This Japan-made Guyatone brings back memories of hitchin’ rides around the U.S.
So, as I’m prone to do, I started digging around hitchhiking culture and stories. Surprisingly, there are organized groups that embrace the hitching life, but the practice remains on the fringe in the U.S. Back in the 1950s, writer Jack Kerouac wrote the novel On the Road, which celebrated hitchhiking and exposed readers to the thrill of maverick travel. Heck, even Mike Dugan (the guitarist in all my videos) hitched his way to California in the 1960s. But seeing that fellow on the side of the road also sparked another image in my brain: Yep, it always comes back to guitars.
Let me present to you a guitar that’s ready to go hitching: the Guyatone LG-180T, hailing from 1966. The “thumbs-up” headstock and the big “thumb” on the upper bout always made me think of thumbing a ride, and I bought and sold this guitar so long ago that I had forgotten about it, until I saw that hitchhiking dude. Guyatone was an interesting Japanese company because they were primarily an electronics company, and most of their guitars had their wooden parts produced by other factories. In the case of the LG-180T, the bodies were made by Yamaha in Hamamatsu, Japan. At that time, Yamaha was arguably making the finest Japanese guitars, and the wood on this Guyatone model is outstanding. We don’t often see Guyatone-branded guitars here in the U.S., but a lot of players recognize the early ’60s label Kent—a brand name used by an American importer for Guyatone guitars.
With a bit of imagination, the LG-180T’s “thumbs up” headstock seems to be looking for a roadside ride.
Kent guitars were extremely popular from the early ’60s until around 1966. The U.S. importer B&J fed the American need for electric guitars with several nice Kent models, but when the Guyatone contract ended, so did most of the Kent guitars. After that, Guyatone primarily sold guitars in Japan, so this example is a rare model in the U.S.
“Unless you are a master at guitar setups, this would be a difficult player.”
This headstock is either the ugliest or the coolest of the Guyatone designs. I can’t decide which. I will say, no other Japanese guitar company ever put out anything like this. You have to give the Guyatone designers a thumbs up for trying to stand out in the crowd! Guyatone decided to forgo an adjustable truss rod in this model, opting instead for a light alloy non-adjustable core to reinforce the neck. Speaking of the neck, this instrument features the most odd-feeling neck. It’s very thin but has a deep shoulder (if that makes any sense). Totally strange!
Another strange feature is the bridge, which offers very little adjustment because of the three large saddles, which sort of rock back and forth with the tremolo. It’s a shame because these pickups sound great! They’re very crisp and have plenty of zing, but unless you are a master at guitar set-ups, this would be a difficult player.
This could be why the LG-180T only appeared in the 1966 and 1967 catalogs. After that, it disappeared along with all the other Yamaha-made Guyatone electrics. By 1969, Guyatone had gone bankrupt for the first time, and thus ended guitar production for a few decades. At least we were blessed with some wacky guitar designs we can marvel at while remembering the days when you could play in the back end of an explosive 1973 AMC Gremlin while your mom raced around town. Two thumbs up for surviving our childhoods! PG
The design of this Kent 834 borrows from the “violin” guitar craze, propelled by the influential visibility of Paul McCartney’s Höfner bass.
When I began to research guitars, I just simply reached out to people and asked all the questions I could think of. Man, I talked to musicians, studio people, factory workers, guitar designers, and company owners. Almost all of them were a bit surprised at my interest in them and my wanting to know about mostly forgotten guitar history.
I’ve interviewed people from all over the world, from the U.S. to Italy to England to Germany. At one point, I had so much information that it was depleting my hard-drive space and my brain, to the extent that I had to take a breath and organize all this stuff! In that process, I found that I cared for all these people and felt the need to tell their stories. Like any good journalism major, I realized the historical implications and the human element. So, for this month, I wanted to highlight a guitar design by Yasuo Momose. He worked at the famous Fujigen factory in the early 1960s, and later moved to a smaller factory called Hayashi Mokko, where he let his creative notions flow. He’s responsible for all the ultra-cool late-’60s Kent guitars with the racing-striped bodies!
Japanese guitar designer and builder Yasuo Momose.
Photo by Tadashi Ito
This particular model borrows from the “violin” guitar craze, mainly perpetuated by Paul McCartney and his Höfner bass. Dubbed the 834, this Kent was only produced for two short years, from 1967–1969. Priced at $125, the 834 was described as:
“The best of both—all in one! The free-sounding acoustics of a violin-shaped body, plus the charged up excitement of Kent electronics! This semi-acoustic body has an arched top and back, two pickups, two tone and two volume controls, toggle switch for pickup selection, rhythm-solo switch, compensating damper bridge and Kent tremolo tailpiece.”
Ah, to be an ad writer back in those days! In reality, this guitar was supercharged because of those Kent pickups, which are hot as hell, and could drive a small tube amp into the red zone! This is one of the guitars I wish I had never sold, because it’s light but also over-engineered and rather sturdy. Oh well. It has a wonderful headstock and body, “Kent” inlays, and of course, the cool side binding which had a dual purpose: to cover up the wood joining and to act as rally stripes. So cool!
