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Mona and Lisa's preferred guitars, the Rickenbacker and Gretsch
Mona and Lisa’s preferred guitars are the Rickenbacker 350v63 and Gretsch Duo Jet respectively, which are also very similar to what the Beatles used, so I did a little research into why the Beatles favored them.
Mona’s red and white Rickenbacker 350v63 is a regular length Long Scale guitar “with the same toaster pickups, wood, controls etc as Lennon’s legendary 325.” It is usually played “through a VOX AC30 amp with a tiny bit of reverb and slightly cut treble, depending on the song.” Mona will “occasionally put flat wound strings on it which give it more of a thuddy sound which get balanced out by the bright, jingly tone that those good old toaster pickups produce.” She usually uses “regular round wounds on, medium gage.”
Mona said about her Rickenbacker 350v63“…I love the sound, feel, sturdiness, and look and can’t imagine ever giving away that guitar!”
Lisa’s black and white Gretsch Due Jet guitar has a Compton Bridge and a modified Düsenberg Tremolo and DynaSonic Pickups. Lisa avoids effects pedals because she prefers the raw unmodified sounds of guitars. For live sessions it’s just a “Vox Tonelab ST effects pedal for nothing more than a little compression, reverb and volume control and then straight into a Vox AC30.”
About the Gretsch Duo Jet, Lisa referred to it as her:“all round live performance weapon”.
Mona and Lisa in action with their “performance weapons”
Here are some results of my research on Google on both the Gretsch and Rickenbacker. George Harrison’s 1957 Gretsch Duo Jet had F-Holes (I hope I got the term right) that allowed for loud volumes during live performances without feedback. When playing lead guitar you need pumped up volumes so the lead licks will stand out from the rest of the guitar music.
George Harrison was a lifelong fan of the Gretsch guitars because he greatly admired Chet Atkins and that is why he purchased a Chet Atkins Gretsch Country Gentleman guitar in 1963, and prior to that he had the Gretsch Duo Jet which George referred to as his sentimental favorite guitar because it was his first American guitar and his first good guitar that he purchased 2nd hand at age 18 from a Liverpool cab driver. Although George gave the Duo Jet away as a gift in 1965, he reacquired that same guitar he gave away 20 years later, restoring it himself to the original condition he first had it, and remains in his estate to this day. “George used the Duo Jet on the first Beatles album “Please, Please, Me”, and a quarter-century later he returned to the guitar for his acclaimed 1987 solo album Cloud Nine.” That’s quite a reunion story with his first and sentimental favorite guitar. I guess that first Gretsch was very special to George and he regretted ever giving it away.
John Lennon’s Rickenbacker 325v81 is a rare bird being one of the very few early production 325’s in 1958. It originally came with only 2 rotary controls and 1 pickup selector and was retrofitted later as two additional potentiometers were added above the existing two using the same ‘single’ lucite plate. This was because shortly after the initial production of the 325s in 1958, Rickenbacker made a change in the design later that year and all 325s were produced with two tone controls and two volume controls and elevated pick guard. In the factory, Rickenbacker refitted the already produced earlier 325’s still in inventory that had just the 2 rotary controls with the additional two volume controls. Therefore, John’s 325 was one of the early production retrofitted two control 1958 325’s. This would explain the skewed placement of the control’s on Lennon’s 325, making it an extremely unusual instrument, and some “say the most valuable guitar on the planet…”.
“The final change to the famous 325 was its colour. It had remained in it’s original natural/honey finish even through the recording of the first album ‘Please Please Me’. In 1963 the 325 was refinished in black. It is thought that it was to match George’s black Gretsch Duo Jet which was his main guitar at the time.”
Although George and John would go on to many other guitars they were presented with, the Gretsch and Rickenbacker were the guitars they both started their careers off with and used during their rise to fame, and so has a special place in Beatles history.
I know I am only scratching the surface here on the Beatles guitars given my very basic and rudimentary knowledge of guitars, but thought it would be fun to satisfy my own curiosity a little about Mona and Lisa’s favored guitars and the relevance these models had with the Beatles. Anyone here with more knowledge of these or other famous Beatles guitars, please enlighten us all. I heard there is a famous Beatles guitar named Lucy that even went through John Sebastians hands for a while. 🙂
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27 Replies
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I think this post is missing some live MLT guitar riffing.
Let’s smoke those guitars!
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E3XVSykA7Ws
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q3NTVkHwD5I
The Rickebacker and Gretsch in action!
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Excellent post Jung! Lots of great info there.
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Thanks Tommy. It was fun compiling the info about Mona and Lisa’s Rick 350v63 and Gretsch Duo Jet, and learned lots about their setup and why. I had to look closely at the guitars for the videos, because the ladies like to mix it up on stage. The same with the Beatles on stage videos. Finding one that had both John and George with their 325 and Duojet with a clear shot of their guitars was hard. It all enhanced my appreciation and enjoyment of watching Mona and Lisa play their respective pride and joy guitars so skillfully in the live performance videos. They are just brilliantly awesome!!!
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Thanks Jung for your fabulous research and insightful comments. I really enjoy all your wonderful contributions to the club. Please keep it up!
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Thanks Stephen for those kind words. Really appreciate that! ????
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Jung, George’s Duo Jet Gretsch has an interesting story, the guy’s name was Ivan Hayward from who he purchased the guitar, who bought it at Manny’s in NY. Here’s a video with the story, including the IOU for the unpaid £20.
Now we have the video for “Baby Mine” where we can see the Gretsch in all it’s glory, and Mona’s Epiphone EJ200. A treat for us.
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Great story Tomás. I’m not a musician but find these back stories fascinating. So much history there and the Beatles’ guitar tradition is being carried on through the Twins with their Gretsch and Rickenbacker. Nice to have such an intimate experience of their guitars in the video ‘Baby Mine’. I’d love to see a photo of all their guitars together!
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Exactly my thoughts Howard. Not a musician either but fascinated by Mona and Lisa’s guitars and relevance to the Beatles instruments, and just love seeing them jam with them in the two recent live videos and Baby Mine.
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Thanks Tomas for sharing that video about the story of the George Harrison Gretsch Duo Jet. Enjoyed it.
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Tomas thanks for that video, very interesting and very cool history of that Duo Jet! Love to have one of those. Lisa sure makes it sing! George would be proud of her I’m sure.
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Similar to that George Harrison Gretsch Duo Jet video posted earlier, here is one on the John Lennon Rickenbacker 325 and back story around it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j8SclzAcQ0s
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Thanks Jung, that’s great. I knew it had gone through many changes, but it’s great to know why and when, gives more perspective into John.
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Long live Mona and Lisa’s Rickenbacker and Gretsch!
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