Glen Campbell's studio guitar resurrected?

[Joshilyn Hoisington]

https://eastwoodguitars.com/collections/bring-it-back/products/eastwood-t-60-gc-deposit

Eastwood guitars specialises in making close copies of defunct weird guitars, and now they're fixing to bring back the Teisco T-60, which, you Glen Campbell fans will know was arguably his primary six-string electric guitar for his session work days.  I've wanted to own one, and of course it's not the original but I have the Eastwood Mosrite 12 copy and it's a solid guitar and I bet this would be too.

Here's a question -- despite Glen's long and intimate relationship with the BBs, he played very little six string electric indeed.  His contributions were either acoustic or electric 12-string.  So who can say whether his Teisco showed up on a Beach Boys record.  But you've definitely heard it!

I would love for there to be more sort of "signature models" of LA session greats.  The best we have now are the Hal Blaine Zildjian drum sticks, and maybe the Joe Osborn Lakland bass.  But a Tommy Tedesco signature Bellzouki reissue from Danelectro would go a long way!  The Frank Capp signature Vibraphone?  Ooh, ooh, the Ron Swallow signature tambourine!

Anyway, thought people might be interested.

[Mitchell]

Very cool.

Ah, guitars and bicycles, and the n+1 rule.

[Joshilyn Hoisington]

Very cool.

Ah, guitars and bicycles, and the n+1 rule.

But I really need this one.

[guitarfool2002]

This is fascinating because the reputation on Teisco guitars for decades has been cheap Japanese imports that you could find in a pawn shop for under 50 bucks consistently from the 70's until the mid-90's or so...and that they were very difficult to play and usually needed a lot of repair or rehab. Yet Glen's T60 was actually a hand-built, high quality instrument from the early days of Teisco that actually played and sounded fantastic. I know others are also asking how did a guy like Glen get such an early, basically custom-built-by-hand Japanese import in the days before the US market was flooded with Japanese imports? I don't think I've seen an answer to that. From what I understand the only way you could get some of these, especially a hand-built Teisco prior to '63 or so, was to have someone who had been in Japan bring one or ship one back to the US. Unless some one-offs made it to certain stores.

What people also said in terms of Glen's early session work - Imagine when Glen showed up the first time in the studio with some of these known players, who were playing Telecasters, Gibson archtops, etc...with a Teisco guitar that looked like that. I'm sure he got some odd looks from the established guys, if not outright questioning and mockery, and then he actually starts ripping solos on that guitar and all doubts are erased immediately. Must have been an interesting scene. It looks like an import, lower budget model, yet Glen's had that special magic or Mojo that it sounded amazing and played great.

Is it true that up to maybe '67 or '68 most if not almost all of Glen's 6-string solos were cut on that Teisco? That's pretty amazing, because I have never heard a Glen solo that sounded bad. Is that, for example, the guitar heard on Mary Mary and so many other classic solo breaks? Crazy! I know he switched over to Fender at some point around when he became a touring Beach Boy, but apparently he used this Teisco almost exclusively on his electric studio work.

Looks like they're still priming the pump with advance orders for that reissue, and it's still lagging a bit. You can see the Deadheads came out in full force to fund the Bobby Weir Ibanez copy...

And related to Eastwood and Glen's relationship with Ovation...I always wanted an Ovation Breadwinner, just to have one, and Eastwood makes a repro of that too. I remember seeing David Cassidy play one on Partridge Family reruns and always thought it was a cool, almost crazy design for an electric guitar.

[Joshilyn Hoisington]

Incidentally, for reference:

[SBonilla]

I remember seeing Teiscos for $49.00 at places like WT Grant and Woolworth's. I never saw them for sale in any music store. They were usually in the $49.00 range.

[Rocker]

Incidentally, for reference:

That's Don Everly on the right, isn't it? Possibly Phil in the middle section in the background

[guitarfool2002]

I remember seeing Teiscos for $49.00 at places like WT Grant and Woolworth's. I never saw them for sale in any music store. They were usually in the $49.00 range.

That's exactly what blows my mind about Glen's Teisco - It was an early model, a true hand-built model that was crafted and not mass-produced, and one which as I mentioned would have been virtually impossible to get unless you were in Japan at that time. I'd still like to know how Glen came to own this guitar. And yes, Teisco along with dozens of other discount-store brands made in Japan was a result of the demand boom for guitars especially after the Beatles inspired all those kids to take up guitar, and they were simply not good instruments. I've tried out a bunch of these brands through the years, and almost all of them were very flawed instruments.

Yet Glen Campbell somehow got an early handmade Teisco deluxe model that was so good and sounded terrific enough that it was his main "solo" electric guitar for years in the studio. And I've even heard others who have played and owned the T60 like Glen's say they're cool guitars, but need quite a bit of work to get them up to professional standards as vintage guitars. Go figure!