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  #1  
Old 09-09-2015, 10:03 AM
davidphilips davidphilips is offline
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Default Gibson F25 "Folk Singer"

Anyone else got one of these guitars? Mine's from 1966 and I love it but I'm considering selling it as I have too many guitars... GAS has struck too may times!! Can't make my mind up though haha

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ib8nTYa2z1Q

Would like to hear from other F25 lovers who love that wide neck and funky blues/folk sound.
Cheers
David
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Old 09-09-2015, 01:05 PM
Wade Hampton Wade Hampton is offline
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Back in the 1990's there was a church musician from another Episcopal parish in my diocese who had one of these. His had a bad crack in the top, and he asked me who I recommended as a guitar repair tech who could fix it. I gave him my repairman's name and number, then asked: "How did it get cracked?"

"Oh, it got cracked on the plane when I returned from the Southeast Asian war games" - meaning that twenty five or thirty years earlier, when he was flying back from his deployment in the Vietnam War, the guitar got broken.

It sounded pretty good, but it had a really serious crack. I told him: "You've been lucky so far, probably because it has nylon strings on it, so it doesn't have as much tension on it as if they were steel. But that looks bad and you really ought to get it fixed."

"Oh, I will, I will."

A couple of years later I saw him with a different guitar, and asked him if he'd gotten his Gibson Folksinger fixed. "No, that guitar just pulled itself apart," he smirked, as if it was some sort of badge of honor that he'd neglected it for decades.

Which is typical of that guy. He doesn't like getting precisely in tune with the other musicians, because that's not how they did it back in the Hootenanny days, and starting and ending together seem to be foreign concepts to him.

Anyway, sorry to take a detour into that guy's bizarre rationalizations, but his Gibson Folksinger guitar did sound pretty good before he allowed it to completely self-destruct.


Wade Hampton Miller
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Old 09-09-2015, 01:12 PM
fishstick_kitty fishstick_kitty is offline
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That's a great song!!
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Old 09-09-2015, 01:15 PM
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Ed-in-Ohio Ed-in-Ohio is offline
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Wade, I SO want to jam with your buddy!
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Old 09-09-2015, 02:09 PM
davidphilips davidphilips is offline
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Hey Wade hahahaha great story!! Sounds like a real character.
But did he have nylons on his F25? These are steel string guitars, albeit with a classical guitar body and neck.. a strange experiment Gibson did back in the day. They sound fantastic when in good condition like this one.
This is it recorded in my studio with good mics https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vIs1Lg1qgo0

Thanks fo the entertaining story anyway. I'm with Ed-in-Ohio, I'd like to jam with him too (wouldn't let him near my guitar though haha)
Cheers
D
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Old 09-09-2015, 02:10 PM
davidphilips davidphilips is offline
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Fishtick : Oh thanks!! It's from my 3rd record. I've taken it through a few different arrangements live but seem to always end up getting a bit rag timey on it.
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Last edited by davidphilips; 09-09-2015 at 02:20 PM.
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Old 09-09-2015, 05:22 PM
zombywoof zombywoof is offline
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Very different from anything else Gibson was making. With a wide nut and a flat board they feel like a classical guitar. Interesting guitar in that they were built to be strung with either nylon or steel strings. These guitars were totally redesigned around 1969.
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Last edited by zombywoof; 09-09-2015 at 05:28 PM.
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Old 09-09-2015, 07:18 PM
Wade Hampton Wade Hampton is offline
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After I mentioned my fellow church musician (from another parish, thank you, Lord,) who learned what few musical skills he has during folk music hootenannies and hasn't progressed musically since 1962, Ed wrote:

Quote:
Originally Posted by Ed-in-Ohio View Post
Wade, I SO want to jam with your buddy!
No, you don't, Ed, you really don't. The guy's an out-of-tune steamroller in human form. It doesn't matter how precisely or well anybody else is playing, so far as he's concerned you're just there to back him up.

Even if you're not....

Then David wrote:

Quote:
Originally Posted by davidphilips View Post
Hey Wade hahahaha great story!! Sounds like a real character.
That's a polite way to put it.

Quote:
Originally Posted by davidphilips View Post
But did he have nylons on his F25? These are steel string guitars, albeit with a classical guitar body and neck.. a strange experiment Gibson did back in the day.
He had either nylon strings or silk and steel on it, but I'm pretty sure he'd strung it with ball end nylon strings.

