Gibson Firebird

Ages ago, an automotive advice column got some feedback from a reader.  “You told that man having problems with his Firebird that he should contact General Motors.  You should have told him to contact Ford.”  Apparently the reader was confusing the Pontiac Firebird (made by GM) with the Ford Thunderbird (made by Ford).  However, the guitar world has the Gibson Firebird and the bass equivalent, the Thunderbird, also made by Gibson.  And Fender makes both the Jaguar and Mustang, models considerably less popular than the Stratocaster or Telecaster, although Kurt Cobain liked the Mustang – and much less popular as guitars than the auto equivalents are, of course.  Confused yet?  Good, because it gets better.

In 1963, following up its replacement of the Les Paul with new models – the SG, the Explorer, and the Flying V – Gibson watered down the Explorer into the Firebird, designed by Ray Dietrich, who normally designed cars: Packard and Lincoln.   These models were the so-called “reverse” models.  The body looks like an Explorer radically toned down with a reverse headstock and chrome mini-humbuckers.  Rare among Gibsons – indeed, among guitars – the Firebird has “neck through body” construction, meaning the neck and middle of the body are all one piece.  Fenders have bolt-on necks (removable and replaceable) while most Gibsons (e.g. SGs and Les Pauls) have glued in necks.  The tuners were originally banjo tuners which went straight through the headstock and turned from behind, rather than from the side like regular tuners. 

Nonreverse.   Soon after the reverse model came out, Fender bitched and hollered, so Gibson changed to the “nonreverse” model, which to my eyes looks even MORE like a Fender than the reverse style - especially since they went from a reverse headstock (generally unique to the Firebird) with a regular 6-in-line headstock very similar to Fenders; some of the last reverse body Firebirds from 1965 (the transition year) actually have nonreverse headstocks.  Go figure.   The standard pickup on the nonreverse seems to be the single-coil P90s, sometimes with minihumbuckers (e.g. the Firebird X, see below). 

Since the sixties, Gibson has reissued the nonreverse model a few times, but reissued the reverse model far more often, so that the latter is effectively the standard Firebird model.   Gibson used Roman numerals to designate the individual reverse Firebird models, I = one pickup and dot inlays, III = two pickups, no vibrato, trapezoid inlays, V = two pickups, vibrato, trapezoid inlays, VII = three pickups, vibrato, and block inlays (i.e. a Firebird “Custom”).  As reissued the V wound up as the standard, without a vibrato.   There’s also the Firebird X, a modern nonreverse version with a 3x3 headstock, and the Firebird Studio, which uses regular humbuckers.  

For 2014, Gibson is still selling reverse Firebirds, although now only in cherry, classic white, and tobacco sunburst.  There are two signature models, the Eliot Easton (guitarist for the Cars) signature model in Gold Mist with humbuckers and a Bigsby vibrato, and just now the Jeff “Skunk” Baxter (Steely Dan) signature model in copper.   Funny, Easton more often plays SGs, and I’ve never seen Baxter play a Firebird.  That’s like an Angus Young signature Strat.

Pickups.  In addition to its neck-through-body construction and reverse headstock, another unique feature of the Firebird is the pickups.  While they look similar in shape and size to the minihumbuckers Gibson started putting in late 60s Les Paul Deluxes - themselves a stockpile of Epiphone pickups the company inherited when it bought Epiphone - they are a different design and sound different from minihumbuckers.  While PAFs, P90s, and other Gibson pickups appear on multiple models, the Firebird is the only Gibson with a pickup specific to the model. 

Mini Humbucker Versus Firebird Guitar Pickups: What’s the Difference? – Humbucker Soup 

The Firebird pickups give the guitar a sound which is closer to a single-coil sound, but not quite – I’m actually not personally familiar with P90s to compare.  In 2010 the banjo tuners were replaced by Steinberger models. From what I can tell among the Firebird owners on Facebook, as of 2020 the Steinberger tuners are the most popular, even more so than the original banjo models, which seem to be preferred only for pure nostalgia and not playability.  https://guitarchitecture.org/2010/10/13/steinberger-gearless-tuners-review/

Famous Players:  Johnny Winter, Paul Stanley (KISS), and Allen Collins (Lynyrd Skynyrd) are the most commonly associated with the reverse model.  I’ve seen Eric Clapton, James Hetfield and Gary Moore playing them, albeit rarely.  For a short time, Dave Grohl was playing Firebirds in Pelham Blue while in the Foo Fighters.  Stanley has a Washburn signature model which copies the Firebird.  Brian Jones was playing a reverse model briefly, and Keith Richards played a nonreverse. 

My Own.  In 2014 I had a surplus of time and money, and at yet another visit to Chuck Levin’s in Wheaton, Maryland, saw an ebony Firebird V (brand new 2013 model) and fell in love immediately.  As a V model, it has the trapezoid inlays, two Firebird pickups, and as a 2013, the Steinberger tuners.  More recently I replaced the pickguard with an ebony model, still with the Firebird symbol.  It’s definitely a fun guitar to play, and if anyone wants another unique Gibson to add to their collection, by all means, choose this one – though I’d recommend getting a model with the Firebird pickups and Steinberger tuners.

Beatles vs. KISS

Yet again, a concert provides inspiration for a blog entry, in this case the Paul Stanley concert at the Ram’s Head Live in Baltimore last night. Paul Stanley is the rhythm guitarist/singer for KISS, and is touring for a solo album, using the house band of the "Supernova" TV show as his backup band. This particular comparison may evoke protests from Liverpool or Detroit/NYC, but I’ve long noticed that the two bands share some amazing similiarities.

