1988 Rickenbacker 330/12 Jetglo + OHSC
Near mint vintage Ricky 330/12. All original. Some very cool lacquer checking. Great vibe. The quintessential 12 string sound.
*Gallery below. Click on thumbnails to view in full screen*
There are few guitars that have such a distinctive and immediately identifiable sound as a Rickenbacker 12 string.
A sound that was first lodged into the public conscience when George Harrison played a prototype Rickenbacker 12 string on A Hard Day’s Night. Soon many other acts of the era were to follow suit and make use of the Ricky 12 string’s distinctive jangly tone, most notably Roger McGuinn of The Byrds who pretty much made a whole career out of the sound of a Rickenbacker 12 string.
Over the decades there have been numerous devotees to the Rickenbacker 12 string including Tom Petty and Mike Campbell of Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers, Johnny Marr, and Peter Buck of REM amongst others.
Here we have an ‘88 330/12 in Jetglo. It seems a little strange calling a guitar made in 1988 vintage but at 33 years old technically it is indeed now vintage. The mid 80's to early 90's is considered to be a good period for Rickenbackers and not many 330/12’s were made during this era. They are thin on the ground, so finding good examples like this is getting harder.
Overall this can be described as near mint condition. There are a handful of barely noticeable, light surface scratches on the back of the guitar (which are very difficult to capture on photo), a couple of small paint chips at the top edge of the headstock (see pictures) and a small surface scuff on the upper edge of the body where it looks like it has rubbed against something painted white (see pictures). There is some very cool natural lacquer checking all over the guitar which really gives the guitar a great vintage vibe. Very much a ‘closet classic’.
The action is set up nice and low which makes for easy fingering of the 12 strings. There is no visible wear whatsoever on the beautifully figured rosewood board.
Sonically this guitar is everything you would expect of a Rickenbacker 12 string. The pair of Hi-Gain pick ups deliver the classic Rickenbacker chime and jangle but with a little more output than the older ‘toaster’ pick ups. There are separate volume and tone controls for each pick up as well as the somewhat mysterious ‘blend’ knob. The official explanation is that this knob has several different functions, such as acting as a tone blender between pickups and as a general EQ between the bass and treble tones of the guitar. Its primary function, however, is to serve as a bass pickup volume blender allowing for the generally louder neck pickup to be reduced to comparable levels of volume with the bridge pickup – so there you have it!
A class act. Comes complete with the original black Tolex case.
