Fender Flame or Esprit? Anyone?

[Kap'n]

I'd rather have one of .

[elicross]

Byootiful. The pic says "Nightbird"...is that a Gretsch? I love it!

I also love the look -- and the very idea -- of the Fender Esprit. Someday I'm going to have one of those, by God.

[dlmorley]

I'd take the Esprit over the above guitar anyday
The fender is such a nice shape and is original in design
Every time I play it, I realize just how good the build quality is. Not much will compare these days for reasonable money
Plenty of good guitars out there but few as original as the esprit/flame

[Kap'n]

Byootiful. The pic says "Nightbird"...is that a Gretsch? I love it!

Guild, designed by George Gruhn, and the inspriation for the Flame/Esprit. This one has had the pickups changed. I've owned a couple.

[rick31797]

That's a very nice guild., what model is that guitar.
I have a 1966 T-100 hollow body electric, that i have had for 37 yrs.

I have seen a few Fender Master series guitar's on Ebay lately.They seem to come all at once and then you don't see them for awhile. One person see what they are selling for and decides to sell.

[Kap'n]

That's a very nice guild., what model is that guitar.

Nightbird GG. Appears to be an '85, probably one of the first 50 or so. Spruce top, chambered mahogany back, ebony board, 24 3/4" scale. De-luxe appointments, like 7-layer binding, notched diamond inlays, bound G-shield headstock. Even the tuners are funky - small button knobs with tension adjust on the other side.

[NeoFauve]

Kap'n-
I was just flipping through that "Guitar Stories" book last week, to see if there was any info about Guild's early humbuckers, (the smaller pre-HB1's), and stumbled across that picture of your guitar.
I would imagine that the spruce top would sing a little differently that the maple top on my Bluesbird.
I've never played one of those. Nice guitars.

[Kap'n]

They are nice. I ended up selling it for a tidy profit. I really liked it, but I was always afraid to bring it to the crappy bars I play at because I always was afraid of damaging something rare.

It also had a fairly thin neck profile, that I think was based on a 1960 LP Standard. Eventually I ended up liking chunkier necks.

[NeoFauve]

There was a piece on George Gruhn in a Fretboard Journal an issue or two ago.
There's a shot of him standing in his shop. There were a number of variations on the Nightbird design hanging on the wall behind him. Deeper arches, venetian cutaways, Filtertrons.
Neat stuff.

[Kap'n]

The original pickups for those were supposed to be Filter-tron like, but I'm not sure how close they actually were, as I never had a chance to compare them side-by-side.