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USA Custom Graphic, "Road Song" / "Falling Rocks"

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edge trem
3K views 2 replies 3 participants last post by  TAorama 
#1 ·
I have just tracked down an USA Custom Graphic "Falling Rocks" or "Road Song". After looking here, http://www.ibanezregister.com/Gallery/uscg/gal-uscg-fallrock.htm, I'm not really sure which it is.

The guitar has the Edge tremolo and H/S/S pickups.

What is a reasonable price to pay for this guitar, an how rare is it really?
 
#2 ·
as for the rarity, taorama or rick or many others can surely advise you better

as for the price...well, here's what I think: a USCG is, in my opinion, a largely "emotional" purchase, so listen to your heart...whatever you feel like to pay for her, it's automatically a right price...

I'll clarify with an example...
for a mint, say, "no bones about it" (masterly done graphics, but not my genere) I'd pay 500$ or so...for a mint "leather and metal", well, oh my god, oh my poor bank account, I'd pay maybe triple of that!...but that's just me, it's all up to personal taste about the painting!
 
#3 ·
Ibanez promo literature calls that graphic "Road Song", so I'd go with that. As for value, Machinediva is right on. It's up to the buyer on the UCGR's. A good ballpark figure for a nice UCGR is around $600, but some of the graphics will tend to pull in more or less. Some of the more common graphics, such as "Necromancers Castle", turn up fairly often and don't draw the big $$$ unless they're absolutely mint. My personal Holy Grail, "Chop Shop", is almost never seen for sale, and I paid a ridiculous amount for mine just because it's my favorite. On the other hand, I've got a really cherry "Last Cigarette" that I got for cheap, partly because it's ugly and I didn't have to fight someone for it. (I laugh at the recent auction for one with a $1200 starting bid!!!). Stuff like "Leather and Metal", "No Bones About It", "Grim Reaper" and the like bring a premium because they're more appealing to more people (you can't go wrong with skulls, death, or half-naked women). I've paid as little as $250 and as much as $1000+ for USA Customs. I've seen some USAC's actually sell for $1400+ that I thought were ugly. If you really like the graphic, it's worth more to you. I'd probably go $400-$500 for "Road Song" if it was really nice. Totally mint, maybe $600. But that's just me.

As for rarity, there's not a "for sure" number on any of these graphics. Supposedly, there were only 250 of each design made, but I'm positive that some designs had much lower numbers, and some may have been higher. I have two USAC's that are 1 of 1 designs. As I understand it, the artists working for Ibanez would submit new designs on completed bodies. If Ibanez liked it, they'd ask for more. If they didn't, they'd generally complete the guitar and ship it out anyway (why waste a perfectly good body?), but not order more of that design.

Anyway, just from looking at the frequency of the different graphics coming onto the market, you can judge which had higher productions and which didn't. Of course, some "cooler" designs may be harder for an owner to turn loose of, but generally speaking, auction sites and used guitar marketplaces are good indicators of production numbers. Like I mentioned, "Necromancer's Castle" turns up pretty regularly. Either there's a bunch of them, or the same couple of guitars keep getting bounced around. Something like "Sea Monster" is very rarely seen, so I'm inclined to believe there's far fewer than 250 of them out there. "Road Song" doesn't show up too often, but I've seen a few at auction so I know they're out there.

Want a totally ridiculous, unsubstantiated, wholly unscientific method for calculating production numbers? Try this: Take the number of times a particular design shows up on that big auction site in one year, and multiply that by 21. "Necromancer's Castle" shows up almost monthly, so 12x21=252, close to the 250 production "cap". "Leather and Metal" go maybe once or twice a year, so 21 to 42 of those. If you never see one, figure less than 20. I know that's total crap (and don't flame me for it, because I KNOW it's crap!), but it amuses me to put some sort of number on each design.

Personally, I'd love to see a registry for each design, similar to the RGART registry. I know the Ibanez Register has a list of some, but I'd like a real head-count. I'll be happy to start one if anyone's really that interested.

Andy
 
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