Hamer Improv

2004, Hamer Improv, archtop guitar. 22 frets, neck HB floating pick-up. Mahagony sides and back, spruce top. Passive pick up with volume and tone control on finger rest. 24.75" scale length, ebony bridge and fingerboard. It is a jazz archtop guitar, it has the features it needs.

I purchased to fill in my Hamer collection a bit. I have the Artist Custom and Newport Pro, but wanted something with more acoustic woodiness and snap to the notes, which this guitar does. Like all holllow archtops, it feedsback, so unless I am playing in a quiet situation or recording, I will stick primarily to teh Newport Pro for live usage. I use all my jazz guitars through an Evans JE-200 amplifer.

All the pieces are fine, no problems I can see. Some pieces like the ebony tuners, ebony knobs and bridge are all hand made. Binding is very nice, classy looking. Mine is #006 and is jazzburst in color, fitting for its genre.

I hae had a lot of Hamer USAs and have about 32 at the moment, no problems so far. I never gig w/o a backup to anything, since problems arise and it is better to be safe than sorry, however I have not had a Hamer failure ever.

I know the people at Hamer very well and have never had a problem, but they always go out of their way to be helpful to me. I can not say enough good things about Kim Keller, he does a fantastic job IMO.

I was considering a DeFoe or Foster, but they only have fret access to the 12th fret like most archtops. I come from a shred back ground originally so I frown on a lack or upper fret access, or the lack of those notes in their entirety.

Would I buy another one? I don't know, its only been a few weeks, too early to say that. I will be keeping it, that i am sure of.

Value? $7,000 is a lot of money, regardless of your income level, so you have to want it for it to be valuable to you. I went with this guitar because of my wonderful experiences with Hamer USAs, my trust in their quality, and the upper fret access this guitar affords me.