Chapman Guitars at NAMM

Limehouse_Blues

I honestly think a lot of the Chapman bashing is jealousy or resentment. It seems to be a peculiarly British trait to knock the successful rather than show any admiration. I'm no great fan of RC's music but come on, the guy's done really well. I'm sure there have been lucky breaks and support from the right people on the way - but plenty of hard graft too. Credit to the bloke as far as I'm concerned. Over a 10 year span he's exploited a new medium to send his career on an impressive trajectory. The guy made a wave so big that others have ridden it too, notably Rabea Massad (whose playing I dig far more).

As for the guitars I'd be curious to try one of the Korean ones but would never entertain a purchase because I detest that infinity symbol at the twelfth fret. Just looks naff to me and grates like those wretched birds on most PRSs.

If I wanted a premium grade superstrat with steel frets I'd be all over the new Ibanez rather than these. The Ibanez, while expensive, are good value compared to these.

digitalscream

Here's the dirty little secret, I think - I put together my Nuno-alike guitar as a total amateur, and made a number of mistakes in the process, but gave it to Adey at Vanquish for some fretwork and a general setup and now it plays at least as well as any of my other guitars - all hand-made, two British and one USA. Sure, it doesn't have the same quality of finish as much more expensive guitars, but it's been a bit of an eye-opener.

chrisj1602

Imagine the resale value...

kt66

Like made in UK is a good thing?!!!
Coming after all those world famous UK guitars manufacturers like......er......er....

digitalscream

Limehouse_Blues said:

I honestly think a lot of the Chapman bashing is jealousy or resentment. It seems to be a peculiarly British trait to knock the successful rather than show any admiration. I'm no great fan of RC's music but come on, the guy's done really well. I'm sure there have been lucky breaks and support from the right people on the way - but plenty of hard graft too. Credit to the bloke as far as I'm concerned. Over a 10 year span he's exploited a new medium to send his career on an impressive trajectory. The guy made a wave so big that others have ridden it too, notably Rabea Massad (whose playing I dig far more).

As for the guitars I'd be curious to try one of the Korean ones but would never entertain a purchase because I detest that infinity symbol at the twelfth fret. Just looks naff to me and grates like those wretched birds on most PRSs.

If I wanted a premium grade superstrat with steel frets I'd be all over the new Ibanez rather than these. The Ibanez, while expensive, are good value compared to these.

I've not seen any Chapman-bashing on this thread - if there were, I'd have stamped on it pretty quickly. Seems to me that it's all a valid critique of the business approach; let's not forget that the original Ghost Frets were built with exactly this business model going a few years back (with Jaden making them), and they sold...two or three?

I have my own personal beef with the way Rob's used and discarded friends of mine in the past, but I've tried not to let that into it. I simply can't see how they can possibly sell as many as he says they will.

digitalscream

kt66 said:

Like made in UK is a good thing?!!!
Coming after all those world famous UK guitars manufacturers like......er......er....

Generally-speaking, I definitely think it is a good thing - particularly given that you can usually get spec changes to end up with the exact guitar you want.

This isn't that, so I'm wondering where the benefits are.

peteri

I’ve said before, I really liked the initial marketing idea of the early Chapman’s and for his market it was spot on. 

I really dont get the premium ones now, that’s just not their price point for me and for the UK built ones - it would seem crazy to me to pay that when I can go to Feline or similar and have exactly what I want built for me at the same or lower price 

Their range is also getting diluted for me as well 

wish them all the best but I don’t get it anymore 

Whitecat

I very much admire what Rob’s done (despite the fact that Andertons videos tend to make me cringe, but that’s a different complaint). 

It’s just an entirely odd trajectory, as mentioned. 

I hope he sells them all and fast, at full price. I’d love to know who’s buying them though. 

Vibetronic

Fair play to him, he's certainly worked hard and seems to be doing really well. I've got absolutely no problems with the guy whatsoever.

Not sure about these though - they don't really look like £3-4k guitars. I thought the initial ones they came out with were probably fairly decent mid-range guitars for people who were onto their first properly good guitar, but they look pretty chunky and not particularly refined. These new ones look like those but with a fancier finish, and I really can't see they selling compared to the amazing stuff out there already (and a lot of it cheaper). They just don't have the history/refinements from years of experience/the endorsees (unless you count youtubers these days...which may be possible, no idea!). Good luck to him though.

darthed1981

Holy F**k - 4k for a Chapman!

grungebob

I wish him well in his endeavours but I think this is a badly thought out plan. 
I don’t know how many high end guitars are sold each week in the UK or what % of the sales quota they make up ( Andertons probably do) but I’m guessing it’s not many. The chapman guitar brand is still in its infancy and doesn’t have great residual value on the secondhand markets, if you can’t convince the used markets to pay a premium for your normal range then you can’t ask even more for a new model....yet. 

darthed1981

themeinside said:

Delusions of grandeur and a distinct lack of market awareness methinks, made worse by building up to it on their social media presence as if it was going to be an interesting announcement for the masses. Utterly out of touch.

