 |
| Solomon: You got this one? Tummler: Yep. Solomon: [looks at the cat, and lowers Tummler's BB gun] Don't kill the bitch. It's a house cat. [the cat runs off] Tummler: It's a lesbian cat. You can tell. Solomon: Looks like my mom. - Gummo (1997) |
With claims of "being better than the original" flying around, I had to investigate. Last time this claim was made, KFC promised their new recipe to be "better than original". I spent the next day camped out on the john, with the same squirts I do with their standard chicken. Myth: Busted. Anyhow, landing on Swade's webpage, I was greeted by the smug grin of Keith Urban creepily staring back at me. After searching for a solid two minutes, I noticed that none of his guitars have a "Fender" logo on them at all. Just your standard Fender rip-offs, but no logos. My only speculation is that he was using a Fender waterslide decal all sneaky like, upon special request.
Like most scandals, I assume this attention to Kelton Swade's business is probably booming. This dances in the same boat as my previous post on pedal cloning. The ironic fact about this debacle, is as innovative as Leo was, not all of his designs were original. As one reader reminded me in my previous cloning post:
"If people didn't wholeheartedly rip off others' (circuits), after all, we'd never have Marshall amps, Mesa-Boogie, or even Fender (who took their designs straight from the RCA playbook, so to speak). While that trend hasn't been great for consumers when it comes to prices, it has been huge with regard to innovation
I can't fault someone for trying to protect their design, but music electronic circuits are simple and there is so little out there that hasn't been done before. That leaves designers with little choice - a certain amp company takes a legal intimidation route and slaps patents on circuit elements regardless of if they're new ideas or not (they aren't) - going so far to warn would-be cloners on their schematic drawings. Very few small builders have the money to pay for a lengthy legal battle though so they can intimidate any small builder they want. Oddly enough they haven't gone after big companies..."
Although he is talking about circuits, this applies to guitars too. There are only so many shapes builders can use before ideas start to degenerate (resulting in the Firebird X). I've made this argument before, but as much as I love Fender, they have a knack for reproducing the same ol' guitars, crappy hardware (think stock jaguar bridge), and shotty pickups. Let's be real here, unless you spend well over $1,200, the stock electronics in a Fender guitar blow (even then, they're only adequate). By the time I finished replacing the worthless components in my Fenders, I had sunk quite a bit more money into it. Gibson is the same way.
I can see Fender pretentiously suing overseas companies because they were pretending to actually BE the Fender company. But strong-arming a backwoods guitar builder seems a bit silly. Anyhow, I'm curious as to what the opinion of the masses is.
- Stonewall
I think I might side with Fender on this one. If we assume this guy can make great guitars, why doesn't he put his own name on them?
ReplyDeleteFender designs are great, sure, but they can be improved on. Of course, for every guitarist willing to try a guitar that looks unusual but plays like a dream, there are probably a hundred that won't play anything that's not a Strat.(TM) (R) (C)
On the other hand, the big guitar companies are fiercely defensive of their headstocks and body shapes, which they usually go overboard about but here, I mean, this guy messed up. Anybody willing to pass off their work as someone else's makes me wonder how good their work is to begin with.
Thanks for reading again Paul.
DeleteTo the extent of my knowledge, most of his guitars had his name on them both on the headstock and neck plate (or none at all). H0wever, according to the article, Fender played "secret shopper" and requested a Fender logo. He caught it just in time before he sent them the guitar (and removed the logo), but he must have had that as an option, which is where he fudged up. Again, there's only speculation about how deep this went. He may have actually sold a few replicas as the real deal (for all we know). There's no evidence for it, but Fender usually doesn't come out of the wood work unless someone blatantly did something wrong. Again, all speculation.