Dave Gonzalez The paladins x550

Jeff Haddad

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Welcome! I would love to hear the story of how you were able to acquire that guitar along with some photos!

I saw them in a small bar here in PA in 2002 and got to meet Dave and speak with him a bit. When I asked him about the guitar he asked if I wanted to see it and handed it to me to check out. It was a Holy Grail moment for me!
 
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1000001548.jpg
 

GAD

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I'm trying to attach pictures but and videos but it's not letting me
You have to host videos somewhere else and link to them here. Photos should be no problem.

There you go!
 

GGJaguar

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Welcome to LTG! Boy, if that guitar could talk...
 

Jeff Haddad

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Wow! That is the real deal! I thought you meant the ca. 2000 signature model from Guild/Fender, but this is the OG!

Congrats! I would love to hear how you managed to pry that away from Dave Gonzales.
 

chazmo

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Awesome, mondo!!!!!! That is wicked cool.

Funny story, there was a Dave Gonzalez (not sure of the spelling) that we met during one of our Let's Meet Guild events when he working in New Hartford years ago. Everyone kept confusing him with the "real" Dave Gonzalez. :) (there wasn't any real comparison. :D :D )

Actually, Dave was a corporate Fender guy, if I remember correctly, and he just came to visit with us during LMG. I think it was only for one of the 4 events...

Good luck with your X-550. Über cool. It'd be cool for us to see the label, if you can get a shot of it (and the back of the headstock). Hans Moust may already have this guitar in his records, I'm not sure, but it should be!
 
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SFIV1967

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Funny story, there was a Dave Gonzalez (not sure of the spelling) that we met during one of our Let's Meet Guild events when he working in New Hartford years ago. Everyone kept confusing him with the "real" Dave Gonzalez. :) (there wasn't any real comparison. :D :D )
That Dave was the Guild Product Manager at FMIC:



Ralf
 

chazmo

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That Dave was a Guild Product Manager at FMIC:



Ralf

Exactly, Ralf. Did you ever meet him. I liked him, and he seemed mostly open with us when we spoke, but I felt he was holding back a lot at the time. I wish he'd been as transparent as all the other NH folks (who were formerly Hamer/Ovation guys). I miss htem.
 

SFIV1967

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Good luck with your X-550. Über cool. It'd be cool for us to see the label, if you can get a shot of it (and the back of the headstock). Hans Moust may already have this guitar in his records, I'm not sure, but it should be!
The guitar is well documented, here for example in the 2003 catalog:

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Ralf
 

SFIV1967

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Did you ever meet him.
No, by 2013 he was already moved on to be responsible for Takamine and Chris Middaugh was the FMIC Product Manager for the Guild brand (whom I met). I somehow missed visiting the Takamine booth at NAMM 2013 as he was there! Dave Gonzales moved on from Takamine to be the Gretsch product manager later. He looked a bit different in 2017.
But I lost track and don't know what he did afterwards and where he is today.

Ralf
 
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How I got that guitar a couple years back I was in California I was doing a few shows out there, first of all Dave and I are super bros for a lot of years, Dave was out there getting his stuff from Thomas's studio taking it back to Texas, and visiting his mom for mother's Day I went over to his sister's house for a party then he asked me hey can you come with me to the storage locker when we got there he had three guitar cases and he pulls out this old guild guitar case wrapped in duct tape, he opens the case and it was the x550 his main one, he said I don't know why I'm holding on to this I haven't seen this guitar in 20 years, It needs to be played and you're the guy to do it, It was just wasting away in a storage locker, I took at the Joe compagna guitar tech and and he brought it back to life, this guitar has the most mojo and plays and sounds just like the records I'm very honored to have it,
 
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