Good investment ?

[David Martin]

Just to gently point out that there is a difference between the current model on offer through imuso above, and the 2004 Anniversary edition. A number of those were made without the subsequent neck pocket modification, and a very small number were shipped with scratchplates made of the original material which subsequently warps.

In my opinion, those are superb guitars, vastly superior to the originals (and, indeed the Custom Shop "Legend") and should be treasured - contrary to what you may have inferred from another thread, they do not have ceramic based pickups but alnico, and having a set of original 60's pickups with which to compare, they sound totally authentic. The neck profile is a very comfortable soft Vee, and the Res-O-Tube trem is amazingly stable and reliable.

But they do feel and handle quite differently to a Strat and take a little getting used to... I have number 027 which was the third one available in the UK after Hank's and Bruce's for the 2004 tour. It's a great guitar... and that's the best reason for owning it.

(As to investment, you can certainly make money buying and selling old guitars if you choose carefully; Jaguars, Jazzmasters, 70's Fenders generally, 60's basses have all increased in value markedly over the last 5 years... even later 70's Les Pauls - which were awful, generally speaking - are going for silly money now, but guitars bought now - even exotic ones - won't realise their current retail price for about 15 years - and then only if thought to be desirable. And vintage "investment" guitar prices fluctuate... 50's Les Pauls with P90's which were fetching circa £30,000 are now around at £20-25,000 and maybe less... and if you were in the market for investment grade "bursts" or Strats would you ever dare to take it out of the house to play in anger?

[hansaustria]

My Anniversary 2004 ( # 167 ) does have the orig. 60`s neck cnfiguration not the stratlike one.
And - on the headstock of my Marvin there was a sticker written on it - LEGEND white. I didn`t
ask B.G. but I believe that the company used for my guitar a LEGEND neck. The sound of the
guitar i great.

Hans

PS: I would never pay € 20 000.- for a vintage instrument !!!