1985 Guild Brian May BHM1

GAD

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It's twofer day! First the Model Four amp, and now the 1980s Brian May guitar!

http://www.gad.net/Blog/2019/03/19/1985-guild-brian-may-bhm1/

Guild-1985-BrianMay-BM01-TopFull-3-1.jpg


As always, please PM me with typos, errors, or whatever else I've done wrong. :eagerness:
 

Bonneville88

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Cool! That thing is practically a guitar event unto itself - endless neato details!
 

F312

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That is one of the coolest guitars I have seen in a "long time", "long time".

Ralph
 

Nuuska

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Howdy

Your local vet should have x-ray !
 

Nuuska

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No - GAD was asking help to get that guitar x-ray'd
 

kakerlak

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Hey! I have those knobs... Way back in the '90s, before eBay took over from various classified ad sites, I bought some "clear Guild knobs" from a photoless listing. They must've been spare Brian May knobs -- I think I have four or five of them. Never knew what they were and always wondered how/why they got IDed as Guild knobs in the first place. Now I know (and am fairly certain I'll never need them)!
 

shihan

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I’m not a Queen nor Brian May fan (no offense intended, to each his own!) but I really enjoyed the review.
It’s always a good thing to learn more about a rare-bird Guild, and you make it fun, sort of like that one cool teacher you had that made (your worst subject here) interesting. As I’ve said before, I’m always impressed by the length you go to to get the whole story, such as buying and dissecting a spare pickup. Truly above and beyond the call.
A big plus for me on this review was, a rarity for me, I don’t want one. I won’t be spinning my gears trying to figure out how to scrape up the cash to buy a Red Special.
Thanks for a fun read.
 

GGJaguar

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Another fine (and fun) review!! I still don't understand Guild's choice of the Kahler trem for this model.
 

HeyMikey

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Outstanding review! Just incredible how much detail and fascinating bits you add. Way above and beyond.
 

GAD

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I’m not a Queen nor Brian May fan (no offense intended, to each his own!) but I really enjoyed the review.
It’s always a good thing to learn more about a rare-bird Guild, and you make it fun, sort of like that one cool teacher you had that made (your worst subject here) interesting. As I’ve said before, I’m always impressed by the length you go to to get the whole story, such as buying and dissecting a spare pickup. Truly above and beyond the call.
A big plus for me on this review was, a rarity for me, I don’t want one. I won’t be spinning my gears trying to figure out how to scrape up the cash to buy a Red Special.
Thanks for a fun read.

Wait until I release my review of the '93 Brian May Guild!
 

GAD

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Hey! I have those knobs... Way back in the '90s, before eBay took over from various classified ad sites, I bought some "clear Guild knobs" from a photoless listing. They must've been spare Brian May knobs -- I think I have four or five of them. Never knew what they were and always wondered how/why they got IDed as Guild knobs in the first place. Now I know (and am fairly certain I'll never need them)!

Thanks very cool. I bet someone would pay real money for them if they needed them. If no one needs them, though, probably not. Capitalism in a nutshell, right there.
 

GAD

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Another fine (and fun) review!! I still don't understand Guild's choice of the Kahler trem for this model.

Hans would know more and that's probably reserved for the next book, but my guess is using off-the-shelf parts makes it easier to make guitars. That, or they had a pallet of the damn things that they needed to move. :lemo:
 

DThomasC

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I'd guess they pretty much had to source all the hardware from vendors. Best case, they could talk Kahler into reproducing something close to the the original, but for such a small production run it would be end up being crazy-expensive. The guitar was already too expensive.

I would prefer they spent the money on pickups.
 

sailingshoes72

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That's a very thorough review! I enjoyed reading it. In particular, I appreciated the chart that shows the various tonal options with the pick-ups, and the schematic of the wiring and switches. Like with the Fender Jazzmaster and Jaguar, I've always been a little confused by all the different switches on the BHM1.

It was cool to see Queen open the Academy Awards Show this year with a medley of songs (w/ Adam Lambert on vocals). Brian May was playing the Red Special. I immediately thought of the Guild signature model.
 
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I can’t wait for the review of the 90’s Brian May.
Your reviews are excellent . Thanks for taking the time
 

Wulfthar

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Great memories...when I was a kid Brian May was the reason why I picked up the guitar.

In the 90s I wanted that guitar, but it was impossible to procure, I know that later in the decade people were available to spend the equivalent of $6000 for a second generation Guild, as at the time it was the only production model BM guitar before he worked with Burns to make the "cheap" reissue in the early 2000s that I own.

I like the 1985 because of the Dimarzio pickups (that I installed on my Strat at that time) and also the Kahler, IMO it´s an interesting shredding version of the Red Special. I remember Brian used it quite a lot in the Kind of magic tour and also in the Back to the light tour (with the then new 1993 model). He described the sound as "harder" than his Red Special, more modern, more 80s.
 
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