As I was researching my book, I could never figure out which factory made the 834, along with all the other Kents from that era. So, on one of my visits to Japan, I was encouraged to visit Momose-san, who was then working at the Deviser factory in Matsumoto City. He was still making guitars, but they were all high-end electrics and acoustics, sold under the Momose name. I was led back to his workspace and there he was, toiling away at five guitars! He made all of them from scratch and was treated with a certain reverence among the other employees. In Japan, they respect their elders!
“Almost all of them were a bit surprised at my interest in them and my wanting to know about mostly forgotten guitar history.”
We got to chatting and sat down for an interview. At the end, I showed him some pictures from my book, and when I came to the Kent guitars, he started to tear up. He said, “These were my first designs,” and went on to tell me some more history and anecdotes. I tell this story again because Momose-san passed away recently, and I wanted to highlight him once more. He was the same age as my dad, both born in 1944. It turns out there is really only one reason to write about history. Get it straight before it disappears.
The plastic bridge on this Kent Copa is a limitation, but when it is properly set up this guitar can sing thanks to three Guyatone pickups and a vibrato unit that feels great to play.
The Velvet Underground was a bit before my time, but I discovered them at a great period in my life—when I had simple needs, a miniscule budget, and a rabid need to make noise with a guitar. To the uninitiated, try to search out songs like “I’m Waiting For the Man,” “I Heard Her Call My Name,” and my personal VU favorite, “Sister Ray.”
I’ve always been fascinated with real characters—people who are just weirdly interesting. Usually I don’t find them; they find me. And man, the Velvets had some characters. Check out the movie if you can. It is well worth your time to see how all these interesting artistic movements coalesced with a music scene in New York. But I have to say, one thing I kept digging was the interesting gear the band was using in the early days: most notably fuzz boxes, Sears amps, and a wonderful little Japanese guitar called the Kent Copa.
The Kent brand was manufactured in Japan by Guyatone.
I guess you’ve heard this from me many times, but around 1963, electric guitar popularity began to explode and the world was flooded with Japanese imports. The Kent brand name was used by the Buegeleisen & Jacobson Trading Company (B&G for short), based in New York City—just one of the many importers dealing with Japanese guitar builders at the time. From 1964 to 1966, almost all the Kent electric guitars were produced by the Tokyo Sound Company (more commonly known as Guyatone), which had an extensive catalog of guitars, amps, pickups, effects, and microphones—everything a budding musician would need.
And so it went that a humble Guyatone-built Kent guitar made it into the hands of Sterling Morrison and Lou Reed. If you check out the documentary or search out photos, it’s easy to see Sterling and Lou take turns tearing it up with a Kent Copa. (Of course, the guys played other guitars, too, and Lou is more associated with his black Gretsch 6112, especially in the early period. The VU was also endorsed by Vox and I seem to hear all sorts of early Vox effects in the songs.)
Here's a close-up look at those gnarly sounding pickups, tone and volume controls, rotary pickup selector. cheap-o plastic bridge, and surprisingly good vibrato.
As for the Kent Copa, it made its first appearance in the 1963 Kent catalog as a mid-level electric with a list price of $149. This model had a mahogany body and maple neck (supplied by the Japanese Mahura factory) paired with three Guyatone-made pickups, three volume controls, one tone control, and a rotary selector switch. The model came in red or sunburst, but I rarely see the red color. As the years passed, the Copa evolved a bit to feature better sounding pickups and a cheaper price. By mid-1966, the Copa only cost $112 and had two more finish options (honey blonde and cocoa tan), but the axe remained basically unchanged in its short three-year run.
The Kent Copa that Sterling and Lou were playing was from the 1964–’66 range, since theirs had the more angular, rectangle-shaped pickups. These were low-output pickups with a strong DC resistance rating, but they were rather gnarly with a hint of overdrive, even at calm control settings. The real magic happens when the Copa is paired with a raunchy amp (à la the Danelectro-made Silvertone 1484) and a primitive fuzz like the early Vox Tone Bender.
Two other quirks to note: The bridge was a non-adjustable plastic job that did not help with intonation. So, if your guitar was off from day one, it would be off forever. Second, the tremolo on the Kent Copa is actually very good! The spring is recessed into the body and the darn unit just works amazingly and has a great feel. There was a story that the founder of Guyatone, Mitsuo Matsuki, visited the Harmony Guitar factory here in the U.S. He observed all sorts of building techniques and tried his hand at making his own tremolo. Not really knowing anything about a guitar’s playability, he made an early tremolo that only moved one way and increased the pitch. Sort of weird, but by the time the Copa came out, Mitsuo had it all figured out. See—we all can learn and evolve! So, excuse me for now. I have to get upstairs to see the 76ers game!
