Rickenbacker International Corporation is a string instrument manufacturer based in Santa Ana, California, United States. Rickenbacker is the first known maker of electric guitars, having introduced an electric lap steel guitar in 1932, and produces a range of electric guitar and bass guitar models.
History
Founding
Adolph Rickenbacker and George Beauchamp founded the company in 1931 as the Ro-Pat-In Corporation (ElectRo-Patent-Instruments) to sell electric lap steel guitars. Beauchamp designed his instruments in collaboration with Paul Barth and Harry Watson, who had been active in the National String Instrument Corporation.
Electro String also sold amplifiers to accompany their guitars. A Los Angeles radio manufacturer named Van Nest designed the first Electro String production-model amplifier. Shortly thereafter, design engineer Ralph Robertson refined the amplifiers, and by the 1940s at least four different Rickenbacker models were available. James B. Lansing of the Lansing Manufacturing Company designed the speaker in the Rickenbacker professional model. During the early 1940s, Rickenbacker amps were sometimes repaired by Leo Fender, whose repair shop evolved into the Fender Electric Instrument Manufacturing Company.
Early history
George Beauchamp was a vaudeville performer, violinist, and steel guitarist who, like many acoustic guitarists in the 1920s, was looking for some way to make his instrument cut through an orchestra. He first conceived of a guitar fitted with a phonograph-like amplifying horn. He approached inventor and violin-maker John Dopyera, who made a prototype that was, by all accounts, a failure. Their next collaboration involved experiments with mounting three conical aluminum resonators into the body of the guitar beneath the bridge. These efforts produced an instrument that so pleased Beauchamp that he told Dopyera that they should go into business to manufacture them. After further refinements, Dopyera applied for a patent on the so-called tri-cone guitar on April 9, 1927. Thereafter, Dopyera and his brothers made the tri-cone guitars in their Los Angeles shop, under the brand name National. On January 26, 1928, the National String Instrument Corporation opened, with a new factory located near a metal-stamping shop owned by Adolph Rickenbacher and staffed by experienced and competent craftsmen. The company made Spanish and Hawaiian style tri-cone guitars as well as four-string tenor guitars, mandolins, and ukuleles.
Adolph Rickenbacher was born in Basel, Switzerland in 1887 and emigrated to the United States to live with relatives after the death of his parents. Sometime after moving to Los Angeles in 1918, he changed his surname to "Rickenbacker". In 1925, Rickenbacker and two partners formed the Rickenbacker Manufacturing Company and incorporated it in 1927. By the time he met George Beauchamp and began manufacturing metal bodies for the "Nationals" being produced by the National String Instruments Corporation, Rickenbacker was a highly skilled production engineer and machinist. Adolph Rickenbacker became a shareholder in National and, with the assistance of his Rickenbacker Manufacturing Company, National boosted production to fifty guitars a day.
During the early production of the A-22 Fry-Pan, Beauchamp and Rickenbacker would experiment with wooden-bodied Spanish guitars and solid body prototypes; ultimately giving birth to the Electro-Spanish Model B and the Electro-Spanish Ken Roberts. Both models had been experimental, produced as early as 1931, and officially released in 1935. The Electro-Spanish Ken Roberts model was subject to a limited production of forty-six. There were several new design elements found on the Electro-Spanish Ken Roberts. The instrument was the first of its kind to be named for an endorser. While most arch-top guitars had 14-fret neck joints, the Electro-Spanish Ken Roberts fingerboard joined the body at the 17th fret allowing much greater access to the higher frets, creating a full 25-1/2" inch scale. This addition made the Electro-Spanish Ken Roberts the first production full-scale (25-1/2") electrified guitar.
In 1963, Rickenbacker developed an electric twelve-string guitar with an innovative headstock design that fit all twelve machine heads onto a standard-length headstock by mounting alternate pairs of machine heads at right-angles to each other. After including the twelve-string guitar in the Rickenbacker 300 Series.
