Homemade Upright Bass-Banjo. Awesomely unique instrument.

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I'd love to hear how this Bass-Banjo sounds. I think it's a great idea and I had one of those " how have I not thought of this" moments. This particular bass looks like it was made quite cheaply It makes me wonder if it's a viable concept to make a higher end version.

Has anyone seen something like this before?

R.W. Haller


© 2015, Guitarz - The Original Guitar Blog - the blog that goes all the way to 11!
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Nechville Meteor 5 String Electric Banjo with Fleximount Neck design.

guitarz.blogspot.com:

I must have missed Bertram's post about the Nechville Meteor Electric Banjo from a few years ago because until today I didn't know that this incredible beast existed.

This Nechville Meteor is apparently the only electric banjo that they have made with the Fleximount neck design. It allows you to easily swap out necks.

The listing does not say, but since i see 2 volume pots I can assume that there is some kind of acoustic pickup under the bridge which with the EMG81 would make for a nice hybrid instrument. ( please note that the pictures with the single coil are from Nechville to further illustrate the design of the Fleximount )

I'd love to see how closely the smaller head sounds compared to typically larger banjo heads. I suspect with the right tension it would be pretty close.

R.W. Haller


© 2015, Guitarz - The Original Guitar Blog - the blog that goes all the way to 11!
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Banjocaster. Custom made Telecaster conversion

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I recently purchased a 1970s era made in Japan banjo and I was doing some internet searching to figure out if it was sold under a specific brand as it has no name ( my best guess so far is that its an Iida.....but will keep looking ).

In my searching I came across this great little custom project.
This Banjocaster looks like it was built from a fairly entry level Telecaster, or from parts of that quality level.

The idea is great even if some of the work is not of the highest fit and finish. Plus I'd love to hear Foggy Mountain Breakdown through that humbucker.

R.W. Haller


© 2015, Guitarz - The Original Guitar Blog - the blog that goes all the way to 11!
Please read our photo and content policy.

What's that ... Banjo?

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Here's an interesting bantar guitanjo thing played by Brian Setzer in his Stray Cat days. Is it a one-off? Can anyone ID it? Thanks!

yours, Tone Deaf Radio

Hi Tone, it does indeed very familiar. I have a feeling I've seen one being used by The Pogues. But yeah, it's a Deering Crossfire electric banjo. It actually has two magnetic pickups mounted beneath the head and is designed to be played at volume without any feedback.

Note it's not really a "guitanjo" or a "bantar" - those names are usually given to six string banjos, which are essentially banjos tuned like a guitar so as to accommodate guitar players' existing know-how.  This Deering is a proper 5-string banjo, but in electric format.

G L Wilson

© 2013, Guitarz - The Original Guitar Blog - the blog that goes all the way to 11!
Please read our photo and content policy.

1930s vintage Vega electric tenor banjo, made in the USA

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I love bizarro vintage stuff like this. This isn't a round electric guitar, it's an electric tenor banjo bearing the Vega brandname and can be dated to the late 1930s thanks to a pencil inscription on the inside of the removable back.

I shall copy from the seller's eBay listing, just for the sake of preserving some of this information:

Description: 1930s / 40s Very Rare Vintage Vega Electric 4-String Tenor Banjo made in USA.

Condition: Super cool vintage vibe - various minor nicks, chips, dents & dings; surface scratches, finish wear & light weather checking. Overall the banjo has a great look to it with a gorgeous patina. This is an exceptionally rare instrument and is the first of its kind we’ve had in the shop.

Body: Double bound 11 7/8” diameter body with maple top, back and sides in natural finish. There’s some really pretty flame figuring in the top & back. Nickel trapeze tailpiece with height-adjustable rosewood bridge; single-ply tortoise pickguard. There are no cracks in the pickguard. A hand written note on the inside of the back panel reads: “Purchased new in 1939 Pruneau Music Studio Worcester Mass”.

Neck: Soft “V” shaped maple neck with ivoroid binding & red side-dots. Ebony fingerboard with pearloid star & dot inlays. Nickel machine tuners with ivoroid buttons in perfect working condition. 1/8” nut width, 23” scale length. There is a 9-digit number pressed into the back of the headstock, which appears to be a social security number.

Pickups/Electronics: Original single coil pickup with master volume and 3-way rotary tone control with settings for bass, normal and treble.

Playability/Sound: This banjo produces some exceptionally good tones both acoustically as well as plugged in. The pickup provides excellent output (2.03 Ohms) and a sound that is full, rich and has the utmost in ringing clarity. The three-way tone control allows the player to dial in highly useful sounds. The hollow maple body creates an overall “openness” to the sound that still retains plenty of snap and attack. The neck is exceptionally comfortable and is set up with perfect action.

Case: Includes equally rare hardshell case with multiple stripes in the tolex & two vintage screen prints of dancing women.

