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Last but not least for this year’s NAMM boutique standouts is Portland-based Koll Guitars, the brainchild of longtime luthier Saul Koll and Brooklyn-based filmmaker/photographer Gary Hustwit. This company has been around for a number of years, though in the most recent previous years, these guitars had been previously licensed to an outside company. Since 2015, most of all of Koll’s guitars have been hand-built in-house by Saul Koll himself. In a brand that is quickly becoming heralded by guitarists the world over, the previously profiled Prisma Guitars again made a splash at NAMM 2018 with its line of guitars made out of repurposed skateboard decks.
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In her affidavit, Delph said she discovered Young had been communicating with another person during the robberies on a number registered to Zeff Rocco, an East Coast Crip who’d done prison time for carjacking. In June 2023, a Brinks armored car pulled into the parking lot of a 7-Eleven at the intersection of Florence Avenue and Crenshaw Boulevard. They grabbed bags of cash, checks and the victim’s weapon after taking it from the holster and fled in a white Honda Accord with $166,640, according to court records obtained by The Post.
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Moments later, Rocco jumped from his third-floor apartment armed with an assault rifle. He momentarily dropped the gun while trying to get away and went to reach for it, according to surveillance footage. Over the last 32 years, Norman’s Rare Guitars has become something of a worldwide phenomenon thanks to its appearance in t-shirt form in This Is Spinal Tap and being name-checked in plenty of other films.
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These guitars play like a labor of love and while I’m not familiar with the previous iterations, I can’t help but recommend these builds. Whether you are looking for a guitar that nails the early Gibson/Gretsch-sound or ‘50s-era Fenders, Koll likely has a stylish and worthy offering that is almost guaranteed to satisfy even the most stubborn tastes. The models displayed this year evoked classic eras of lost excellence in guitar design and sound, and it was hard not to walk away impressed. The Arcade is the second and newest model from the company (founded by three brothers) and is sure to wow boutique and vintage lovers wise enough to give it a chance. It’s like the guitar equivalent of a sledgehammer and I’m pretty sure that if Malcolm Young were still around, he’d be a huge fan. On the contrary, there are plenty of great deals to be had, such as a black Fender Road Worn 50s Stratocaster.
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This model features three rosewood spacer-mounted DeArmond Rowe Gold Foils with silver foil inserts, some of the best examples of that thrashy, trashy goodness that defines the foil pickup. In case you couldn’t tell by their inclusion, I think they were wildly successful in this mission. Most of the Koll models range from upper-$2k all the way to $5k or more, but the quality of the instruments more than speaks for itself. For those interested in their newest guitar, the Super Cub, it will retail at a price of about $3k and will be customizable, similar to their other offerings. Another must-play from this year’s NAMM were the offerings from Switzerland-based Soultool Instruments by luthier Egon J. Rauscher.
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As the shop nears its 10th anniversary, owner Reuben Cox still seems mystified at the success of his shop. The shop offers all manner of instruments, from ultra-rare one-offs, tried and true vintage favorites, and even modern affairs. With a cursory glance at what hangs on the walls of its huge showroom, it’s clear that the love of the guitar is alive and well in Norman’s Rare Guitars. As we browse and peruse, our friend and salesman Todd Wisenbacker rolls out guitar after guitar while Norm gives us the inside scoop on each instrument. All in all, when you play a Prisma you get the feeling that they were made with the blood, sweat, and tears of the builder. Depending on the model you prefer, Prisma Guitars tend to start in the mid-$2k range, making them a very attractive challenger for your next boutique buy.
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In a year almost defined by eye-popping guitars and a return-to-form for many companies in terms of design, Soultool and its small display of guitars stood out like a sore thumb among other boutique lines. “The Telecaster shape is such an airtight industrial design and I seem to return to that shape often,” Reuben elaborates. Continuing the hollowbody theme are a blacked-out model with a Bigsby-like pointy cutaway, and a blonde Jaguar-style guitar with a Johnny Marr-style control scheme and a tasteful f-hole. The shop is highly regarded among guitar enthusiast types for its embrace of quirky, kitschy guitars of the 1960s. Any trip to the shop will likely yield the branding of Asian, European, and American origins as well as home-brewed builds that simply must be played to be believed.
This lovely ’66 Casino is in excellent condition with a bright and clean cherry sunburst finish. Owner Shai Ashkenazi runs a fair and honest business here, where he buys and sells at a breakneck pace thanks for his unwavering commitment to matching customers with the right instrument. While we shadow him for a couple of hours, we see him tackle two customers’ doubts, both with cash in hand, and in each encounter he speaks openly about how the instrument in question may not be right for them. To be honest, after the last one we aren’t sure that anything will impress us so much, but this penultimate guitar is surely a showstopper. This 1963 Fender Jaguar, wears the exceedingly rare gold hardware option which looks quite smart against the custom colour Candy Apple Red finish.
Each crack in the finish reads like a line on the palm of your hand, each a story of the past and portent of things to come. Yellowed binding sets off the silky smooth Brazilian rosewood fretboard and unadorned cream plastics, while that famous golden-era craftsmanship ensures the guitar has a loud and resonant sound and near-infinite sustain. This, according to founder and luthier Nick Pourfard, was done to show that Prisma is not a gimmick or just the "skateboard guitar company" and is instead a premier boutique guitar company. In my opinion, they more than succeeded in terms of craftsmanship, playability, and the build quality. The Mastery bridge system on these is a nice touch too and allows for deep dives and an undeniably smooth playing experience.
While not quite vintage, the caché of Jerry Jones’ incredible guitars continues to rise. Jones was the Nashville-based maker of upmarket Danelectro-style guitars which were built to last and upgraded for stellar sound. They were always affordably-priced, but since shutting down in 2011, prices have risen steadily. One of Jones’ stranger models, the Guitarlin boasts a 25.25-inch scale and 31 frets, offering three and a half octaves of fun. The dual lipstick pickups capture each note in incredible detail, with a loud and robust tone to match.
Truetone’s vintage selection includes an exceptional example of the Res-O-Glas era, a circa 1964 Supro White Holiday. This one has its original vibrato unit (which works perfectly, we might add) as well as the ‘Clear Tone’ pickup with Deco adornments. The three-way preset tone circuit is such a genius control scheme for the model, perfectly matched to the unique hollow sound of the fibreglass body. Take the lightly-bursted T-style/Coodercaster guitar pictured here, featuring a gold foil in the neck position and a horseshoe in the bridge. With that in mind, I went ahead with great pleasure (and blues licks) and found some of the most superb boutique brands in all of NAMM. All of these guitars are high-quality instruments that sound as nice as they look and deserve to be played by lovers of the instrument.
Factory aged and beautifully set up, this snappy little shredder remains a near-constant must buy. The Road Worn series featured an alder body with a relic’d nitrocellulose finish, Tex-Mex pickups, and a vintage-style maple neck with a 7.25-inch radius. If you were considering joining a Pink Floyd cover band, this would be the perfect place to start. First from the back room is an undeniably breathtaking 1955 Les Paul Goldtop… and back, and sides, and neck. That’s right, the beautifully crazed gilded vision you see before you is in fact one of the rare all-gold models and a sight to behold in its totally original glory.