EVH Shark at NAMM 2019

[twonabomber]

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NAMM 2019: EVH has unveiled its new Striped Series Shark Model. The model is based on the iconic striped guitar that Eddie Van Halen debuted during the first Van Halen world tour in 1978.

Eddie Van Halen first took his angular offset axe and sawed a chunk out of the body, leaving jagged edges in the wood that resembled teeth. After applying a coat of silver paint, Van Halen added tape to create his famed striped pattern and then grabbed a rattle can of burgundy Schwinn bicycle paint to finish the job. The final product notably appeared on the back cover of Van Halen's 1980 album, Women and Children First.

The EVH Striped Series Shark features an angular ash body that is paired with a set maple neck, carved to a modified “C” profile. The neck also features a “hockey stick” headstock and the same striped paint job as the body on the back, while the 12”-16” compound radius Pau Ferro fingerboard has 22 jumbo frets and white dot inlays.

The guitar is fitted with custom designed EVH Wolfgang alnico 2 Humbucker bridge and neck pickups. Like the original, the bridge pickup features parchment bobbins with metal braid wire, while the neck pickup features black bobbins with metal braid wire.

A low-friction volume knob with a treble bleed cap provides for high frequency retention when lowering the volume, while a chrome-plated solid-brass harmonica bridge provides massive attack, presence and sustain.

The guitar also features black numbered speed knobs, a three-way toggle switch housed on a brass mounting plate, a brass nut, gold and chrome custom EVH-stamped Gotoh tuners and chrome eye hooks with turnbuckles.

The EVH Striped Series Shark will be available in May at an MSRP of $2,068.95.

For more on the guitar, head on over to evhgear.com.

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[Terry]

The two eye hooks on the body where the jagged edges are: looks flimsy.

I understand it is a replica, but I'd lose the hooks.

I wouldn't mind it, say, all in black with no patented EVH white stripes. With the jagged body parts smoothed out, eyehooks removed. Plus don't bother with the carved out body part exposing the pickup selector switch wire: just have the body as one piece.

At least the price - at a little more than $2k - is somewhat reasonable.

[ZahZoo]

LOL I recognize the iconic history of the guitar... but $2,068.95 for a replica of a piece of junk... What's that saying about a fool and his money..?

[Seshmeister]

Maybe as a bit of art to hang on your wall but it’s not going to feel very unique.

[Terry]

LOL I recognize the iconic history of the guitar... but $2,068.95 for a replica of a piece of junk... What's that saying about a fool and his money..?

Well, and that's the thing...when Eddie was making those guitars back in the 1970s and early 1980s for himself, they basically WERE customized pieces of junk, in that they weren't these precious museum pieces.

I mean, the Frankenstein guitar was a piece of shit, in terms of the parts that made it up, and how beat up it was. He'd slap a Kramer neck on it, and throw in a Gibson PAF pickup in the bridge position. Seemed bizarre to me 10 or so years ago when exact replicas of that guitar were being sold for $20,000 + a pop. Partly because the price is so ridiculous, but also...you know, it's not 1984 anymore.

The Shark model doesn't look comfortable to play sitting down. These days, though, $1500 is a fairly reasonable average benchmark price I'd expect to pay for a good guitar.

[So this is love]

Exactly, I agree, but I'm not tempted by the Shark, I really like the quality of the Wolfgang Specials, and the next on my list is probably the 5150.

[Seshmeister]

Well, and that's the thing...when Eddie was making those guitars back in the 1970s and early 1980s for himself, they basically WERE customized pieces of junk, in that they weren't these precious museum pieces.



It's the same if you read Steve Vai's tour diary from the EEAS tour where his Marshall head blows every few nights. Who needs a customised amp that can't go 5 hours.

Most stuff is better nowadays.

[Terry]

I suppose I can understand the...what...preciousness of that customized gear, but not to the point where you're trying to keep the gear going when it's not practical.