Currently listed on eBay by Cream City Music in Brookfield, Wisconsin, with bidding currently nearly at $600 and just under a day left on the auction at the time of writing.

G L Wilson

© 2013, Guitarz - The Original Guitar Blog - the blog that goes all the way to 11!
Please read our photo and content policy.

1960s Teisco electric banjitar which allegedly sounds better than a Strat

guitarz.blogspot.com:

Here's an oddity from 1960s Japan that I find curiously appealing for some reason that I cannot fathom. It's a Teisco electric banjitar. That's right, a solidbody electric 6-string banjo. With a whammy bar!

Actually, my guess is that the only thing "banjo" about it is the shape. Surely, without a resonating head on the body it couldn't possibly sound like a banjo, even if the body is chambered and the instrument has really bad sustain. To confuse matters even more, the seller claims that it "...has a better Stratocaster sound than either one of my two Strats."

Currently listed on eBay with the quite astonishing price of $1,799. Yeah, I appreciate it might be a rare model in excellent condition but I can't see it selling at that price somehow.

G L Wilson

© 2013, Guitarz - The Original Guitar Blog - the blog that goes all the way to 11!
Please read our photo and content policy.

For the left-handed player who has everything... leftie Gold Tone Banjitar

guitarz.blogspot.com:

I've just been trawling through all the left-handed guitars on eBay, trying to find something a little bit different for our southpaw friends - who, rather unfairly, do not get the same range of choices when it comes to guitars as right-handed players (northpaws?) - and the best that I can find is this Gold Tone Telecaster-styled left-handed banjitar - ideal for the left-handed guitarist who wants to let a little banjo into his or her life!

Currently listed on eBay with a Buy It Now price of $779.

G L Wilson

EDIT: Several of you have commented that the above photo is a stock photo of a right-handed guitar which has been flipped to make it look left-handed. It's good to know you guys out there are alert, which is more than I was when I wrote this blog post late on Friday night. But the point is that the left-handed version of this guitar/banjo does exist and is what the successful bidder on the auction will be getting.

© 2012, Guitarz - The Original Guitar Blog - 10 years and counting!

The Rock Ock Eight-Neck Guitar Performance of "Crossroads"

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Eight necks and supposedly fully playable... just so long as you have seven friends to help you out!

G L Wilson

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

1967 Rickenbacker 6000 Bantar Electric 5-String Banjo

guitarz.blogspot.com:

This instrument is unmistakably a Rickenbacker with its gently contoured upper body edges, the back's checkered binding, the varnished rosewood neck with distinctive triangular inlays, the fireglo finish... but it's a banjo!

Indeed it's a Rickenbacker 6000 bantar, a hybrid between a solid electric guiar and a 5-string banjo, as played be legendary banjoist Bela Fleck. It doesn't feature the skin as found on a traditional banjo so is not going to have the same percussive tone, so soundwise its classid Rickenbacker all the way, just utilising banjo stringing and tuning.

Another weird Rickenbacker hybrid instrument of the time was the Banjitar, which according to the promotional literature:

"...combines the sounds of the plectrum banjo, mandolin, Hawaiian guitar and Spanish guitar. Two harmony string pairs and two single strings plus a vibrato unit create this incredible range of tones."

To look at the Banjitar you might think at first glance that it was a standard Rickenbacker guitar, but the very narrow long neck might cause you to do a double take.

G L Wilson

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

Harmony H82 electric tenor banjo

guitarz.blogspot.com:

Here's another electric banjo, this time it's a Harmony 4-string tenor and, unlike the previous ones we have looked at, it doesn't have a skin top to it - so that purists may argue that it's actually a tenor guitar. It has an electric guitar style magnetic pickup mounted onto a spruce top. The seller has copied out the marketing blurb from the 1955 Harmony catalogue that this appeared in, and which I in turn shall reproduce here:

A completely NEW instrument!

Harmony Electro Banjo (Pat. Apppl'd For).

A new instrument in which banjo tone is created electrically - an achievement of Harmony research and ingenuity.

Tuned and played as the traditional banjo. Though the magic of an ingenious bridge and electronic pickup assembly, mounted on a resonant spruce sounding board, it produces the familiar crisp banjo tone so popular today - through an amplifier.

Finished in Jubilee Red and white. Harmo-metal band with fluted red plastic insert at top edge. Pearlette inlaid fingerboard, with edge binding.

Individual tuning keys.

G L Wilson

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

Nechville Meteor Electric Banjo

guitarz.blogspot.com

OK, to be honest, I know nothing about banjos, and even less about electric banjos, so maybe I'm unduly amazed by this Meteor by Nechville, but I find the concept of the cutaway really brilliant and inspirational! It's so cool that it deserves to be a guitar (sorry banjo lovers!)

I won't pretend I can bring any more information about it - I would just copy-paste what you can find on Nechville's website, so if you're interested, just click on the link above. 

Bertram

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