
Flash back to an era when 6-string beasts with names like Teisco, Silvertone, Hofner, Wandre, Cipher, and Maier (quietly) roared.
Let me take you back, good people, to a time when The Ed Sullivan Show was featuring rock ’n’ roll bands beamed into homes via brand-new color televisions. This was when the U.S.A. was experiencing a prosperous, post-WWII era filled with ideas of space exploration, jukeboxes packed with vinyl records, and muscle cars cruising the highways. For most in the States, the early 1960s was a great time to grow up and an even better time to want to play electric guitar. It was the era that birthed garage bands. Demand for electric guitars boomed, and guitars were being designed as original models rather than copies of copies. I could write several volumes about guitar design variations, but for this article let’s examine a curious chapter of electric guitar production: the age of fully transistorized Japanese electrics, from 1964 to 1966.
For historical perspective, let’s look at the dawn of solid-state technology. Back in 1947, Bell Laboratories developed an alternative to the costly and problematic vacuum tubes that powered most electronic devices. This transistor technology slowly found its way into consumer products, but was truly embraced in portable radio formats. Before this time many radios were huge and bulky, often positioned as the centerpieces of living rooms. Transistors made it possible to seriously downsize radios so you could carry a pocket-sized one, cranking out the latest Beatles tunes. It may not seem like much of an innovation compared to our palm-sized smart phones, but this new form of technology appealed to the young baby-boom generation. It allowed for more expedient ways to get news and music, all wrapped up in the novelty of transistor radio design. These little radios appeared concurrently with electric guitars in all sorts of pop-culture references on TV, in movies, and in print publications.
Transistor technology was available to many Americans in the 1950s, although the cost of such devices was often expensive. But a few visionary Japanese engineers were visiting the U.S., including Masaru Ibuka, with their eyes on the market. He was the co-founder of Sony, and his fledgling company began making transistorized electronic equipment under license from AT&T. By the early 1960s, Japan had become a major player in transistor radio production, with Sony competing with other Japanese companies such as Toshiba and Sharp. This manufacturing boom was concurrent with the electric-guitar boom and the explosion of popular guitar music. The planets aligned, and soon the technology of both guitars and radios morphed into an interesting combination: the “amp-in-guitar” concept.
Image 1: Attaching a simple, radio-like circuit board platform to a pickup begat the concept of onboard amplification.
One of the earliest examples of these transistor amplifiers appeared on the German-made Hofner “Bat” guitar of 1960—the year it debuted at a European trade show. The Hofner Bat, known as the Fledermaus in the company’s catalog, was produced in very low numbers and is now arguably the rarest of all Hofner electric guitars. It featured a pretty radical angular-but-symmetrical design that incorporated a transistorized amplifier and speaker inside the guitar’s body. Also appearing in the early ’60s were the Italian-made Wandre Bikini Avanti 1, which featured a detachable amp that connected to the lower bout of the guitar, and the Meazzi-branded Transonic, which had a fully integrated amp and speaker in its body.
Image 2: Wandre’s Bikini models sported a detachable amp that connected to the guitar’s lower bout.
Photo by Robert Patrick
Even though these models pre-dated the Japanese models with onboard amps, the Italian guitars were also hard to find in the U.S. and were very expensive. The Wandre Avanti 1 was imported by the Maurice Lipsky Music Company in the early ’60s and priced at an astounding $395.
Image 3: Italian guitars like the Meazzi Transonic arrived on these shores as pricey imports.
But the advertisement for the Avanti 1 read, “No Wires, No Outlet Worries, Plays Anywhere.” Those taglines really reflect the sense of freedom and mobility that transistor technology offered the guitar-playing community. Hey, take your Wandre Bikini to the beach party!
Teisco Silvertone TRG 1 Amp-in-Guitar Vintage Japan
Okay, it ain’t a Marshall combo, but this Teisco TRG-1’s onboard amp does have its own character, and after the guitar’s plugged into a stand-alone amp at the 2:00 mark, it’s obvious that the 3" speaker accurately reflects the natural tone of the instrument.
Japanese guitar maker Teisco introduced two transistorized models in 1964: the round-necked TRG-1 and the TRH-1 lap steel. Of course, the true proliferation of the technology was dominated by the Japanese makers of the time, and the Teisco Company led the way when Japan Music Trades magazine featured the newly introduced Teisco TRG-1 in June 1964. Also introduced was a lap steel called the TRH-1.
Image 4: Teisco TRG-1
The “TR” standing for “transistor,” these new models were basically takes on existing guitar designs. The TRG-1 featured a slightly larger Teisco ET-300-style body and one pickup, with the small amplifier mounted under the pickguard where a bridge pickup would otherwise reside.