Guitars and 1960s rock and roll
right|thumb|Body of a 370/12, with the distinctive R-tailpiece, sharkfin inlays and stereo jacks
In the 1960s, Rickenbacker benefited tremendously when a couple of Rickenbacker guitar models became permanently intertwined with the sound and look of the Beatles. In Hamburg in 1960, Beatles guitarist John Lennon bought a Rickenbacker 325, which he used throughout the early days of the Beatles. He eventually had the guitar's natural alder body refinished in black and made other modifications, including adding a Bigsby vibrato tailpiece and regularly changing the control knobs. Lennon played this guitar for the Beatles' 1964 debut on The Ed Sullivan Show, as well as for their third Sullivan appearance, pre-taped the same day but broadcast two weeks later. During Lennon's post-Beatles years in New York, he had this guitar restored to its original natural wood finish and the cracked gold pickguard replaced with a white one.
Hallmarks of Rickenbackers
thumb|200px|Double truss rod neck
Some Rickenbacker models feature a stereo "Rick-O-Sound" output socket, allowing each pickup to be routed to different amplifiers or effects chains. Another feature is the use of two truss rods to correct twists and curvature in the neck. Rickenbacker guitars typically have a set neck made of multiple pieces of wood laminated together lengthwise, while their basses have a one-piece neck that extends through the entire body. Rickenbacker instruments are known for narrower necks (41.4 mm versus 43 mm at the nut for most competitors) and lacquered rosewood fingerboards, giving them a different feel.
Known for their bright jangle and chime, early Rickenbacker guitars were often favored by folk rock, and British Invasion bands such as the Searchers, the Beatles and the Who. The early models were equipped with low-output toaster pickups. With the late-1960s advent of heavy rock, these were phased out circa 1969–70, and replaced by high-gain pickups with twice the output. Still, the early models were viewed by Pete Townshend as pivotal in his refinement of feedback techniques and the eventual development of the Marshall sound.
Since the 1960s, a diverse cross-section of artists have played Rickenbacker guitars. In 1979, Tom Petty and Mike Campbell of Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers used vintage 1960s models to attain that toaster-pickup jangle. The high-gain pickup sound is associated with acts such as the Jam and R.E.M.
Basses
thumb|90px|Rickenbacker 4001JG
The 4000 series were the first Rickenbacker bass guitars, introduced in 1957. They followed the 4000 with the 4001 (in 1961), 4002 (limited edition bass introduced in 1977), 4008 (an eight-string model introduced in the mid-1970s), 4003 (in 1979, replacing the 4001 entirely in 1986 and still in production in 2024), and most recently the 4004 series. They also made the 4005, a hollow-bodied bass guitar (from 1965 to 1984)—which did not resemble other 4000 series basses, but rather the new style 360-370 guitars. The 4001S (introduced 1964) was basically a 4001 but with no binding and dot fingerboard inlays. It was exported to England as the RM1999. However, Paul McCartney received one of the early 4001S instruments (his unit was left-handed, and later modified to include a zero fret). Along with McCartney, other early adopters of the 4001 were Roger Waters of Pink Floyd, John Entwistle of the Who, Pete Quaife of the Kinks, Chris Squire of Yes (who technically used the RM1999 British import) and Geddy Lee of Rush.
The model 4003S ("standard") arrived in 1985, was discontinued in 2000, and relaunched in 2015. This was similar to the 4001S with its dot neck markers and no binding. From 1985 to 2002, the 4003 and 4003S had black hardware and black binding options available. Later special editions included the 4003 Blue Boy, 4003 CS (Chris Squire), Blackstar, Shadow Bass, Tuxedo and 4003 Redneck.
Rickenbacker basses have a distinctive tone. The 4001 and 4003 basses have neck-through construction. The 3000 series, made from the mid-1970s to mid-1980s, were cheaper instruments with bolt-on 21-fret necks. There was also a glued-in "set neck" 4000 version in 1975–1976 (neck set like a Gibson Les Paul), which featured a 20-fret neck, dot inlays, no binding (similar to the 4001S) and only a single bridge-position mono pickup. Fred Turner of Bachman-Turner Overdrive used the 4000 extensively on the Not Fragile album, as seen in a promotional clip for "You Ain't Seen Nothing Yet." This bass also appears on the gatefold sleeve of Four Wheel Drive.
