The Smiley Smile Message Board

I didn't know he was an "official" BB.

http://www.italiaguitarsusa.com/making-this-the-first-true-generator-on-the-internet-2/

What a scam from Jeff! ::)

Maybe if it was a good guitar and I wanted a new one.

I have no problem with anything in the blurb. Note: it says from the Beach Boys, not of the Beach Boys. World of difference.

Of course it would have been even better if it had been Alan:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=10GKFM5eVe8

Italia make nice guitars. Bought one a few years back. I think I might prefer a Carl Wilson Ric though  :hat

Wow!  In my opinion, this is silly.  Jeff Foskett is really that famous?

You couldn't pay me to own something with his name on it.

Supposedly he has some sort of a following in Japan.

Why is everyone getting their knickers in a twist? It clearly states he only tours with The Beach Boys. But apart from that Jeff does have a following in Asia, I know this for a fact  and I can see why they picked him.
I consider him more of a beach boy than Ricky or Blondie any day of the week.  I love Jeff , Brian's shows have never been the same since he's been gone.

And I'm planning on getting that guitar actually solely based on Jeff's endorsement.

Would you like to tell more about that? How is someone who has not ever been an official member more of an official member than two actual official members? Did Jeff release a song he wrote on a Beach Boys album? Oh right, he didn't. 

Exactly. Blondie (https://youtu.be/pF9k3I1sQSE) or Jeff (https://youtu.be/DdeVu5mnTxU) in Brian's band? I'll take Blondie any day.

Well I meant it in the sense that I don't care for Blondie & Ricky's contributions. But Jeff's vocals have been an asset on Brian's solo work & The Beach Boys recording since the 80s and he also improved the concerts since the 80s. The Queen Mary may have not had Carl but they other early 80s concerts I attended before Jeff joined were horrid.

The early 1982 Carl-less Beach Boys stunk just as much after Foskett joined. Not a knock on him; he was trying his hardest like Carter and Figueroa, etc.

The band didn't start sounding solid until Carl came back. It had as much to do with Carl's setlist and rehearsal conditions as it did him being there.

As for Foskett's new guitar, there are many names unknown to the masses that get signature instruments. I think "from the Beach Boys" in the headline does imply actual membership, another silly side effect of the band's weird licensing arrangement. Foskett often excessively pads his resume; I've seen articles and bios that say he joined in 1979 or 1980 when he actually joined in last days of December 1981.

"From the Beach Boys" is a better sales pitch than "from the licensed touring band backing band."

I played one of those Italia guitars years back and liked it quite a bit. However ... I couldn't get past how ugly they are! (the one Jeff is holding looks better ... but they used to have these weird pearl colors) ... I got a Schecter 12-string for awhile that I liked better overall (a bit cheaper too). Of course, I soon found a Fender Electric XII and never looked back.

Can't find it now, but I read an unusual comment from Jeff Foskett in an old book online ... in which he said he switched from a Fender Electric XII to Epiphone 12 because the music required a higher quality instrument or something like that. I would think if it were good enough for Billy Strange and Pet Sounds, that would be the gold standard :)

That said, I met Jeff once and he seemed to be a very nice fellow.

... Found a link, here it is:

https://books.google.com/books?id=LpdMAgAAQBAJ&pg=PT99&lpg=PT99&dq=tijuana+brass+%2212+string%22&source=bl&ots=lpcub_kxWA&sig=UDqBecEZ-cOhacH_CPMq1PS_0UE&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiC7-P3icvRAhVqjFQKHR8DC3EQ6AEIMTAC#v=onepage&q=tijuana%20brass%20%2212%20string%22&f=false

(... scroll back one page ... can't figure out how to link to a specific page in this book)

Donny already knows this, I've said it many times here and elsewhere. But it bears repeating. If you want *that sound* in a durable and easy to intonate and play electric 12-string, Fender is the one. Stairway To Heaven was a Fender 12-string, McGuinn used one in the studio besides his Rickenbacker...many famous classic electric 12 parts were recorded with a Fender 12. Like Pet Sounds. Other contenders were the Danelectro, of course the Rickenbacker, but the original models of those could be difficult to intonate and were more of a chore than the Fender, which was and is built to last and to play right out of the case. Like the Telecaster.

That's just my two cents as a fellow owner and player.