Image 5: Teisco TRH1
This model had a few different names in its early days, such as TRE-100, TRET-100 (with a tremolo), TRG-1, TRG-1L, and probably a few others. But they were all essentially the same model, offering “new sounds in music.” In 1964 and 1965, Teisco really promoted the amp-in-guitar models in Japan and, here in America, Weiss Musical Instruments was placing advertisements in Music Trades magazine as early as February 1965. Also appearing in 1965 was a Silvertone-branded variation, called the 1487 in Sears literature.
Image 6: Teisco’s ads of the era boasted “new sounds in music” and a decidedly “mod” look.
All of these Teisco-made guitars could be plugged into an amplifier and played like a “normal” guitar, or you could use the internal amplifier powered with 9V batteries that were installed through an access plate on the back of the guitar.
Image 7: Sears’ in-house guitar brand, Silvertone, entered the competition in 1965 with the 1487 model.
All of these Teisco-made guitars could be plugged into an amplifier and played like a “normal” guitar, or you could use the internal amplifier powered with 9V batteries that were installed through an access plate on the back of the guitar.
Image 8: A 3" speaker with 1 watt of power was de rigueur for the self-contained 6-strings of the 1960s.
The batteries fired a tiny transistor amplifier that put out about 1 watt of power through a 3" speaker. You definitely weren’t going to play a house party with this setup, but it was perfect for bedroom jamming and learning songs off the record player.
There were several other Japanese amp-in-guitar models that appeared during 1965, including a super-cool instrument made by the short-lived Shinko Gakki company in the city of Tatsuno. The rarely seen Shinko example was sold in the U.S. through the New York-based Inter-Mark Company, which branded all their guitars as “Cipher” models.
Image 9: This one-pickup Cipher model imported by the Inter-Mark Company originated in Tatsuno, Japan.
The Maier example pictured below was made by another Japanese manufacturer, forgotten by time. After examining the components, this guitar seems to have been produced in the Matsumoto area of Japan. Even the import name of “Maier” is a relative mystery. After pouring through stacks of trade magazines from the era, the only possible clue I’ve found is the R.J. Maier Corp. of Sun Valley, California.
Image 10
They were primarily known as a maker of clarinet and saxophone reeds, but during the guitar boom of the mid-’60s, all sorts of musical instrument companies were importing electric guitars. Either way, the Maier variation follows the familiar blueprint of a single-pickup guitar powering a tiny amp through a 3" speaker.
Image 11
Finally, this two pickup variation, also below, was made at yet another Japanese factory that remains a mystery. I have owned this same model without the internal amp, and the designers simply routed out the regular guitar bodies to accept the transistorized components. But this example features a headphone jack!
The makers of these guitars—a one-pickup model with a Maier-marked headstock and a two-pickup model with a headphone jack—are a mystery today.
There aren’t any records of how many of these amp-in guitars were sold, and I often wonder about the popularity of this format. But by 1966 most all of these guitars had vanished from catalogs, advertisements, and literature. As with many of the Japanese imports, these all-transistor guitars were relegated to closets and pawnshops. Rory Gallagher famously adored his Teisco TRG-1 and recorded with it. But other than that famous connection, the brief history of these guitars has been largely ignored.
Meazzi Supersonic Vintage 60s - Demo
This cousin of the Meazzi Transonic seems to feature a plywood top and has a distinctive-looking pickup with a serviceable, if feedback-prone, amp onboard.
So how do these internal amps sound? Well, they sound like a tiny transistor radio! And for those of you too young for the comparison, imagine a seriously lo-fi sound that’s tinny and raw. Really, these amps were more about portability than sound. Even when direct miked, they sound weak, but—as with all tones—there is a place for this sound in someone’s creative imagination.
Unfortunately, these old amps are almost always in need of repair due to bad capacitors. The values on these capacitors are often odd, but they can be repaired easily enough by almost any good electronics repair tech. I’ve owned eight of these transistorized electric guitars over the years, and all but one needed repair work on the amp circuitry. But when these guitars are fixed up, I love using them. I still take my Teisco TRG-1 to the shore every year. And when my kids were born, you can bet my playing was limited to the 1-watt amps in these guitars as I plucked lullabies in the wee hours of the night. Even today there’s a place for these oddities of ’60s technology and guitar playing!
Frank Meyers is the author of History of Japanese Electric Guitars, published in 2015.
[Updated 3/2/22]
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Greg Koch performing live.
The Gristle King himself, Greg Koch, joins reader Bret Boyer to discuss the one album that should be in everyone’s ears.
Question: What albums should every guitarist listen to and why?
Greg Koch - Guest Picker
Recorded in 1964, this album has been essential listening for generations of guitarists.
A: Going from the gut, I would say B.B. King’s Live at the Regal would be something every guitar player should listen to as it is the well from where every other electric blues guitar player drank from—whether they know it or not. Blues Is King is another one, but Live at the Regal is really the essence of what electric blues is all about.
