Japanese epiphones with open book headstock-any good?

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tokaifreak

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I've seen a few Japanese made epiphones les pauls on ebay. The ones that were made after orville and orville by gibson were discontinued. Are these guitars any good? I've noticed the pickups are Japanese ephiphones and not usa pickups. These guitars looks very nice, with nice grainy tops on them. You don't hear a great deal about these guitars. I do know that for some reason Gibson stopped making these with the correct open book headstock and replaced it with the ugly narrow headstock on the ephiphone elites. The ephipone elites are otherwise excellent guitars.

Any feedback would be appreciated.
 
I believe they took over where the Orville guitars left off and that they're made at the same plant.
 
the local Rock Inn just got a bunch of those SGs in, they don`t have price tags yet.
 
There's not that much difference between a Epiphone Japan LP and a Orville LP.
They are/were both made at the same factories.
From what I understand the Orvilles should have been Epiphones from the start in 1988.
Aria had the Epiphone contract before 1988 and the new Epiphone contract (which became Orville) was with Yamano from 1988.
Apparently Aria still had some legal ties with the Epiphone name in Japan and wouldn't let it be used by Yamano in 1988 so they came up with Orville instead.
When the Orvilles ended in 1997/1998 the legal ties Aria had with the Epiphone name in Japan had expired so Yamano could use the Epiphone name in Japan if they wanted to.
FujiGen told Jim Donahue (from Ibanez R&D) in 1993 that they couldn't use the Epiphone name when he asked them why they were named Orvilles.

The open book Epiphone Japan headstocks seem to be for the local Japanese market only and the changed Epiphone Japan headstocks seem to be for export.
 
So what are the Epi pups like on Epiphone Japan guitars?
ANy good? I hope they're made in Japan and not the same as the Epis in Korean and CHinese made ones
 
They're made in japan, they sound asame as the orville PU. Not fantastic. But if you're not a gibson PU fan then it's a good opportunity to upgrade with what you want. :)
 
right...the last Elite SG here has a 3 piece body but not sure how many the MIJ Epis have , I do know my Edwards is one piece. Next time I`m in the shop I`ll have a good look at the MIJ Epi SGs they just got in.
 
japanstrat said:
From what I understand the Orvilles should have been Epiphones from the start in 1988.
Aria had the Epiphone contract before 1988 and the new Epiphone contract (which became Orville) was with Yamano from 1988.
Apparently Aria still had some legal ties with the Epiphone name in Japan and wouldn't let it be used by Yamano in 1988 so they came up with Orville instead.
Click to expand...

It's an interesting theory if the ?piphone production has been stopped, but ?piphone models have been produced between 88 and 98. :wink:

Orville was used for Gibson copies, but the original ?piphone models ( like Casino and Riviera) were produced at the same time ( where? They are very different from the Matsumoku ?piphone so maybe already Terada?)

Or Aria had the contract for th ?piphone models and yamano for the Gibson copies?
 

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