1967 Harmony H59 Rocket... Version 2

If you have followed this blog for a while you might remember my first Rocket (Rocket Version 1).  If you read through that post then you might have seen the comment by a guy about his Harmony Rocket.  Well, here it is!

This Harmony Rocket was built in 1967 in Chicago.  Harmony made this version of the Rocket from '66 to '67.  Sometime between '67 and '68 they discontinued the single cutaway and produced instead the double cutaway version which I am not a very big fan of.

I am a huge fan of the second incarnation of the gold foil pickups though.  Some call these "double mustache" pickups.  They are very similar to the gold foils except these have adjustable poles and aren't quite as hot.  I played this guitar back to back with my Harmony Bobkat (Gold Foils).  It seems like the Double Mustaches wouldn't give me all the tube saturated goodness that I have been getting out of the Gold Foils.  It still needs a bit more set up so I'll have to keep working on it.

Let's mention the elephant in the room, as it were.  This guitar is so clean that you might think someone sold me a reissue.  This is not a reissue.  This is the real deal down to the date stamp on the back of the pickups:

I was skeptical at first too.  The finish is shiny and shows no checking.  The frets are tarnished a bit but have almost no playing wear.  The only thing that was wrong with this guitar when I got it was that the rivets in the bridge pup were loose.  I tweaked them a bit and popped them back in and it is good to go now.  I might clean up the pots a bit when I get the chance.

One unique thing about these Harmony guitars is that the necks don't taper towards the headstock but are one uniform width the whole way.  If you are used to a Fender or Gibson neck then the first 3 frets might feel a bit wide and the 12th fret area might feel a bit skinny.  It really doesn't feel that different to my hands unless you have just put down another guitar.

My previous Rocket had a rather serious design flaw: no adjustable truss rod.  By 1965 Harmony realized that wouldn't fly any more especially with their weaker Poplar necks.  This one is lucky to have one but really doesn't need any adjustment.  In fact, I don't think any of the screws/nuts had been turned before I took the pickups off for cleaning.  Unfortunately there is really not a good way to tell if that is true until you try to turn the screws!

Here is Brittany Howard of the Alabama Shakes with her favorite guitar:  1966 Harmony Rocket H54/1.  It is very similar to the H59 except it has only two pickups and is the double cutaway version.  Have you heard the Shakes yet?  Go check them out.  Here is what Brittany says about her Harmony Rocket in an interview for innocentwords.com: 

"I have a '66 Harmony Rocket that I am in love with.  It's cherry red.  I play it out of a '66 Silvertone 1483 with an intact Jensen 12" speaker.  It can glitter, it can growl, it can rock, it can lull you to sleep.  So far, it's the perfect rig."

I have GOT to get me a Silvertone 1483.  I have been looking for a good 60s Silvertone amp for a while.  I think it is safe to say that Brittany is a fan of her rig.  What do you think about her tone?  Leave a comment and let me know what you think.

Harmony Bobkat Video Blog

I picked up this Harmony Bobkat a couple of days ago.  I didn't feel like writing tonight but I wanted to get the word out about these so I made a quick video about it.  Check it out, comment, disagree, like it, share it.... participate.

I just wanted to show that while I could be playing much more expensive and technically "better" guitars, instead I am playing this one.  You don't have to pay 3 grand to get a solid vintage guitar.  Price does not translate into quality, playability or tone.  The price of a vintage guitar is only the result of supply and demand.  Most of the time the demand for a guitar and its overall tone/quality go hand in hand but there are always exceptions.  I believe this is one of them.

This girl is tearin' up this Bobkat!  Good stuff!

Email Guitar- Look what we have here!

I got an email from a reader with a couple of pictures attached.  Needless to say, I was pumped.

It's a Silvertone 1446!  It is always a great day when you find an old guitar in a closet, under the bed, wherever it was left years ago and forgotten.  This one seems to be original except for the decal pinstripes on the headstock.  I think they are cool but I would probably still attempt to remove them if I felt comfortable with it.  It even has the original case and seems to be in good shape.  

Damian sent these in to my email (tvguit@gmail.com) and said he had an amp with it too.  Way to go Damian!  Maybe he will send in some pictures of the amp?? Are you reading this Damian?  Don't leave us hangin' man!

My Vintage Guitar and Gear Wishlist.... and why I think these things are cool

There are always weird guitars and gear that I see and hope to run into one day.  Recently it has been a Harmony made Silvertone and a brand new amp from Fender.  More on that one later.

The Silvertone 1446l has been popping up on my radar just about everywhere.  These things are American made by Harmony in Chicago from 1962 until 1967.  They featured a Bigsby Vibrato, a hollow body of laminated maple (even though the ads said Spruce top and back!) and the very illusive Seth Lover designed, stagger-poled mini-humbuckers.  I have never held one of these in my hands but supposedly these pickups screamed with higher output and thick silky humbucker tone.  This one is often refferred to as the Chris Isaak model but I believe that Dan Aurbach of the Black Keys is a fan as well.  Do you have one for sale?? Contact me!

And now, for something completely different: The Fender Pawn Shop Series' Greta.  These things are a bit "gimicky" but they are just so damn cute.  It is a two watt (tube), table top radio style guitar (and iPod) amplifier.  It features one 12ax7 preamp tube and one 12 at7 power tube and breaks up faster than your "high school sweetheart" friends.  The 4"speaker has a bit of a hard time keeping up with the output but plugged in to a cabinet this thing is an apartment ready blues machine.

Notice the "VU" meter?  It is a total gimmick and I love it.  VU stands for "Volume Unit" with the green section indicating clean tones and the red indicating distorted.  The meter is backlit with a small blue LED that is really just fun to look at.  The knob on the left is gain and the one on the right is tone.  

The coolest part about this little amp is what is on the back:

From left to right: Guitar, Aux In, Line Out, 8 ohm Ext. out, Switch, Power Input

Fender made this amp very versatile with all the ins and outs.  With the 4" speaker there isn't much headroom before the speaker farts out.  Which is why they added the 8 ohm extension out.  This thing sounds really good through a 4 12" cabinet.  It has a little more headroom but still has a nice, thick tube crunch.   If you are looking for a sparkly clean tone then you should probably look somewhere else.

But what if you have a larger amplifier that you like but can't play at the volume you want at home?  Enter the Greta, once again.  It has a Line Out that you could run a 1/4" cable directly into that amp's input.  Just use it like a distortion pedal.

But what if you are a trendy hipster with a turntable and feel like your warm, analog signal path is being ruined by your solid state stereo?  Enter the Fender Greta's Auxiliary 1/8" input.  Plug your turntable into this little guy for analog tone that lets your recent Grizzly Bear or Bon Iver vinyl sound like it should, I guess.  Or just plug in your iPod (digital music through an analog amplifier?).  I actually have not experimented with this feature of the Greta although I would love to.  My wife and I listen to a wifi radio (Logitec Squeezebox) every morning and I would be very interested to hear how it sounds through the Greta.  Do you play your iPod through your Greta?  Comment and let me know what you think about it.