Another worthy choice is this live album from 1966 which features an incredible take on Willie Nelson’s “Night Life.”
Obsession: I would say playing slide in open tunings. I have been playing mostly standard tuning for the simple convenience of it, but nothing is quite as filthy as playing slide in open G or open E. I’ve been bringing out two guitars specifically for those two tunings and it’s been a lot of fun.
Bret Boyer - Reader of the Month
Photo by Jamie Hicks
Recorded in a single take in 1971, Spence’s vocal style complemented his folky, angular guitar approach.
A: If you’ve never listened to the Bahamian guitarist Joseph Spence, you are in for a treat. Joseph is such a unique guitar player and singer, and his music is the purest expression of joy I’ve heard on an album. Start with Good Morning Mr. Walker; it’s a great reminder to have fun and be yourself.
Obsession: Hub Hildenbrand’s music is very personal and unlike anything I’ve heard on guitar. Check out the album When the Night Lost Its Stars. He even bows his 1953 Gibson archtop on two tracks. Hub draws deeply from non-Western music, with a strong influence from the oud tradition in his playing. His music is quiet, deeply reflective, and searching.
Nick Millevoi - Senior Editor
A: Steve Reich’s “Electric Counterpoint,” the original version performed by Pat Metheny. It shows that since the guitar is capable of anything, you might as well use it to do exactly what you want to do and have some fun. And for experimentalists, it’s a great reminder that there’s so much you can do using nice, tonal chords.
Obsession: The EHX Attack Decay has been delivering loads of inspiration lately. After buying one earlier this year, it hasn’t left my board. The premise is simple—create swells with controls for attack and decay speeds—which leaves so much to be discovered.
Ted Drozdowski - Editorial Director
A: Son House’s Father of the Delta Blues, because it’s a reminder that music is something elemental. It comes from the soil and is more deeply embedded in us than our own DNA. House’s performances are Heaven and Hell, doubt and surety, love and death. It’s that raw, true, and beautifully imperfect—poetry that breathes.
Obsession: Prog rock, thanks to recently experiencing the BEAT Tour and David Gilmour live in the same week. That reminded me of how sublime prog can be when it functions on an empathetic level first. My bedrock for prog remains In the Court of the Crimson King.
Ethnomusicologist Frances Densmore records the song of Mountain Chief, head of the Blackfeet Tribe, on a phonograph for the Bureau of American Ethnology in 1916.
Once used as a way to preserve American indigenous culture, field recording isn’t just for seasoned pros. Here, our columnist breaks down a few methods for you to try it yourself.
The picture associated with this month’s Dojo is one of my all-time favorites. Taken in 1916, it marks the collision of two diverging cultural epochs. Mountain Chief, the head of the Piegan Blackfeet Tribe, sings into a phonograph powered solely by spring-loaded tension outside the Smithsonian. Across from him sits whom I consider the patron saint of American ethnomusicologists—the great Frances Densmore.
You can feel the scope and weight of theancient culture of the indigenous American West, and the presence of the then-ongoing women’s suffrage movement, which was three years from succeeding at getting the 19th Amendment passed by Congress. That would later happen on June 4, 1919—the initiative towards granting all women of this country the right to vote. (All American citizens, including Black women, were not granted suffrage until 1965.)
Densmore traversed the entire breadth of the country, hauling her gramophone wax cylinder recorders into remote tribal lands, capturing songs by the Seminole in southern Florida, the Yuma in California, the Chippewa in Wisconsin, Quinailet songs in Northern Washington, and, of course, Mountain Chief outside the Smithsonian in Washington, D.C. Author of more than 20 books and 200 articles, she carefully preserved the rich cultural diversity of Native Americans with over 2,500 field recordings.
Why am I writing about this? Firstly, to pay homage! Secondly, because it serves as a great reminder to seek and cultivate sound outside the studio as well. We live in a time of great technological power and convenience. Every week a new sample pack, plugin, pedal, or software instrument hits the market. For all the joy that these offerings bring, they deprive us of the joy of creating our own instruments from scratch.
This month, I’m advocating for you to make some field recordings of your own—nature, urban, indoor, outdoor, specific locations, animals, or anything that piques your interest! Bring the material back to the studio and make music with it! I’ll show you how to make your own sample libraries to use in your music. Tighten up your belts, a multipart Dojo is now open.
What do you need to get started? Quite simply, you just need any device that is capable of recording. This can range from your cell phone to a dedicated field recorder. The real question is: Do you want to use mics housed in handheld units or have more robust mic pres with the ability to power larger live/studio microphones using XLR connectors found with the larger units? Let’s look at three scenarios.
