My guitar collection - G&L
Around 2010, artist Johnny Garcia had produced 4 unique guitars with custom artwork for G&L the world only became aware of 2 year later after they were included in a list of guitar prototypes on their previous website. The original ‘The Roses’ is one of these pieces, an ASAT Classic with a thin Transparent Red satin finish on the front and more brownish hue close to a Nearly-Naked (NENA) finish on the back. During September 2014, the Custom Creations Department commissioned another 20 guitars for Johnny to use as his canvas for a ‘The Roses’ design. However, to retain the uniqueness of the original, this second batch is different in a couple of ways. This time it is an ASAT Classic Bluesboy in Amber with a satin “Frost” topcoat on an swamp ash body still without pickguard and without a model decal on the headstock. As per usual, it comes with an ASAT Classic 6-saddle bridge housing an ASAT Classic Magnetic Field Design pickup combined with a Seymour Duncan Seth Lover (SH-55N) neck humbucker and the standard ASAT Classic Bluesboy wiring harness. The neck is hard-rock maple with a 12” East Indian rosewood fingerboard, clear satin finish, Jescar Medium Jumbo 57110 frets, 1⅝” nut width, and G&L branded Schaller closed tuning machines. No other information is otherwise readily available on these pieces.
ASAT Classic bluesboy ‘The Roses’ Limited Edition
The story behind this guitar
Year:
Serial number:
Neck date:
Body date:
Strings:
In total, only 5 out of the 20 ‘The Roses’ Limited Editions are registered at the time of writing. Searching online, one can also find many of the (unregistered) others. This particular guitar came from Todd’s Music Express in Metairie, LA. A nice surprise found in the case was the original packing slip G&L used to ship the guitar to that store. What it reveals is that proprietor Todd Schultz placed his order on September 22, 2014. Tagged as PO #391914 todd, it is linked to internal SO #321266 within G&L. Note both date and SO number also appear as such on the neck heel sticker. Comparing data from other ‘The Roses’, that date does fall close to the first week of neck production/assignment for sure. But should the guitar then be dated to 2014? No, that would simply be incorrect. The date sticker on the Seth Lover neck pickup reads ‘20160216’ for instance. And neither would it jibe with the serial number sequence nor with the fact the guitar got “shipped” on March 3, 2016. Also note Spencer Brown, then general foreman at the factory, signed the spec sheet only on March 8, 2016 which I take as the guitar’s birthday. The about 1½ year gap is not too surprising since it would be impossible for Johnny to finish all 20 bodies at the same time. The small gap at the end I believe is of purely administrative nature: the packing slip was created, and hence the guitar assigned to its intended destination, 5 days prior to the instrument being completed. Below one finds a pictorial tour of the complete design which is exquisite. With its NENA finish, the guitar has a wonderful tactile aspect to it. Sound wise it is nothing earth shattering. Roses make you smell better, not necessarily sounding better. It is just another rock solid Bluesboy.
The story behind this guitar
2016
CLF076387 (one of 20)
09/22/14, marked ‘THE ROSES ASAT CLASSIC BLUESBOY’, ‘RW’,
‘SWAMP ASH BODY’, ‘CUSTOM ARTWORK BY’, ‘JOHNNY GARCIA’
none, marked ‘Roses’
