Grateful Dead Music Forum

Hey all,
Got a custom shop es 339 with stock pickups, a pair of Gibson 57' classic humbuckers, a model of a PAF pick up with Alnico II magnets. Looking for a late 70s bob tone. If you were plugging this straight into twin (axe fx2 twin with vic's jbl patches) sans effects what would you change on the guitar, set up, strings, PUps to get that nice tone
Thanks!

I think you have the wrong guitar for a late 70's tone. You need three single coils (yes, you can split the neck & bridge pickups), however, adding a 3rd pickup to a 339 wouldn't be my recommendation. Firstly, it's a semi-hollow and you should be using a solid body. Secondly, it will kill the resale value of the guitar.

mk

Yea I'll second what MK said. For my late 70s Bobby, I took a strat and got the same pickups that were used in the Cowboy Fancy and wired it to that same specs. MK did a simiilar setup to a guitar as well, the thread is somewhere in here. Anyway, semi hollowbody is early 70s all the way.

Thanks for the replies. Same question but say 1974 a la grateful dead movie when bobby was playing the 335.

Mulling on this more, what guitar in the used es339 price range would you look at to get that late 70s bobby tone taking into consideration guitar + changing out pick ups, mods, etc
Thanks!

ES339 is around $2K?

You can get a Ibanez 2681 for less, or the Ibanez 2680 (less fancy version of the 2681) for much less. Then add a middle pickup.

mk

That sounds aobut right, I am in the midst of some gear purging but I would love a 2681 although they seem to next to impossible to find.

A 2681 recently sold on Ebay! It was the first one I had ever seen for sale actually. I had the seller talked down to $1400, and in hindsight, I wish I took him up on his offer....it ended up selling for $1650ish!

Keep in mind too, that if you do search out and get a 2680, or even a 2681...make sure it's got the original pickups!