Can anyone ID this Gibson acoustic?

Roger Rettig · Post by **Roger Rettig** » 28 Oct 2009 3:53 pm

I'm not buying it, but it belongs to a friend who's wondering if it is actually a Gibson.

It looks to me very much like the Epiphone Cortez from the 1960s. Did Gibson do a version of that guitar in a budget line like this? It's serial # is right for a 1967-68 Gibson.

That headstock is odd - it looks like the narrow one on the solid-body Gibson Melody Maker guitar, but I never saw one on an acoustic before.

Does this guitar ring a bell out there?

Chris Bauer · Post by **Chris Bauer** » 28 Oct 2009 4:23 pm

I'm not much of a Gibsonologist but I seem to remember guitars like these being around in the early 70s and maybe late 60s. They were called LG somethings (maybe LGOs), I think. Anyone else have the same memory??? If it's the model I'm recalling, they were small bodied guitars with an equally or perhaps even smaller sound.

Michael Lee Allen · Post by **Michael Lee Allen** » 28 Oct 2009 5:46 pm

REMOVED

Kevin Mincke · Post by **Kevin Mincke** » 28 Oct 2009 5:47 pm

I think this may be a B-25 6 as it looks very much like my B 25 12-string triburst from 1964.

Bill Hatcher · Post by **Bill Hatcher** » 28 Oct 2009 5:50 pm

MLA is right. Have not see too many of these. The B25 series is more prevelant.

Roger Rettig · Post by **Roger Rettig** » 28 Oct 2009 5:58 pm

I've checked the 'images' of Gibson B-15s on Google, and it looks like that's what it is! The small headstock is peculiar to the 15 - the B-25 has a more-standard Gibson headstock (like a J-45 - and the mahogany body seems to clinch it.

Many thanks, guys - it'll be nice to able to confirm to the lady that her guitar probably IS a Gibson; maybe not a very valuable one, but it was a gift from her late-father in '68, so there's no question of her disposing of it.

Joachim Kettner · Post by **Joachim Kettner** » 29 Oct 2009 10:25 am

The top wood is not spruce. I wonder how it sounds with this kind of wood?

Roger Rettig · Post by **Roger Rettig** » 29 Oct 2009 10:31 am

These are all mahogany. I imagine they were intended to compete with the Martin 00-17s which also had mahogany bodies. I don't know about these Gibsons but the 00-17s I've played work very well - bright-sounding, but balanced.

Chris LeDrew · Post by **Chris LeDrew** » 29 Oct 2009 3:00 pm

Yes, its most certainly a B-15. The B-25 was more often sunburst or natural, but the B-15 was one step lower with an all-mahogany body and narrow headstock. It was the younger brother of the earlier mahogany LG0.

Lindsay Buckingham was a B-25 player, and Barry Gibb played a B-25 12.

Chris Bauer · Post by **Chris Bauer** » 29 Oct 2009 7:57 pm

Chris - Thanks for the reality check that there was such a thing as an LGO and that these were close relatives to some degree.

Weren't there also B-15s and B-25s at some point that had the more traditional Gibson headstock? For some reason, that's the only kind of B-15s and B-25s I can conjure up in my mind. Is that simply yet another brain fart on my part or were there actually such guitars?

Roger Rettig · Post by **Roger Rettig** » 30 Oct 2009 3:09 am

Chris

My research (various books I have here, as well as Goggling 'images') this week has revealed that the B-25s seem to have the standard wide headstock and the B-15s the narrow one.

I was fooled at first; I guessed it might have been a B-25, but I'd never heard of the '15' before. The narrow headstock was blowing all my theories! Once MLA (thanks, Michael!) mentioned them in his post I was able to loook for that specific model and the mystery was solved.

Jon Moen · Post by **Jon Moen** » 30 Oct 2009 11:22 am

Is there anything stamped on the neck block inside the guitar?

Donny Hinson · Post by **Donny Hinson** » 31 Oct 2009 6:16 am

They're one of the cheapest made Gibsons you'll ever run across. Made for only a few years in the late '60s and early '70s, and worth about $400-$500.

Bo Borland · Post by **Bo Borland** » 1 Nov 2009 4:38 pm

Is there any difference between a B15 and a LGO? most of the pics look very similar..

Chris LeDrew · Post by **Chris LeDrew** » 1 Nov 2009 5:24 pm

Bo, the one main difference is the headstock, which is more narrow on the B15. There are probably some other minor differences, but the two models are definitely close. The B15 came after the LG0.

Btw, Roger, the B15 you've pictured here on this thread looks immaculate.

Tony Glassman · Post by **Tony Glassman** » 1 Nov 2009 6:16 pm

Here's a link to an LGO on the Bay.

There's a good headstock photo for comparasion:

http://cgi.ebay.com/1965-Vintage-Gibson ... %26ps%3D63

Roger Rettig · Post by **Roger Rettig** » 1 Nov 2009 6:42 pm

Right, Chris - I thought the same thing. My friend told me that her dad bought it for her new in the '60s, but that she never made any real effort to play. Now her interest is - understandably - nostalgic as it's a link with her father.

I've urged her not to mess around with it any way - it may not be a valuable piece, but it'd be a shame to compromise it at all.

Thanks for all the clues, guys - I knew the B-25s and the LGOs, but the B-15 was a new one on me. Interestingly, there's a reissue Gibson Melody Maker electric over in 'Instruments For Sale', and it, too, has that odd-looking narrow headstock. I remembered the old '50s MMs having that, but the B-15 is the only other Gibson to share it, it seems.