It could also be considered rather cynical.  If their market skews young then to buy them they would be maxing a credit card or spending all their savings if lucky enough to have any to buy this "ultimate" chapman, when they should be shopping around to get the best they can for under £1000 (IMHO) to get a proper workhorse instrument.

The fact is though, Chapman is raking it in, personally.  He has gone in a few years from well-off to genuinely rich and he must be doing a heck of a lot right!

thegummy

impmann said:

Why do we think that a UK based luthier can build a single cut better than a Korean one?

I always find it shocking that there is so much nationalism in the guitar world and some people are convinced that some nationalities automatically are better than others at making guitars.

The UK one is even weirder though because we don't have established guitar brands like America does. Almost seems like some darker reason that anyone would assume the UK could be better than Korea or other Asian countries.

NeilMcG

I can't see the market for these. Surely people with 3k-4k to spend are either buying big-brand custom shop / hgh-end, or very customised individual hand-built?

Does anyone else take some of their mass-market designs and then make hand-made non-custom versions of them?

It should be cheap to get off the ground if they are made strictly to order (less a few demo models), so probably not a risky experiment commercially. If it works then well done for finding a new angle!

thegummy

Limehouse_Blues said:

I honestly think a lot of the Chapman bashing is jealousy or resentment. It seems to be a peculiarly British trait to knock the successful rather than show any admiration. I'm no great fan of RC's music but come on, the guy's done really well. I'm sure there have been lucky breaks and support from the right people on the way - but plenty of hard graft too. Credit to the bloke as far as I'm concerned. Over a 10 year span he's exploited a new medium to send his career on an impressive trajectory. The guy made a wave so big that others have ridden it too, notably Rabea Massad (whose playing I dig far more).

As for the guitars I'd be curious to try one of the Korean ones but would never entertain a purchase because I detest that infinity symbol at the twelfth fret. Just looks naff to me and grates like those wretched birds on most PRSs.

If I wanted a premium grade superstrat with steel frets I'd be all over the new Ibanez rather than these. The Ibanez, while expensive, are good value compared to these.

I really like Dorje; even wear their t shirt.

If I was buying a 3 grand luthier-made guitar, though, I wouldn't want his name on it. I find it bizarre that anyone would.

mbe

Whitecat said:

I very much admire what Rob’s done (despite the fact that Andertons videos tend to make me cringe, but that’s a different complaint). 

It’s just an entirely odd trajectory, as mentioned. 

I hope he sells them all and fast, at full price. I’d love to know who’s buying them though. 

Perhaps he has his target market in the USA.

There are lots of gullible Anglophiles over the pond professing a love for all things British at it's best. Like Aston Martin, Savile Row suits you sir etc. and all the associated bragging rights that feed their dislike of Asian products.

John_P

He’s a marketing guy and that’s what these are.  For little investment on his part people are talking about Chapman guitars.   Doesn’t matter if they sell as it get publicity and might go some way towards lifting the perception of his brand towards serious quality.   

darthed1981

impmann said:

Why do we think that a UK based luthier can build a single cut better than a Korean one?

Very good question, also applies to US made.

Apart from utterly artificial variances in specification, and genuinely expensive things in any country like nitro finishes, what makes the difference between US made and Korean, Chinese or Indonesian?

Is this the guitar world's equivalent to the "harmonics" so beloved of audiophiles...?

DiscoStu

impmann said:

Why do we think that a UK based luthier can build a single cut better than a Korean one?

I don't think that that is the point. The way I see it is that they've done the 'assembled from parts to a budget' route already,  they've tried to upgrade the quality in later runs and now this later venture is hopefully still keeping the 'community' idea going but this time the individual parts are being made here in the UK, to support British talent?

I like the idea of the guitars being showcases supporting individual British craftsmen, whether that be luthier, sprayer, pickup builder, whoever, but if they are indeed farming each part out then no wonder the prices are astronomical. If this is the basis of the project then listing the contributors would add a bit of kudos and dare I say respect? 'Body by Jaden, finish by Crimson, pickups by Oil City', that sort of thing. As it is they are pushing everything as 'Chapman' which as a brand does not carry the prestige the prices need. 

Good luck to them and everything, but they're not for me. 

SimonC

thegummy said:

The UK one is even weirder though because we don't have established guitar brands like America does. Almost seems like some darker reason that anyone would assume the UK could be better than Korea or other Asian countries.

Nothing wrong with buying British as far as I can see, nothing dark about it.

I like to buy British fruit and veg wherever I can as well, l don’t think that makes me a bad person.