Silvertone H-53

I picked this guitar up on Ebay. This is an late 40's Silvertone archtop hollowbody. Probably
from 1948. But I'm not sure. The numbers inside are very faint. A non-cutaway 16,5" x 3,5" body.
Darkbrown sunburst with nice checkerboard binding. The neck is straight and feels great.
What makes this guitar ultracool is the beautiful tortoise shell headstock with the the name
Silvertone in gold and a V-shaped banner in white, green and gold. It has the huge raised ridge
DeArmond pickup which works fine. Somewhere in time someone added a second floating pickup,
a 50's style DeArmond Guitar Mike, halfway between
the neck pickup and the bridge. It is floating but screwed into the top. Two more pots where added
for it. Unfortunatly they do not have the original bakelite brown knobs like the first two potmeters have.
They're also very old and have the same color but have a slightly different shape. It has still the
original tortoise pickguard and tuners. I don't know about the woods of this guitar. But the top
seems to be solid. It is a very sturdy built guitar and it looks very good, but it is obviously not in the same
quality league as, for instance, a Gibson or Epiphone archtop from the same era.
It has a few scratches and dings as to be expected. But overall it is still in good shape. And it
sure looks fifties! And that is what I want and look for. So to me it is a big 10!
However there is only two minor downsides, which to me doesn't affect the rating.
The neckpickup is one of the first types single coil DeArmonds. Which means no adjustable
polepieces. I can only lower the top and bottomside adjusting the two mounting screws.
That seems to work fine, but there's no way to balance the tones for each pole.
Second, it doesn't have a master volume. Not a big deal when using a volume pedal.

I play 40's/50's jazz, jump-blues, rock-a-billy etc. The H-53 is made in that era and for most
of these styles of music. The old DeArmonds in the big hollowbody sound amazing!
Okay, they are very microphonic and produce the occasional noise. The original single coil neckpickup
produces an extremely heavy basstone with lots of wood in it. But not at all mushy. Just claen, full throttle
big bass! I had to lower the pickup on the bass-side to reduce the huge basstones a bit. The mids and highs
are fat and creamy, yet very punchy. You can either play very warm smooth jazz or add some backslap delay
and dive in to a nasty, raw Rock-a-billy sound.
Think a full and fat Tiny Grimes tone. It feeds back easily though.
The 'floating' D.A. Guitar Mike is a lot more punchy with a very articulate tone, but still very warm.
Excellent for ryhtmchords. In combination with the neckpickup it is truly astounding. A perfect match.
The round and warm tones can easily match a 50's era Gibson. I know 'cause I have '51 ES-300 with two
P-90's too. I have strung the guitar with 0.13 d'Addario flatwounds. The Silvertone can produce a early
50's Tal Farlow tone. Wish I could produce one of his licks.
I play it through a 70's Fender Twin Reverb. And usually I crank up the mids to full and roll off
the treble knob. With these baby's you don't need to dial in much bass.
This is the fifties hollowbody sound that just can't be equalled by modern archtops. The secret
are the aged pickups I guess. It is not a tonemachine though! It covers the late 40's an early 50's style
of music very well. But don't expect to play country stuff on it. And it isn't suitable for more modern
music either. But that is not my cup of tea anyway.

Nice checkerboard binding. The finish is still nice.
I bought it on Ebay. And had it shipped all the way
from the U.S. to Europe. I had to set it up myself.
But that worked out very easy.
When it arrived the neckpickup appeared to be glued
with some rubberkit into the plastic spacer for some unknown reason.
I removed the kit and replaced the two short screws for longer
ones.Now the pickup can easily be adjusted in hight. And it works
fine. I strung it with 0.13 d'Addario flatwounds. And the action is still low.
The neck plays very smooth and fast.

Well, it is a Silvertone. Same built as the Harmony guitars from that era.
Not the top-league. It has made it from 1948 untill now without much damage.
It has had a neck repair though. I know a n old guitar like this must be
handled with care. But it is a player. And it will last a few more
decades I'm sure.

I've been playing guitar for more than 25 years. Strangly enough I have
always played and owned only archtop hollowbodies. That is probably because I am
an 40/50's jazz and jumpblues addict . I have considered a DeArmond M-75T recently
because of the wonderfull Gretsch-like tones but then I got to play a x-155 and the
archtop bug bit me again by surprise (I think the X-155 is an amazing guitar) . Can't help it.

The Silvertone completes my set of four next to an Aria Pro II PE-180 (L-5 copy) on
which I replaced the two humbuckers for 2k single coil DeArmonds (very very nice!),
An 1951 Gibson ES-300 with two P-90's, A DeArmond x-155 with the astounding Goldtones.
All these guitars plus the Silvertone have a sound and character of their own and still very vintage.
I have been looking quiet a while for an Harmony or Silvertone with these old DeArmond pickups.
And now I got that 'birth of rock & roll'- sound covered all the way.
If it were stolen or lost I'd roam the world and find that crook that stole my baby from me treat
him on a Tora Bora special.
Anyway, it is everything I wanted and even more. I'm in heaven.