DID IBANEZ EVER PUT A GIBSON LOGO ON ...

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Author Message Pauln (Pauln) Posted on Saturday, February 02, 2002 - 10:45 am:    Hi Jeff I had a guy email me who purchased an Ibanez LP copy from a dealer for big buck's. The head stock on this piece read's GIBSON Is it possible that you guy's whent this far or is this dealer laughing all the way to the BANK Thank's Paul Daveyanco (Daveyanco) Posted on Monday, February 04, 2002 - 11:27 pm:    Hey Paul, I was wondering that myself, there was a fellow who said he was selling off his "golden era-lawsuit" collection. Sold maybe half a dozen Ibanezs that I saw on ebay about month or so ago. 3 or 4 ES175 style lawsuits and at least one flametop les paul, all had Gibson on headstocks...Dead ringers exept for bolt on necks! Guys location was "something" Country Club, Southern California....He and his wife were doctors of some type if I remember right. All the guitars looked great, got good money for them too. Maybe same guy your talking about??? Dave. PS: yeah I remember now, I had bid on the les paul and he emailed me new years morning real early said I won the bid, but when I checked, the auction was still on! Too much to drink I guess! Johns (Johns) Posted on Tuesday, February 05, 2002 - 8:00 am:    Paul: I think we may have lost Jeff. He's a busy guy. Anyway, we all know that putting Gibson's logo on guitars that are not licensed to have such would be against the law, right? There's 2 levels of law involved. Outright counterfeiting (fraud to the consumer) and then there's copyright (and perhaps patent) infringement against the manufacturer. Although anything is possible (especially in countries that don't abide by international copyrights), the action taken against a company importing and selling counterfeit guitars would probably have been much more severe than a simple civil "lawsuit" to stop producing guitars that have the exact "shape" of Gibson's models. It's more likely that enterprising forgers took advantage of the situation: 1) easy availability to Gibson logo decals, 2) the fairly decent level of construction and materials used on somme replica guitars and 3) the rapidly rising price of Gibson vintage guitars. There would also be a gray area in the law where someone modified their own guitar with no intention to represent and sell it as "the real thing". And if such a guitar someday got onto the market, well the law and manufacturer would probably not expend too much effort to prosecute. Ibanez (Hoshino) has a much longer history in the musical instrument industry than their guitar lines. I find it hard to believe that they would have risked their reputation by stooping to the level of criminals and producing counterfeting Gibson guitars. Just my thoughts. Harry (Harry) Posted on Tuesday, February 05, 2002 - 8:15 am:    Hi Paul/Davyanco It's highly unlikely to me that Ibanez ever put Gibson logos on the headstock. All the way through the seventies' copy-era Ibanez was lying under Gibson's fire about the ressemblance of their instruments to the "real thing". Gibson sued Ibanez also, so I don't think Ibanez would take a bigger chance by also putting the name "Gibson" on the headstock. What I believe is the possibility that some people put on that logo themselves; I can recall from my darkest youth that I once owned a Morris SG, carefully took off the decal and painted "Gibson" on the headstock, so at least from a distance people would stare at me like:"Gee, this guy has a real Gibson...." And many youngsters with a too small budget to buy a "real one" did so. In fact: over here in Holland we have a vintage guitar show/market twice a year and (not legally, probably) there is this stand where they sell complete headstock-fronts with the split diamond (or the "Les Paul-model" signature, choice is up to you) and the Gibson logo. In fact it's a kinda foto-copy on a thin plastic plate. Take off the machine heads of your Harikiri or Kamikaze Les Paul, glue the plastic plate on, drill the holes for the machine heads in the right place and put the machine heads back in their place. It's as easy as your ABC. Also real Fender decals can be found there, ready to be fitted on fake-Fender headstocks. "If done well, nobody will notice unless you tell....." So I don't believe for a second that Ibanez did this...It would be a far to big risk too to do so. Greetz, Harry Harry (Harry) Posted on Tuesday, February 05, 2002 - 8:21 am:    John! It looks like I'm playing your parrot here, but when I started writing my reaction yours wasn't on yet! I got interrupted and when I finished it and posted it, I saw your reaction from 15 minutes before mine... but it's cool to see we apparently have the same thoughts on this matter. Cheers! Harry Fredb (Fredb) Posted on Tuesday, February 05, 2002 - 12:00 pm:    I'd definitely agree that Ibanez would have no point in doing this, they were going out of their way to build a brand name, and were actually bucking the trend by using consistent branding when many Japanese guitars would have whatever label a distributor would request. Fred Johns (Johns) Posted on Tuesday, February 05, 2002 - 12:39 pm:    Dave: I believe you are referring to Dr. Art Ridderhoff. I bought one of my Scruggs from him. He's a friend of Harold Wherry. I was intrigued by his Gibson-logoed Ibanezes. Actually, I only remember seeing the blonde, flamey ES-175. I wondered what the story was, but never got up the gumption to ask. Did he state how he knew this was an Ibanez, did it have a label inside? To his credit, he wasn't trying to pass this off as a real Gibson. The modification, obviously destroys the "collector's value"...unless disreputable hypesters were leading buyers to believe some "legend" that Ibanez imported and sold counterfeit guitars and that's why there was a "lawsuit" in the mid '70s. Johns (Johns) Posted on Tuesday, February 05, 2002 - 12:46 pm:    Harry: Great minds think a like. As long as we are confessing, I remember seriously trying to figure out how to change the logo on my '75 Ibanez SG to a real Gibson one. I also wondered out loud what it would take to make it a setneck versus a bolt-on. I didn't carry any of these fantasies out. I just traded the Ibanez for a Gibson Melody Maker. Spiro (Spiro) Posted on Tuesday, February 05, 2002 - 3:44 pm:    i am in the middle of restoring an Ibanez set neck LP copy which i looked at and thought how easy it would be.. seeing as i replaced the logo to begin with... Johns (Johns) Posted on Wednesday, February 06, 2002 - 10:26 am:    Spiro: So that's what you need the scan of the Ibanez logo for! How did you carry this logo replacement out? Spiro (Spiro) Posted on Wednesday, February 06, 2002 - 5:05 pm:    It actually went quite well... Check post restoration of Ibanez 2651CW Fredb (Fredb) Posted on Sunday, February 10, 2002 - 1:55 pm:    That's too bad that Jeff's been lost to this site. One thing I've wondered about, especially since this site has brought people from all parts of the world together to discuss Ibanez, where's the Japanese contingent? That would be something if some of the old craftsman from the mom-and-pop construction sites were around to go over details. Can anyone translate from Japanese? There's a mystery about the earliest models, and would wonder if there are detailed records buried in the back of one of these shops, if they still exist, which might answer a lot of questions. Fred Johns (Johns) Posted on Monday, February 11, 2002 - 11:27 am:    Fred: I hope that Jeff will find his way back, soon. (If his absence means that he is helping out on the new Ibanez book, then it's time well spent.) The "Japanese connection", that's an interesting idea. I have a Japanese friend that could probably translate, but I'm not sure how we'd even contact anyone to start a conversation. Fredb (Fredb) Posted on Monday, February 11, 2002 - 5:41 pm:    John, I'm not sure how such a conversation could be started either, would be interesting though. Maybe some of the ex-employees are at or near retirement...I could imagine them kicking back, enjoying their retirement on the Internet and finding this site...would certainly give a different perspective on things. Fred

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