Firebird V Electric Guitar

Conceived amid the chrome and tailfins of the Motor City, forged on the workbenches of Kalamazoo, proven on rock and blues stages around the globe, the Gibson Firebird was one of the most radical instruments the world had ever experienced when it hit the scene in 1963, and its still a guaranteed head-turner today. Its classic reverse-body styling and Custom Color appointments strike a pose that is truly unique, and tonally its a bird apart too: its powerful yet bright Mini-Humbuckers and through-neck construction contribute to a sound thats both cutting and sustaining. Only around 925 Firebird V guitars were produced between 1963-65 , including the œfew œnon-reverse Firebirds in the transition period that marked the demise of the rare, original œreverse-body styling.

Body
Seeking sleek new looks amid the competitive solidbody electric guitar market of the early 60s, Gibson went right to the source of marketing style and hired automotive designer Ray Dietrich”designer of the Duesenberg car, among others”to take the standard vision of the instrument back to the drawing board. The result was a guitar that was clearly ahead of its time: the new Firebird had a body that appeared to be the reverse image of other solidbody styles on the market, an upside-down six-in-line headstock (using œbanjo tuners to avoid spoiling the lines of the phoenix-head profile), and a solid integral neck/body section with glued-on wings, a rarity in guitar manufacture at that time. To give the Firebird even more pizzazz, Gibson offered the model in a range of a dozen Custom Colors, more than the company had ever made available before.

Hardware
Underneath the paint, there were plenty of sonic surprises in store: in addition to the increased resonance and sustain given to the Firebird by its œthrough-body construction, a new style of Gibson Mini-Humbucking pickup (two of them on the Firebird V) lent the model a bright, stinging tone. Although they look much like the Mini-Humbuckers that Gibson acquired from Epiphone, they are actually an entirely different design, employing a pair of alnico bar magnets with the pickups coils wound directly around them.

Famous Players
As has so often been the case with visionary Gibson designs, however, the rediscovery of this bold electric by a host of major artists”Brian Jones, Phil Manzanera, and Johnny Winter among them”helped to make it a classic in the eyes of future generations of guitarists.

Near-perfect Recreation
The Gibson Custom Shops rendition of the 1965 Firebird V captures all the flair and panache of the original model circa 1965. It is still made in the labor-intensive œthrough-neck style, with its mahogany and nine-ply walnut neck and body section and mahogany wings re dressed in your choice of a dozen Custom Colors”from Cardinal Red, to Kerry Green, to Polaris White”and its rosewood fingerboard is inlaid with the distinctive trapezoid position markers borrowed from the Les Paul Standard. A Maestro Vibrato tailpiece with lyre cover and ABR-1 tune-o-matic bridge provide stylistic versatility and accurate intonation, while Gibsons Firebird Mini-Humbucking pickups remain true to the tone of the originals.