroner examining pictures of the victim of a chainsaw attack and trying to guess the model of chainsaw by the carnage left behind. (Thank god they left the cavity covers on for the pictures or it would REALLY look like an autopsy.)

There are probably still marks from the claw-hammer he used to "disassemble" the innards of all those pesky, useless pots, knobs, wires and switches ("hey! The middle pickup don't even work!" he undoubtedly thought) standing between him and rockstar glory.

"Hey pop! Can I use your Craftsman router? We found an old guitar in Stinky's basement and we want to 'upgrade' it for our horrendous musical tastes. I even learned a chord to play on it! It's called an 'E.' I'll finally be able to play along with my 'Ratt' cassettes!"

Looks like this is the same guitar modified again with a Bigsby. I think it has a good sound although not what I know as an alembic guitar sound.

Those pickups are G&L F-100 MFD 'buckers, cool pickups...in a G&L.

I wasn't aware that the original G&L *MFD Pickups had slotted polepieces. (like this)


In 1983 i bought a G&L El Toro bass with *MFDs, and each string has four polepieces on each pickup. Those - and every G&L I've ever seen, until now - have hexagonal slots, so you can adjust them with an Allen wrench.


At the time I was torn between a five-string Music Man bass (also designed by Leo Fender, y'know) with active pickups or the El Toro. Mine's passive, though they offered actives as a custom option.


Leo had been prohibited from launching a new guitar company for 15 years by the non-compete clause in the sale of Fender to CBS in 1965, so when he and George Fullerton (the "G" in "G&L") started their new company in 1980, I was convinced they'd quickly overtake everybody else, and the El Toro - G&L's first bass with humbucker *MFDs - would be worth a fortune, so I bought it. Turned out they only produced them for a very brief time, because nobody but idiots bought them. 


* I can't figure out what the "D" stands for, but I can guess the rest.

It should stand for "Dale"...Mr. Hyatt did alot for G&L.


The first run of the MFDs were large hex poles,just the first year...then they went to slotted for another year and a half or so...then settled for smaller hex head poles.

An interesting fact for ol' gearhounds like us is that Leo sold Fender to CBS because he'd been misdiagnosed with a terminal illness (it turned out to be a strep sinus infection, which was cured by switching doctors). Believing he was about to die, he had ramped up production at Fender with the goal of stockpiling five years' worth of bodies, necks and parts.

Everybody thinks that "pre-CBS" Fenders are worth thousands of dollars more than those made after 1965, but they actually used the exact same bodies and parts well into the 70s.

As I recall, once CBS took over, they immediately stopped dipping the pickups in wax to save the labor cost.  People noticed the difference and complained.  CBS then went back to dipping the pickups, but the damage to Fender's reputation had been done.

Bill, tgo

So the ugly big headstocks were Leo's doing??  My whole belief system is destroyed!

Peter (who never noticed a difference between the '66 tele he started on & earlier/later '60s ones played later)