The Cellular Approach
The absolute easiest way to get started is with your cell phone. Take advantage of a voice-memo recording app, or use an app that records multitrack audio like GarageBand on iOS. Phone recordings tend to sound very compressed and slightly lo-fi—which might be exactly what you want. However, the method can also introduce unwanted noise artifacts like low-end rumble (from handling the phone) and phasing (moving the mic while recording). I recommend using a tripod to hold your phone still while recording. You might also want to consider using an external mic and some software to edit your sample recordings on the phone. I like using a Koala Sampler ($4.99) on iOS devices.
Upgrade Me
The next step up is to use a portable recorder. These have much better mic pres, and offer true stereo recording with pivoting mic heads. This can give you the added benefit of controlling the width of your stereo image when recording or helping isolate two sound sources that are apart from each other. You sacrifice the ability to easily edit your recordings. You simply import them into your computer and edit the recording(s) from there.
Pro-Level Quality
I would recommend this scenario if you want to record multiple sources at once. These devices also have SMPTE time code, 60+ dB of gain, phantom power (+48 volts), advanced routing, and a 32-bit/192 kHz sampling rate, so you’ll never have a distorted recording even when the meter gets unexpectedly pegged into the red from a loud sound source. I recommend the Zoom F8n Pro ($1099). Now you can use your microphones!
Best Practices
Try to safely record as close to the sound source as you can to minimize ambient noise and really scrub through your recordings to find little snippets and sound “nuggets” that can make great material for creating your own instrument and sample library—which we’ll explore next month! Namaste.
Need more firepower? Here’s a collection of high-powered stomps that pack plenty of torque.
There’s a visceral feeling that goes along with really cranking the gain. Whether you’re using a clean amp or an already dirty setup, adding more gain can inspire you to play in an entirely different way. Below are a handful of pedals that can take you from classic crunch to death metal doom—and beyond.
Universal Audio UAFX Anti 1992 High Gain Amp Pedal
Early 1990s metal tones were iconic. The Anti 1992 offers that unique mix of overdrive and distortion in a feature-packed pedal. You get a 3-band EQ, noise gate, multiple cab and speaker combos, presets, and full control through the mobile app.
Revv G4 Red Channel Preamp/Overdrive/Distortion Pedal - Anniversary Edition
Based upon the red channel of the company’s Generator 120, this finely tuned circuit offers gain variation with its 3-position aggression switch.
MXR Yngwie Malmsteen Overdrive Pedal - Red
The Viking king of shred guitar has distilled his high-octane tone into a simple, two-knob overdrive. Designed for going into an already dirty amp, this stomp offers clarity, harmonics, and more.
Empress Effects Heavy Menace Distortion Pedal
Arguably the company’s most versatile dirt box, this iteration is all about EQ. It’s loaded with an immensely powerful 3-band EQ with a sweepable mid control, footswitchable noise gate, a low-end sculpting control, and three different distortion modes.
JHS Hard Drive Distortion Pedal - Tan
Designed by late JHS R&D engineer Cliff Smith, the Hard Drive is a powerful and heavy ode to the post-grunge sounds of the late ’90s and early ’00s. This original circuit takes inspiration from many places by including cascading gain stages and Baxandall bass and treble controls.
Boss HM-2W Waza Craft Heavy Metal Distortion Pedal
Few pedals captured the sound of Swedish death metal like the HM-2. The go-to setting is simple—all knobs maxed out. Flip over to the custom mode for more tonal range, higher gain, and thicker low end.
Electro-Harmonix Nano Metal Muff Distortion Pedal
Voiced with an aggressive, heavy tone with a tight low end, this pedal offers +/- 14 dB of bass, a powerful noise gate, and an LED to let you know when the gate is on.
Soldano Super Lead Overdrive Plus Pedal
Aimed to capture the sound of Mike Soldano’s flagship tube amp, the SLO uses the same cascading gain stages as the 100-watt head. It also has a side-mounted deep switch to add low-end punch.
We chat with Molly about Sister Rosetta’s “immediately impressive” playing, which blends jazz, gospel, chromaticism, and blues into an early rock ‘n’ roll style that was not only way ahead of its time but was also truly rockin’.
In the early ’60s, some of the British guitarists who would shape the direction of our instrument for decades to come all found themselves at a concert by Sister Rosetta Tharpe. What they heard from Tharpe and what made her performances so special—her sound, her energy—must have resonated. Back at home in the U.S., she was a captivating presence, wowing audiences going back to her early days in church through performing the first stadium rock ‘n’ roll concert—which was also one of her weddings—and beyond. Her guitar playing was incendiary, energetic, and a force to be reckoned with.
On this episode of 100 Guitarists, we’re joined by guitarist Molly Miller, who in addition to being a fantastic guitarist, educator, bandleader, and performing with Jason Mraz, is a bit of a Sister Rosetta scholar. We chat with Molly about Sister Rosetta’s “immediately impressive” playing, which blends jazz, gospel, chromaticism, and blues into an early rock ‘n’ roll style that was not only way ahead of its time but was also truly rockin’.