Now about the Epiphone or even the Gibson electric 12-string models...higher quality? I don't get that at all, unless it's about aesthetics and visual appeal. Carl Wilson said his own had the same issues as most of them did with the headstock cracking or even breaking off due to the flawed design that didn't account for the added tension. Imagine Gibson's "Les Paul Syndrome" with the headstock breakage applied to an even worse headstock and neck design with hundreds more pounds of string tension pulling on it. Carl's neck had to be replaced, if I'm remembering it correctly he had a "Frankenstein" Gibson/Epiphone electric 12 because of the breakage. Confirm, anyone?

Anyway, to each his own, it's like Chevy versus Ford, but still - I don't know where the high quality issue comes into play with electric 12 models from Gibson and/or Epiphone that have a decades-old rep for broken headstocks and neck flaws.

I forget where, but Billy Hinsche addressed that topic and confirmed that Carl had the Epiphone neck replaced with Gibson one.

 :) Thanks for the confirm! I knew I had heard or read it somewhere.

Is this the source? I couldn't find anything else...

http://smileysmile.net/board/index.php/topic,258.msg7644.html#msg7644

I'm not gonna join the chorus of folks pissing on Jeff.  He was there to help when Brian got the ball rolling again, when Brian toured Pet Sounds the first time and when Brian finished and toured SMiLE.  He was a touring Beach Boy for years before that...and again since.  He can't sing or sound like Carl but then who can?

Just 'cause he's now back with that 'love' guy doesn't make him suddenly a useless hunk of dung.  Maybe he isn't a perfect fella.  Who is?  Not me.  But I don't see him constantly whizzing on Brian, Carl, Dennis or the legacy.  He just tags along as an employee.  The 'boss' says where and when.  All he has to do is show up and perform, as he does, with the so-called Beach Boys.

The ad really isn't dishonest.  "ypu"  can buy one of those guitars if "ypu" wants to.

I do have more of a real feel for Blondie though.  Can't think of a thing Jeff sang lead on with the officially recorded and actually released Beach Boys' body of work.  Ricky drums for Bonnie Raitt.  Gainfully employed and a key part of her band.

Yeh I was actually wondering if he was misquoted. Maybe he was using one of the lower-budget Fender 12-string reissues? Even those seem like decent quality instruments ... but maybe they have lower quality hardware or something. Even the later '60s Fender XIIs have kinda crummy "F" tuners ... That said, any old guitar could have issues, so who knows. Funny thing is the Danelectros are king of the budget guitars, and those were used on the original recordings! (as you noted). And I'm pretty sure some other guys in BWs band used what appear to be the Korean reissue Danelectros (which are fine instruments in my experience) at one point or another, so ...

I had a '74 Gibson SG when I was much younger, and that headstock cracked when I took it on a trip. Was never quite the same after. Yeh the Fender XII, though more similar in shape to a Jazzmaster/Jaguar, actually is more Telecaster-like in it's basic layout. Though the pickups are hotter/darker.

Just my own opinion, but I'd agree the guitars are strangely pretty ugly. For such a boutique sort of instrument where everything is usually almost self-indulgently really nicely made and attractive, I'm surprised they tend to look so garish and awkward.

But it may well play and feel and sound really great, which is the important part obviously.

They're actually pretty inexpensive Korean-made guitars:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/like/311477635974?lpid=82&chn=ps&ul_noapp=true

Above is a link to one of those ugly ones I played!

They do play and sound pretty good in my opinion.

If I wanted the guitar based on how good a guitar it was, sure. But buying or avoiding guitars based on celebrity endorsements is kind of silly (unless it's a Hitler guitar or something, I suppose). As for the question about whether Jeff is "really that famous" to have an endorsement, keep in mind how these things often work. Some endorsements are high-dollar, high-value affairs for the company: they build a model specifically for an artist and market the sh*t out of it. (I think back to my formative guitar years, when Steve Vai had the Jem and then Universe guitars.) But others just fill out the rosters so that companies can say things like "that's why more than 100 working musicians play Blahblah guitars," or so they have various niche markets filled (some oldies acts, some rockers, some country guys, or whatever).

It's similar to shoes in sports. There are tiers. Different brands of course have different buying power and different strategies, but generally speaking there are tiers of endorsers. Suffice to say Jeff Foskett isn't Michael Jordan in that area, but he is a key piece of a known name brand band. It doesn't hurt to use him, I'm sure. (As evidenced by them using him.)