Category: Consumerism

This 1966 Guild Starfire III came to me as a surprise gift. Well, it came to me after I apparently bought it on eBay while under the influence of Nyquil and Aged Rum. Well, it was fine Aged Rum and Coke (the real Mexican kind with real sugar, dammit) and then a shot of Nyquil. Maybe two. At least I think that’s what happened because the next day I woke up to a shipment notification for a this 1966 Guild Starfire III in very nice condition that I didn’t remember purchasing.

Anyway, it’s here, so let’s review it!

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Guild released a couple of variants of the T-Bird around 2017 including the Stop-Tail model which has the ST model suffix. The red version, shown here, was easily my favorite looking of the lot, but when it first came out it was a Sam Ash exclusive model and I couldn’t find one anywhere. After finally finding this one they became very available which kind of bummed me out because the exclusivity of the guitar was no more and all my efforts that went into finding one suddenly seemed a waste, but aside from that, this is still my favorite combination for the Guild Newark Street T-Bird. Does it sound and play as good as I think it looks? Let’s find out.

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Today’s obsession is a 1983 Guild X97V. If you’ve never heard of that model that’s because it doesn’t exist… well, not as a production model, anyway. So far as I know this is the only one. This is a prototype guitar for a model that never made it into production, and while it’s certainly possible that there are other prototypes of the X97, as I’ll explain it looks like this is one of a kind. Should it have been a production guitar? I’ll let you decide that for yourself, though it’s pretty clear that Guild already determined that the answer to that was no. Still, this guitar has some interesting aspects to it so let’s take a look at this dangerously pointy Guild X97V.

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As of this writing the year is 2018. This guitar is from 1982 which makes this guitar 36 years old. Finding a 36-year old guitar in mint condition is no easy feat, and it took me years to find this Guild X79 Skyhawk guitar in this beautiful unfaded metallic blue finish. That’s partly crazy because this was a very popular model for Guild, but it’s also partly not surprising for reasons that will become clear in my review.

Let’s see how this guitar holds up when viewed through the eyes of someone who really enjoyed the ’80s.

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For my 30th Guild guitar review, I decided to publish something special, which is a review of this 1994 Guild S100 Polara. I’ve already reviewed two Guild S100s, one from the 2015 Newark Street line and one from the 1997 Westerly Reissue series. Why another S100 review? Because this one is special and rare. It also blows those other ones out of the water.

This black beauty is a Guild S100 Polara from 1994. It was owned by a member over on the LetsTalkGuild forum who was kind enough to let me borrow it for a quick (three month) write up and review after which I threw money at him until he let me buy it outright. While that may not be strictly true, what’s important is the fact that it’s now mine and you can’t have it. What’s the big deal about an S100 from 1994? You’re just going to have to read the review to find out.

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The first guitar review I wrote for this blog was back in 2014 when I wrote up a 1965 Guild S200 Thunderbird. That post started a trend of me writing about Guilds with almost 30 guitars reviewed along with a pile of other articles, all of which you can see at GADsGuilds.com.

When Guild reissued the Guild S200 Thunderbird T-Bird, hits to that page soared and one of the most common requests I get ever since is, “When will you review the Newark Street Thunderbird T-bird?”

The time is now. Let’s take a look at the Guild Newark St. S200 T-Bird.

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I am one of those apparently rare guitarists who doesn’t like Telecasters. Don’t get me wrong – I appreciate their tone and I understand their place in the history of music as we know it, but every time I play one I walk away thinking that it has to be about the least ergonomically designed guitars on the planet.

Being a Guild collector, though, when a Guild T250 guitar came up for sale I had to buy it to see if my favorite guitar brand could somehow change my mind about the venerable Telecaster. Let’s take a look at this relatively uncommon Guild electric guitar.  (more…)