In the 1970s, the Rickenbacker bass became a staple of progressive rock, as exemplified by British bassists Mike Rutherford (Genesis) and Chris Squire (Yes). Squire was one of the first to run a Rickenbacker in stereo by splitting the signal, sending the signal through both a guitar amp and a bass amp.
The sound of Rickenbacker basses featured early on in the UK punk/new wave explosion of the late 1970s and early 80s and was used by: Glen Matlock (Sex Pistols), Paul Simonon (the Clash), Peter Hook (Joy Division), Bruce Foxton (the Jam), Paul Gray (the Damned, Eddie & the Hot Rods), Tony James (Generation X), Michael Bradley (the Undertones), Youth (Killing Joke) and in the U.S., Mike Mills (R.E.M.) and Kira Roessler (Black Flag).
Brazilian bassist Alex Malheiros from Azymuth used a 4001 bass during the band's early years (most notably between 1972 and 1977). His approach to samba, jazz and funk has some echoes of Chris Squire and Paul McCartney.
Acoustic guitars
Rickenbacker has produced a number of uniquely designed and distinctively trimmed acoustic guitars. Although a small number of Rickenbacker acoustics were sold in the 1950s and were seen in the hands of stars like Ricky Nelson and Sam Cooke, the company concentrated on their electric guitar and western steel guitar business from the early 1960s onward. From about 1959 through 1994, very few Rickenbacker acoustic guitars were made.
In 1995, an effort was made to re-introduce Rickenbacker acoustics, with factory production beginning in their Santa Ana manufacturing facility in 1996. Four models of flat top acoustic Rickenbackers were depicted in factory literature (maple or rosewood back and sides, jumbo or dreadnaught shape). Each of these four models was also available in both six- and twelve-string configurations, yielding a range of eight distinct instruments. (The 760J "Jazzbo", an archtop model, was only built as a prototype, with three examples known to exist.) It is estimated that fewer than 500 Rickenbacker acoustic guitars were built before the factory shut down the acoustic department in mid-2006.
In late 2006, Rickenbacker gave a license to build Rickenbacker-branded acoustics to Paul Wilczynski, a luthier with a workshop in San Francisco, California. He continued to offer all eight models of the Rickenbacker flat top guitar line, building each instrument to order, until his license expired on February 1, 2013.
Pickups
Rickenbacker manufactures three pickups for their current standard models: high-gain single-coil, Vintage Toaster single coil, and humbucking. All three pickup designs share the same footprint, so they can retrofit into most current or vintage models. The tone varies from one style to the next, partially because of the types of magnets used but also due to the amount of wire wound around the pickup's bobbin.
Most contemporary models come with single-coil high-gain pickups as standard equipment. Many post-British-Invasion players such as Peter Buck, Paul Weller, and Johnny Marr have used instruments with these pickups. Rickenbacker's HB1 humbucker/dual coil pickup has a similar tone to a Gibson mini-humbucker pickup, and comes standard on the Rickenbacker 650C and 4004 basses. Vintage reissue models, and some signature models, come with Toaster Top pickups, which resemble a classic two-slotted chrome toaster. Despite their slightly lower output, Toasters produce a brighter, cleaner sound, and are generally seen as key to obtaining the true British Invasion guitar tone, as they were original equipment of the era.
In addition to the standard pickups, vintage reissue bass models are equipped with Horseshoe wrap-around style pickups, very similar to the pickups on the earliest Rickenbacker Frying Pan models.
Trademark enforcement
Rickenbacker is known for its efforts to prevent the sale of counterfeits of its instruments.
See also
- List of Rickenbacker players
- List of Rickenbacker products
References
External links
- Björn Ericksson's Rickbeat Reference Page
- John C. Hall Interview at NAMM Oral History Collection (2003)
- Cindalee Hall Interview at NAMM Oral History Collection (2017)
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