Vintage & Rare guitar of the week: Zemaitis GZV 500 MF

guitarz.blogspot.com:

This Zemaitis GZV 500 MF is a Japanese-made Greco/Zemaitis guitar rather than one built by the late legendary British luthier himself. Nevertheless it is a very elegant piece, one of the most attractive Flying V style guitars that I have laid eyes on. Metallica's James Hetfield is also a fan having played the exact same model guitar on the World Magnetic Tour. The guitar features a two-piece Mahogany body, engraved aluminium top, DiMarzio DP103 PAF pickups, a 25" scale, and Schaller M6 tuners.

This guitar is currently being offered for sale via Vintage & Rare priced at €3709.

G L Wilson

© 2011, Guitarz - The Original Guitar Blog - now in its 10th year!

Zemaitis Diamond custom

guitarz.blogspot.com

A cliché I regularly read on the guitar blogosphere, is the claim that the new made-in-Japan Zemaitis guitars are not the real things, that trying to prolong the work of craft-master Tony Zemaitis is pointless and almost blasphemous, and by extension that these guitars are probably just bad instruments (but if you dig a little bit, you find people saying that handmade original Zemaitis guitars were sometimes botched and badly finished, looking much better on photos than is real, a little bit like Wandre's).

Like most guitar lovers, I never played a Zemaitis guitar, never even saw one in real (neither original or Japanese) since they are not guitars you easily find at your local music shop, but I think that they are some the most superb guitars ever, and I imagine that all the pro musicians who play or endorse the new Zemaitis instruments don't do it only for their good look.

The one you can see here, a Zemaitis GZ500S Diamond is actually from the GZ series - one could call it the budget line of Zemaitis if they weren't over 2500 €, handmade, with engraved gears, abalone binding and inlays - built on contract by law-suit era copy specialist and old-timer guitar maker Greco (so good at cloning guitars that a part of the company became Fender Japan). It has upgraded pickups and pots and just one look at it causes in me a feeling of achievement and perfection (together with the sour feeling that I'll never have enough money in my life to buy such a guitar...)


 bertram

Guitarz - The Original Guitar Blog - now in its 9th year!

Greg Lake's Zemaitis doubleneck

guitarz.blogspot.com:

Greg Lake used to feel a bit shortchanged next to his colleagues in Emerson, Lake and Palmer. Carl Palmer had a huge battery of drums and Keith Emerson was surrounded on all sides by keyboards. Meanwhile Greg Lake is standing there with just a guitar. Not only did he try to re-dress the balance of things by marking his territory on stage with a large antique Persian rug, but he also got himself this simply enormous doublenecked guitar/bass.

Apparently it was one of only two doublenecks built by the now legendary Tony Zemaitis. Unfortuantely it was also extremely heavy, and so Lake was unable to play it onstage for more than a couple of songs. Deciding it was too impractical, he eventually gave it away. Considering the value of original Zemaitis guitars (as opposed to the recent Japanese tributes - and they are costly enough!), he must be kicking himself now.

I wonder where it is now?

G L Wilson

Guitarz - The Original Guitar Blog - now in its 9th year!