I guess I've never quite understood the whole signature series of guitars when it gets specific to the point of, say, Eddie's Frankenstein guitar...and wanting a guitar that looks exactly like a custom guitar somebody else played. I could understand maybe wanting...what...an Eddie Van Halen 5150 amp or amp head if you played through that and really liked the sound of it. Or, say, in the mid 1980s when Kramer Pacers started selling: like, Eddie had slapped a Kramer neck on Frankenstein, then was playing with Pacers on the 1984 tour.

But, like, getting a Franky replica, then getting the 5150 amps, then getting an EVH phaser / flanger with the Unchained sweep setting, and then playing Unchained and now you've got all the gear and you're playing the song and it sounds as close to Unchained as one could possibly get...well, so?

How about getting some good off-the-rack gear, sitting down and coming up with your own riff that sounds as good as Unchained? Now, THAT to me would be fucking impressive.

[ZahZoo]

For a piece of art or some sort of "collectible" thing like the signed versions EVH played/auctioned during a couple tours... I get the inflated value that goes as high as the market will endure. That's fine for those that want something to hang on the wall but will eventually be worthless somewhere down the road... I can't see paying over $500 for any of the retail production models though.

Collectibles are not for me, personally though. I buy guitars to play...

I will admit I own 1 signature model guitar... It's a Fender Jimmie Vaughan Tex-Mex Strat. As Terry described, it's a great off-the-rack guitar. Nothing pretentious... just a solid build with hotter wired standard Strat pickups and very comfortable V neck shape. My wife bought it for my birthday back in 96 after seeing me playing around with them a few times at a music store. Paid $600 brand new with a hard shell case... they go for about $850 new today. A very reasonable price for a good solid player.

[Terry]

For a piece of art or some sort of "collectible" thing like the signed versions EVH played/auctioned during a couple tours... I get the inflated value that goes as high as the market will endure. That's fine for those that want something to hang on the wall but will eventually be worthless somewhere down the road... I can't see paying over $500 for any of the retail production models though.

Collectibles are not for me, personally though. I buy guitars to play...

I will admit I own 1 signature model guitar... It's a Fender Jimmie Vaughan Tex-Mex Strat. As Terry described, it's a great off-the-rack guitar. Nothing pretentious... just a solid build with hotter wired standard Strat pickups and very comfortable V neck shape. My wife bought it for my birthday back in 96 after seeing me playing around with them a few times at a music store. Paid $600 brand new with a hard shell case... they go for about $850 new today. A very reasonable price for a good solid player.

Which, to me, is the same, in that guitars are meant to be played.

Whenever I'm at the local Hard Rock Casino, and I see various instruments encased in glass, my reaction is one of a non-reaction.

When I think back to Hendrix or Van Halen, they didn't have a bunch of Signature Series gear to create what they initially did.

I suppose all that EVH Signature Series gear would be useful if one is a guitar player in a massively successful Van Halen tribute band.

For me, it's sort of along the lines of the thousands of youtube videos of people playing any given popular rock tune on guitar...sort of a modern-day updating of the guitar-store syndrome I witnessed in the 1980s: even the really good ones - the ones where somebody is playing whatever Van Halen tune flawlessly - sort of elicit the reaction of me thinking I'd rather hear something as compelling and captivating that was original.

If I'm more than mildly bored watching/hearing Eddie himself playing Eruption live nowadays (is it supposed to be impressive that Eddie is still nailing Eruption after 40 years of playing it?), I'm even more so seeing somebody on youtube playing it. Even when it's some 9 year old kid with the video title 9 YEAR OLD KID SLAYS ERUPTION!!! Great, a technical prodigy. Now, go on from being a prodigy at copying someone else's licks to someone who comes up with memorable stuff of their own.

Seriously. I'm starved for some new, original rock that moves me the way all the classic stuff did. No sarcasm there, either. And I find it hard to believe it takes 5 grand worth of Signature Series gear to do it, because it didn't the first time around in the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s.