How many albums do you have?

[Balok 1,662]

Now THATS a music collection.  Welcome zumbini.

 

Is that a hollow body guitar?

[SteveFord 1,110]

I can answer that one - it's a non sculpted solid body (like a 1955 Les Paul TV Special) but with a bolt on neck (like Fender does) and the pick ups are humbuckers instead of P90s. 
It was part of Gibson's Kalamazoo Line so was offered at a lower price point but it's also fairly rare so probably commands a good buck today.  From the description, you can see where the GK-55 comes from.  Looks like a nice guitar.

[zumbini 6,147]

SteveFord is spot on about the GK-55's pedigree.

The only thing I can add is Gibson made them in 79/80 and they were built out of "spare parts".

The story I heard was that Gibson was close to bankruptcy at the time and had zero credit.

Since their vendors would only take cash they hatched a plan to use what was available.

I'm not sure if that's really true but it's a great story!

 

Here is a better picture:

[SteveFord 1,110]

That sounds about right with the bankruptcy part. 

Another thing that they were doing back then was stamping perfectly good guitars "2nd" and offering them for sale at discounted prices as they were factory seconds.  Isn't that weird? 

When Gibson was sold shortly thereafter the new owners decided that because it was a premium brand they were going to jack the prices up through the roof.  I almost fell over when I saw that a new SG Standard was going for $900 back in the late 1980s...

I just looked your guitar up and they only made 1,000 of them.  Supposedly no pick guard, did you add that?

[Balok 1,662]

Thanks for the extra pic.  I guess i was so wide-eyed from the photo that i completely missed the fact that you included the model of the guitar right under the picture.  For some reason, the scale made the body look bigger, making me think it was hollow or semi-hollow body.

[zumbini 6,147]

I just looked your guitar up and they only made 1' date='000 of them.  Supposedly no pick guard, did you add that?[/quote']

 

No, that's the way I bought it (in 1979) and I always assumed it came that way from the factory.

Come to think of it tho, most of the GK-55's I've seen did not have pick guards. Hmmm...