 Both bands feature 4 guys from the lower rungs of society in large cities: the Beatles from Liverpool and KISS from New York City.

 They both have the same format: rhythm guitarist/singer/songwriter (John Lennon/Paul Stanley), bassist/singer/songwriter (Paul McCartney/Gene Simmons), lead guitarist (George Harrison/Ace Frehley), and drummer (Ringo Starr/Peter Criss). In each band the rhythm guitarist & bassist share the majority of the songwriting and talent (Lennon-McCartney & Simmons-Stanley), but the lead guitarist and drummer also sing and contribute musically, albeit far less than the other two. George Harrison and Ace Frehley both contributed about 25% of the material, and Ringo Starr and Peter Criss managed to sneak in about 10%. A major difference is that Harrison and Starr were talented and hardworking, and actually resented not having more input, whereas Frehley and Criss – if Simmons and Stanley are accurate – were content to do the minimum amount of work and mooch off the other two.

 The Beatles and KISS also started out with a gimmick: in the Beatles’ case it was the matching outfits, which they continued wearing through 1966 on stage. Combined with the haircuts and boots, this set them off from most other bands and established the precedent for the rest of the so-called British Invasion bands, including the Rolling Stones. In KISS’ case, it was the makeup and elaborate stage costumes, which they continued wearing until the 80s, after Ace Frehley and Peter Criss had left the band.

Among the core pair, there were also the "outspoken, I don't care who I piss off" John Lennon and Gene Simmons, and the "someone has to be polite and diplomatic" Pauls, Stanley and McCartney.  

 Of course, there are major differences. The largest one is the talent and development. Anyone can tell the difference between Please Please Me and Abbey Road. There is far less perceptible difference between the debut KISS album and Dynasty or Unmasked. Even in the 80s with Bruce Kulick, the formula never changed that much – why mess with what works...with the obvious exception of taking off the makeup, of course. The Beatles started off trying to be commercially successful, but around Revolver and Sgt Pepper they decided to make art and music for its own sake, rather than sell millions of albums or tour around the world. It certainly didn’t hurt, though, that this material was actually light years better than the earlier work and actually became the vanguard for popular music throughout the late 60s. KISS was, from day one until today, primarily dedicated to making money for the band, whether through selling albums, touring, or merchandising, which Gene Simmons has never been shy about admitting. They have no pretenses about being artists, poets, or anything more than musicians and showmen who give the audience its money’s worth. Whereas the Beatles quit touring in 1966 to focus on making albums, much of which involved elaborate studio innovations unreproducable on stage, KISS prided themselves on being a live band, and indeed the album ALIVE! put them on the map when the three studio albums they had at that point had flopped commercially. Clearly the Beatles were versatile and competent musicians, but even drunk-miss-the-plane Ace Frehley runs rings around George Harrison.

 Yet compare Sgt Pepper – a ground-breaking album – with any of KISS’ work. We get the Spinal Tap moment in the 80s when KISS unveiled their concept album, Music From The Elder, to a stunned record company. Sure, they had Bob "Destroyer" Ezrin helping, but what did they expect – KISS: The Wall? The band, with Ezrin, were proud, "look at it! listen to it!" and the record company was, "What the f**k????" Maybe you should stick with what you know..."Love Gun", "Lick it Up", "Uhh! All Night". Sure enough, they got the point.

 Other bands commonly compared to the Beatles are the Rolling Stones and the Beach Boys. The Stones, though, only have one singer, Mick Jagger, and are essentially a rock band, nothing more. Granted, they were in direct competition with the Beatles and even tried to emulate them to some extent, but never changed their basic nature over all these years. The Beach Boys are a closer relative. More of the band members sing, they had the matching outfits thing, but most importantly, with Pet Sounds and Brian Wilson they had a real song-writing focus and a very real competition with the Beatles. Sgt Pepper was a response to Pet Sounds, which itself was a response to Rubber Soul. Brian Wilson stopped touring to make albums, but his nervous breakdown after Pet Sounds made his artistic contribution much less than it should have been; who knows what might have happened if Smile materialized instead of Smiley Smile. The rest of the band had to step into his shoes, and their late 60s work bears the same resemblence (??) to the early 60s material as the Beatles’ does. All the same, nothing KISS did compares in quality or impact with Pet Sounds, though again, they never pretended or attempted to be "songwriters" or artists in the same sense as the Beatles or Beach Boys.

 Finally, an exhaustive comparison of the Beatles with other bands wouldn’t be complete without mentioning Pink Floyd. Syd Barrett and Pink Floyd recorded Piper at the Gates of Dawn at Abbey Road Studios...across the hall and at the same time the Beatles were recording Sgt Pepper. After a few heavy psychedelic albums, Waters took over and Floyd began making monumental albums, notably Dark Side of the Moon and The Wall (the latter produced by... Bob Ezrin!). But Pink Floyd, unlike the Beatles, never shied away from touring despite being heavily active in the studio: when recording, as much as they tried to innovate and push the envelope, they avoided doing anything they could not reproduce on stage. In fact, with their quadraphonic sound set up (with speakers set up in the back of the concert hall) Floyd have more in common with the Grateful Dead – sharing the distinction of being the house band at the London Underground acid parties as the Dead were for Ken Kesey’s California "Acid Tests" – factoring in the Beatles’ major contribution to 1967’s social and musical revolution... Sgt Pepper! So it all gets mixed up in one big mutually influencial stew, a psychedelic melting pot of electric Kool-Aid. One last nugget: Paul McCartney’s longtime girlfriend, Jane Asher, married Gerald Scarfe, the animator for Pink Floyd: The Wall.