Product: Univox Lucy
Price Paid: US $500+ used
Submitted
01/05/2003
at
05:57pm
by
Ronald E. Luedemann
Features
:
No Opinion
These were made in Japan in the 1970's. They have 24 frets which was quite unusual at the time. The are a copy of the Dan Armstongs made by Ampeg. The body is made out of Lucite. It is crytal clear and quite heavy. It has two pickups, one volume, one tone contol and a three way selector switch. The neck is laminated with three pieces of maple and two stringers of a darker wood seperating the maple pieces. The finish has that dipped in plastic look. There is a rosewood fretboard and headtock cover. The pickguard is simmulated wood. The body is double cutway and looks like something between a Strat and a PRS. It has two pickups that are about the size of humbuckers but may be single coil. These have moveable pop in pickups on a Dan Armstrong, but not so on on this guitar. The bridge is very crude and not adjustable. The neck is a bit wide and thin.
Sound
:
No Opinion
I play play lots of styles. This guitar is for rock, especillay psychedellic rock. There are three obvious allusions in the name "Lucy": (1) Lucite, which is what it was made from; (2) (Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds), which was a popular song when these were made, and (3) "Lucille", B.B. King's guitar. I play this through an old Gibson tube amp (which is about as rare as the guitar). It is thicker in tone than a Strat but thinner than a Les Paul. The guitar is beautiful and gets more remarks than any of my other guitars (about 30). My greatist disklike is the neck which takes awhile to adjust to. It isn't shaped quite like any other guitar I own. The jack is on top. I would have preferred that they were on the side.
Action, Fit, & Finish
:
10
The finish is still flawless. Even the Lucite is unscratched after about thity years. I understand that if you scratch these, the are easily buffed out with a paste (similar to toothpaste). The bridge is dirt cheap, but all other parts are well made.
Reliability/Durability
:
10
This guitar is more durable than almost any other guitar ever made, except maybe aluminium guitars.
Customer Support
:
1
Univox no longer exists. I have heard they got in legal trouble over their copy guitars. The company went out of business in the late seventies and remerged as two seperate companies, Aria (guitars) and Korg (synthesizers).
Overall Rating
:
10
I've been playing since I was fourteen, I'm 53 now. This is my all time favorite guitar. If it was lost or stolen, I would search for another every day till I died. I could never sell it. The only other guitar that I would consider as a replacement would be a Dan Armstrong, but it wouldn't be the same, these are so much rarer. The cost of these seem to be going up while the Dan Armstrongs' seem to be falling. There are many better guitars made nowdays, but none have such a psychedellic vibe as this one.
