You’ve listed the first three 12-strings. A handful more (2-3?) OS 360s were made before the New Style round top 360 became the “default” 360… and a handful more were custom ordered after that point. But OS 360/12s are one of the rarer things out there—there are way more 1993s!
That’s a great question Bob, and I also am unhappy with the imprecision. The problem we have is there is only about a six month period tops between the “New Capri” and “New Style” era, and they weren’t making a ton of 360s during that time cause they were busy filling RoMo orders. So while technically there is a gap between the two eras—which Harrison’s guitar kicked off!—there are so few guitars from that gap they don’t really merit their own “category” yet it doesn’t make sense to not acknowledge their “OS”-ness: I mean, what do you picture when someone says “1964 360”? Guitars from that brief interregnum just get retroactively labeled OS even though, to your point, there was no NS yet
Great article Andy! I love Ric 12-string guitars! Interestingly, you noted Suzi's Ric had traditional stringing while George's #2 had the Rickenbacker stringing. Do you know at who's recommendation? Was it a noted spec? Had any other guitar maker done that? Or was the Ric stringing done by accident (strung by someone who did not how to string a 12-string) and the result was the unique sound?
Back in 2012, some guy acquired the Suzi Arden Rick and modified it into a George Harrison for his TheBeatlesGear website. I never could understand the short-sighted logic in this, since the Suzi was so historically significant. It would be similar to repainting "Friendship 7" on Alan Shepard's "Freedon 7" Mercury spacecraft because John Glenn was more popular. I sure hope he had second thoughts and restored the Suzi to its original configuration,
According to this Rickresource thread from 2017, that was only done for the photoshoot—it was restored to its original factory specs soon afterwards, using almost all its original parts (a custom bracket was used to install the trapeze in place of the R tailpiece).
So only two 360 body types were made as 12s and the 620/12 Tom Campbell had was the third? Or were there other 360 bodied 12s made?
You’ve listed the first three 12-strings. A handful more (2-3?) OS 360s were made before the New Style round top 360 became the “default” 360… and a handful more were custom ordered after that point. But OS 360/12s are one of the rarer things out there—there are way more 1993s!
Andy- just one question; why would we call the December ‘63 360/12 “Old Style” when the “New Style” didn’t yet exist?
That’s a great question Bob, and I also am unhappy with the imprecision. The problem we have is there is only about a six month period tops between the “New Capri” and “New Style” era, and they weren’t making a ton of 360s during that time cause they were busy filling RoMo orders. So while technically there is a gap between the two eras—which Harrison’s guitar kicked off!—there are so few guitars from that gap they don’t really merit their own “category” yet it doesn’t make sense to not acknowledge their “OS”-ness: I mean, what do you picture when someone says “1964 360”? Guitars from that brief interregnum just get retroactively labeled OS even though, to your point, there was no NS yet
Great article Andy! I love Ric 12-string guitars! Interestingly, you noted Suzi's Ric had traditional stringing while George's #2 had the Rickenbacker stringing. Do you know at who's recommendation? Was it a noted spec? Had any other guitar maker done that? Or was the Ric stringing done by accident (strung by someone who did not how to string a 12-string) and the result was the unique sound?
Back in 2012, some guy acquired the Suzi Arden Rick and modified it into a George Harrison for his TheBeatlesGear website. I never could understand the short-sighted logic in this, since the Suzi was so historically significant. It would be similar to repainting "Friendship 7" on Alan Shepard's "Freedon 7" Mercury spacecraft because John Glenn was more popular. I sure hope he had second thoughts and restored the Suzi to its original configuration,
According to this Rickresource thread from 2017, that was only done for the photoshoot—it was restored to its original factory specs soon afterwards, using almost all its original parts (a custom bracket was used to install the trapeze in place of the R tailpiece).
https://www.rickresource.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=415216