Danelectro 1963 Bellzouki 12-string

I enjoyed Terry's review...my Danelectro Bellzouki 12 string is the 2-lipstick tube pickup model. Its built the same way(laminated,utterly flat front and back), not-too-cool looking tan/dk br sunburst, br danny taped sides, rosewood fretboard. A really wack looking chunk of wood, I could see the artist...er uh I mean Prince, playing it ... It has a 3 pos. switch for br, neck or both pu's and a master volume as well as separate vol and tone lg.knobs for each pu. The 2-pu model also has a neater body IMO with little nascent horns near the neck and a tortoise-shell pickguard that looks more like a bat than the plain oval on the one-banger.
The other guy's comment of no sustain just doesn't hold if you make the bridge mod on this pup.

Also it sounds best tuned to D anyway, makes it a lil easier on the digits...I like the steel nut, it doesn't wear, and adds some ring to the tone. Soon after I bought it I tired of the dull, piece of crap little wood bridge (sorry, purists) and they machined a nice little brass one for me at Subway, which brightens the tone a lot, and gives much better sustain, as the strings are then suspended twixt brass and steel.
The coolest thing I ever did with it was play the chords to the refrain of a tune in reverse order on a 2-track deck and flipped the tape to play forward lead with a strat...The backward 12 str chords come out sounding like the bastid son of a pipe organ and a bagpipe... I think it has nice tonal range within its little niche..

Fit and finish are excellent, its very solid...as I don't use it a lot, I've kept only 6 strings on it at times to keep neck tension at a min...The neck is wide, good for big hands. The action is actually pretty good.

I admit the tuners are poor but they'll hold reasonably well as string bending is mostly impossible anyway, but its a good axe to play just one song in a set with as tuning it can be laborious.
This log will be around and twangin when I'm dead, it was that well built...or was I that poorly constructed:)?

My buddy left his leslie speaker with me for a year, and the combo of this 12 with that was a religious experience for me. I think its gettin pretty rare as I haven't seen another since buying it. I can recommend it to players as a unique sound if you can find one!

1963 model, built somewhere in the US. 21 frets, 6 courses of two strings just like any other 12-string you've ever seen, bolt on neck via three bolts and no backplate, aluminum nut, big flat headstock with the cool plastic "Danelectro" logo in raised letters. A quality masonite body in a teardrop shape (just like a bouzouki or a "taterbug" mandolin, except flat). Single lipstick tube pickup, volume and tone knobs, and a toggle switch whose purpose in life escapes me because the capacitor is shot and I'm too unwilling to muck about with a classic axe to replace it. Chromium steel tailstop with ironwood bridge - no adjustments here, buddy! Funky almond sunburst finish with tape around the bouts.

If you stumble across one of these, be sure to play it a lot before buying it, and for God's sake, don't make it your only axe! The Bellzouki has a very unique sound, and is not at all suitable for a lot of music. That sounds as if I'm knocking the axe, so I'll try to explain: this thing has a thin, jangly, sound that's somewhere between "nasal" and "reedy", with absolutely no sustain. It was a collaboration between Dano and Vincent Bell (of electric sitar fame) in an attempt to create a cross betwen a mandolin and a guitar. If you approach this instrument with that in mind, you'll understand and love the sounds it makes. If your aim is to play 12-string things like "Hey, Mr. Tambourine Man", it's not for you. For their part, Dano and Vincent did an admirable job - with it's jangly tone and utter lack of sustain (let me say that a few more times - notes decay IMMEDIATELY on this thing!) it is very mandolin-like in tone: it sounds better than my L5 with the acoustic pickup stuffed in the F-hole, but not as pure as my Ovation Adamas-style electric mando. But - notice I'm comparing the Bellzouki with mandolins, not with guitars. Nice mandoliny sounds with the ease of guitar chording - no left-hand dyslexia! It's cool.

Womp this beast into yonder Line-6 POD, though, and you enter a land of sonic metal mayhem. Huge, distended chords which remain surprisingly articulated (considering), and lead lines which scream and snarl... provided you've done your excercise and can deal with the 1/4" or more push required to fret in the upper registers.

Variety? Not much (although I should replace that cap and see what happens).

Let's be reasonable, here. At the time of this writing, my Bellzouki is 37 years old. The action sucks. It can't be adjusted, although I believe with a 1mm shim under the neck I could push it down a little. The problem is that 37 years of tension times 12 strings equals a masonite body which bows upward at the bridge, and this is what's responsible for the miserable action. Right now it's playable up to the 9th fret; above that and it feels like trying to collapse a suspension bridge onto the fretboard. I'll need a reliable luthier soon, methinks.

And- the machine heads (tuners) suck, as well. They're these open wormscrew affairs; tight, binding, and fiddly. Again, they're 37 years old, so I cut 'em some slack.
On the other hand, the fit and finish is superb. After almost 4 decades, that almond green 'burst is as funky and cool as the day it was painted, with only a few surface ripples and finish cracks to show the passing of time.

Strap buttons are reeaally stable - a good thing, too, 'cause you'll need them. The teardrop shape assures you can't sit down with this instrument! The neck is chunky and fat - a really nice fit for my hands. Fretwork is a work of art (now, if I could only get the strings down onto 'em!!).

This is a tough beast. I could play softball with this axe, and it would be fine. I could hone one edge of the bout down to a razor's edge and ride with the Crusades, and it would be fine. I could bolt a steel plate on the bottom and drive railroad spikes with it, and... you get the idea. It is absolutely bulletproof.

I would never, ever play a gig with no backup using the Bellzouki, but that is due solely to the unique sonic space it inhabits, not because I feared the guitar itself.

Fat chance.

I got this guitar as a birthday present, during a time when I was looking for a 12-string, When I initially saw it, I said "no, that's not for me"... but the guy at the shop handed me a strap and a patchcord and walked away. An hour later he came back, and I had become enchanted by the Bellzouki's sheer Funk Extrusion Factor, and had to have it. There is something that happens when you put this thing on... it makes you feel like playing absolutely ANYTHING except rock and roll - I found myself wailing on all manner of Cuban-sounding progressions, going places I'd never been in my songwriting. The thing I enjoy most about it is it's capacity to send me off in directions I never would condider with a different instrument... and the live-performance aura of slinging it on, popping a big fat cigar in my face, a Panama hat, and grooving on comp lines while the rest of the band chugs away. It's not an everyday guitar - it's an escape unit!

In the studio, it's an enigma. If you have a song cooking that has that nagging sonic "hole" that nothing seems to fill, try this. Chances are it won't work - the reedy quality of the pickup causes the axe to appear in the mix as a "dirty" sound. But TRY IT ANYWAY. Once in about 20 songs, you'll find it drops right into place, tightens and sweetens the entire mix, and it immediately justifies itself. When this happens, the effect is gorgeous. I think of it like I do a transistor tester: it's a tool that you never pull out until something is not working right, but when that happens you're damn glad you have it.

I'm still seeking that 12-string guitar, because the Bellzouki fills a different niche. Still, I'm glad I stumbled across this thing, and it'll always be welcome in my home.

I wish it had better action, and better machine heads. Aside from that, I love it.