Tuesday, February 14, 2012

Annie Clark aka St. Vincent is an Avante Garde Vintage Guitar Goddess

Not since Adrian Belew strapped on his heavily modified Fender Mustang and made it shriek like an elephant has an alternative-art-rocker coaxed such a range of tones from a vintage hunk of wood and wire. I am talking, of course, about about Annie Clark who plays under the name St. Vincent. Her musical style is sort of Kate Bush meets Bill Nelson meets Sonic Youth. And she looks pretty darn sexy doing it.

Annie plays some great old guitars including Harmony/Silvertone H-15/H17's\, a Gibson SG Deluxe, a Vintage Kay archtop electric and a sweet-looking tiger-maple Fender Jaguar. Of course, she uses a bevy of effects pedals. Take a look and a listen.









10 comments:

  1. I love Annie. She's the main reason I checked out a BobKat at a recent vintage guitar show. Ended up buying it, what an amazing sound! And you can play it for hours, since it's so small.

    Eleni Mandell uses one too, check her out.

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  2. Yeah she is pretty cool. Bobkats are very hit and miss. You have to play it to make sure since there were so many made and many were treated poorly over the years.

    The best place to find them used to be FatDawg's shop Subway Guitars in Berkeley, CA. I haven't been there in a few years but he used to have about a dozen of them in various condition. He used to refer to them as his "Jizzmasters" (sic). I played a slick 3 pickup Silvertone 1488 that looked just like Annie's at Subway about 2 years ago and the neck on that guitar was sweet. Fatdawg only wanted $350 for it at the time but I couldn't get him to give me more than $250 for my Univox Hi-Flier on a trade in so I passed on the deal.

    FYI - according to Francois Demont (whom I consider the expert on all thing Harmony) that red 3 pickup guitar must be referred to as a Silhouette not a Bobkat - because Harmony never made a version of that guitar for their own label - only for Silvertone and Holiday. The SIlhouette bodies are slightly larger than a Bobkat. And those gold mini control knobs make it a Silvertone for sure.

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  3. I think the H15/Bobkat was one of the models that were reissued. I wonder is she's playing the new stuff or something vintage. The H19 was the Silhouette and the H15 the Bobkat, different body shapes. There were a ton of variations in these guitars, pickups, number of pickups, colors, retail brand names, etc.

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    1. she has a couple of bobkats. her main one is a 1967 h15. theres an article on premier guitar which talks about her gear etc.

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  4. Oh! Sorry I missed it. The last picture before the last video is a H19/Silhouette. Some day I'd love to find a nice clean H-19 with the the Hagstrom tremolo.

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    1. Brett there is a really nice looking H19 Silhouette with the Hagstrom tailpiece on ebay right now - ends in a day or so.

      here is a link: http://www.ebay.com/itm/Vintage-Harmony-Silhouette-Model-H19-/140709254314?pt=Guitar&hash=item20c2ecd4aa

      It's currently at $351 but I expect it will go for close to $500 - looks very nice. - JC

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  5. Those are vintage guitars she is playing for sure. - JC

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  6. i recently purchased a silvertone bobkat based off the h15. its the 1476 model which was made in black and doesn't come with the whammy. lovely guitar. havnt stopped playing it!

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  7. what guitar is in the 3rd picture from the top with the lipstick pickup?

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    1. That is a Silvertone 1457 - one of the Amp-on-case models from the mid 1960's. Made By Danelectro. Great guitars. Jagger also plays one live.

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I appreciate your comments but please no commercial links or non guitar related conversations. Thank you. - JC

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