28.4.11

05 - Gibson EDS-1275



The Gibson guitar company is known for a number of iconic guitar models. Their "SG" body style is just one of their many contributions to the imagery of the rock and roll. In 1963, as a custom order model Gibson began offering the EDS-1275, an SG-style body with two necks. The lower neck was that of a standard 6-string guitar while the upper neck was a 12-string. Theoretically, the guitarist could alternate between the two necks, i.e. between two sounds, two ways of playing, while performing the same piece of music. While rock and roll rarely seems to involve the level of song craft that would require a guitarist to be so resourceful, a few famous guitar players, most notably Jimmy Page of Led Zepplin, would turn the EDS-1275 into a minor icon itself.

As in previous examples, there is an obvious invitation to anthropomorphize the guitar. The basic components of a guitar have names like body, neck, and headstock. Continuing this analogy, the EDS-1275 is a sort of two-headed beast (not a two-headed person, though I'm not sure why). At any rate, having two heads is not scary, its clever. One head is better at one task. The other head is better at another task. Of course, it is not necessarily a better guitar for most situations. Just has with Cerberus, or mighty Hydra, additional heads require a larger bodies. The EDS-1275 does appear rather unwieldy, albeit less so in the hands of a true rock professional.

Image Source: Klipsch

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