Quote:
Originally Posted by davidphilips View Post
Thanks fo the entertaining story anyway. I'm with Ed-in-Ohio, I'd like to jam with him too (wouldn't let him near my guitar though haha)
After about the fourth or fifth time he'd rolled over whatever it was you were playing, sung an out-of-tune top volume "harmony" over whatever you were singing, and stopped and started his playing with absolutely no reference to what anyone else was playing, sort of like random mortar fire coming in over the wire at Khe Sanh, I suspect that his charm would wear off for you.

It certainly has for me....


whm

Last edited by Wade Hampton; 09-09-2015 at 07:38 PM.
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Old 09-09-2015, 08:15 PM
ThroBak ThroBak is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by davidphilips View Post
Anyone else got one of these guitars? Mine's from 1966 and I love it but I'm considering selling it as I have too many guitars... GAS has struck too may times!! Can't make my mind up though haha

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ib8nTYa2z1Q

Would like to hear from other F25 lovers who love that wide neck and funky blues/folk sound.
Cheers
David
Love the song love the playing and singing! Great lyrics and delivery!

Cool guitar, I have always wanted to try one of these. If you got a good deal on it I would keep it. How many blues guys that can write such killer stuff have such a unique axe? Keep it.
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Old 09-10-2015, 01:37 AM
davidphilips davidphilips is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ThroBak View Post
Love the song love the playing and singing! Great lyrics and delivery!

Cool guitar, I have always wanted to try one of these. If you got a good deal on it I would keep it. How many blues guys that can write such killer stuff have such a unique axe? Keep it.
Oh very kind thanks man. I suppose you're right, it is unique. I have had quite a bit of work done on it too. The collectors will hate this but I had the saddle set at an angle like a normal acoustic so it intonates well. These guitars have the saddle straight like classical guitars and intonation can be tricky if you're moving around the fret board a lot. You may have just convinced me to keep it. Until next time I decide to sell it haha. ;-)
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Old 09-10-2015, 01:39 AM
davidphilips davidphilips is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by zombywoof View Post
Very different from anything else Gibson was making. With a wide nut and a flat board they feel like a classical guitar. Interesting guitar in that they were built to be strung with either nylon or steel strings. These guitars were totally redesigned around 1969.
I've only ever seen them with steel strings on as they have the pinned bridge system like a regular acoustic. I suppose you could use ball end nylon stringsbut for that just get a classical guitar right? haha ;-)
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Old 09-10-2015, 01:40 AM
davidphilips davidphilips is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Wade Hampton View Post
After I mentioned my fellow church musician (from another parish, thank you, Lord,) who learned what few musical skills he has during folk music hootenannies and hasn't progressed musically since 1962, Ed wrote:



No, you don't, Ed, you really don't. The guy's an out-of-tune steamroller in human form. It doesn't matter how precisely or well anybody else is playing, so far as he's concerned you're just there to back him up.

Even if you're not....

Then David wrote:



That's a polite way to put it.



He had either nylon strings or silk and steel on it, but I'm pretty sure he'd strung it with ball end nylon strings.



After about the fourth or fifth time he'd rolled over whatever it was you were playing, sung an out-of-tune top volume "harmony" over whatever you were singing, and stopped and started his playing with absolutely no reference to what anyone else was playing, sort of like random mortar fire coming in over the wire at Khe Sanh, I suspect that his charm would wear off for you.

It certainly has for me....


whm
hahahaha. there really are some characters in music eh? I've been gigging since I was 10 (29 years now) and I've met some proper freaks. Can't beat em.. unless you have to play with em
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Old 09-10-2015, 07:35 AM
zombywoof zombywoof is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by davidphilips View Post
I've only ever seen them with steel strings on as they have the pinned bridge system like a regular acoustic. I suppose you could use ball end nylon stringsbut for that just get a classical guitar right? haha ;-)
Yup. I remember when these guitars were new and that is what Gibson advertised and the guys in the music stores would tell you. But I started gigging in the mid-1960s and never knew anybody who strung them with nylon strings either.
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Old 09-10-2015, 11:40 AM
Wade Hampton Wade Hampton is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by davidphilips View Post
hahahaha. there really are some characters in music eh? I've been gigging since I was 10 (29 years now) and I've met some proper freaks. Can't beat em.. unless you have to play with em
Right. This guy's attitude seems to be that since all of us in the church love Jesus, silly little stuff like being in tune, keeping time and starting & stopping together simply doesn't matter.

Let's just say that I take a different philosophical position on that...


whm
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Old 09-10-2015, 12:21 PM
davidphilips davidphilips is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by zombywoof View Post
Yup. I remember when these guitars were new and that is what Gibson advertised and the guys in the music stores would tell you. But I started gigging in the mid-1960s and never knew anybody who strung them with nylon strings either.
Good to know I'm doing it right ;-)
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