Well folks. You all know that the Mosrite Ventures model II is the guitar that started my love affair with guitars, or maybe you don't, but .... it did.
I've written MANY blogs about them but you can start HERE if you're interested?
With original genuine ones being so rare it was always Mosrite Japan and/or Fillmore ones that were "more" accessible to Mosrite and Ramones tragics and of course with these being hard to get I started building my own, which is how this whole thing started.
I rarely sell these as they are getting harder (and more expensive) to get but in my current cleansing process of selling stuff that doesn't get used, this one is going into the shop. I still have my favourite Mosrite Japan "slab body" that is currently touring the country with Shonen Knife which will take a lot of me to sell, but this one, in some ways is better than that one.
This is from around the same time and factory as my other one and I have held off selling it 'cause it was pretty knocked around. Not as played as my other one, but still with lots of nick and scratches and buckle rash, but then I realised, that's actually how I want one of these to be, so maybe someone else does too?
This one is lighter than my other one which makes it closer to a real one as my other one is considerably heavier than an original (which are LIGHT) and this one has that great thin neck that some of the other copies don't have.
This one also has a Dimarzio FS1 in the bridge with the tone pot bypassed, just like Johnnys original, however the mini humbucker in the neck is still wired in through the toggle, unlike Johnnys. I used a Seymour Duncan quarter pounder in my other one as I likes the fatter sound it gave at the time, but after plugging this one into my old '81 800 this is Johnnys sound alright.
I love the tone of the original Mosrite pickups but as explained in other blogs, its the sound of those early albums but when Johnny changed to the FS1 and 800's his tone changed. I love both his guitar sounds but back when I was playing my other one live I wanted a fatter, thicker sound and went with the SD.
This one is all original (except FS1) and has lots of battle scars, has had the strap buttons moved (and moved back?) but is SOLID and sounds and plays great. These slab bodies are still my favourite R'n'R machine and these ones based on Johnnys white Mosrite are just so .... freaken cool.
It'll be nice to see this one go out and make music.