Antoria Guitars?

[MrBump]

http://antoriaguitars.com/index.html

Anyone know much about them?  They have a good British pedigree, but these things are now being manufactured out of the far east, I believe.

Specs look good...  Couple of hunderd quid for a nice looking LP junior...

[Philly Q]

I remember back in the early '80s I used to see quite a few Antoria guitars in the hands of local bands.  They looked nice, very much like the Ibanez models of the time and I always assumed they were made in the same factory but branded Antoria for the UK.  They were cheaper than Ibanez though, I guess just due to the name.

Don't know anything about the new models, but they look like the same kind of deal - rebranded imports probably sold under other names in other territories!

[PhilKing]

I used to sell them in the 70's, they were imported from Japan by JHS's in Leeds.  They were cheaper lookalikes (there were quite a few brands around, CSL, Antoria, Arbiter, but they were basically the same guitars.  I believe they are all OEM Ibanez's, wiht just different importer's.  Some of them were good copies (we had some single cut LP Juniors that were excellent), and others were naff (plywood topped Les Pauls, with hollow areas under the arch).

[Philly Q]

I used to sell them in the 70's, they were imported from Japan by JHS's in Leeds.  They were cheaper lookalikes (there were quite a few brands around, CSL, Antoria, Arbiter, but they were basically the same guitars.  I believe they are all OEM Ibanez's, wiht just different importer's.  Some of them were good copies (we had some single cut LP Juniors that were excellent), and others were naff (plywood topped Les Pauls, with hollow areas under the arch).

I remember CSL, and a few other brands around that time - Columbus, Fresher and Hondo (I think Hondo became more of a "proper" brand in its own right, some of them even had DiMarzio pickups).

My first guitar was an Arbiter Les Paul copy (although it didn't say Arbiter on the headstock, in fact there was no name at all).

It had a bolt-on neck, the worst tuners ever and (probably) the plywood top you mentioned.  The fretboard was stained to make it look like ebony.  The pickups were really weird - they looked like gold-covered humbuckers, but when I took out a couple of polepieces they seemed to be screwed into some sort of copper-coloured bar under the cover.

Despite all that, it looked pretty!  :lol:

[WezV]

i remember playing a rather nice old antoria 335ish style guitar a while back (antoria rock star???), not seen many recently.   it wasnt awesomely built but played nice enough  that i remember it being quite fun... it did have the most severe red to yellow 'burst' i had ever seen.  really it was a yellow circle on a red guitar and not a burst at all

My CSL firebird also shows promise but, still needs a bit more work before all is right with it (god knows when i will get time)... but its nearly there!

never played a columbus i could get on with... i actually had an LP for a while and i usually like a cheap beater but just couldnt get it workable


my latest cheapy is a baliol acoustic 12 string... its about bottom of the barrel as far as guitars go (actually made in england though) - but the plan is to put it aside for a few years till i have time to do a reso conversion.  the neck carve is closer to a square neck reso than a guitar neck at the moment

[WezV]

ha ha, i just searched "antoria rock star" as i thought i might be being a bit cruel about the burst... but no