Ed Roman: The FAKE Guitar King
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- Опубліковано 7 чер 2024
- The name Ed Roman is one you might hear about in the guitar world.
It's not always followed with praise.
Today we look at the fake guitars, the copies, the modifications/conversions Ed made to vintage guitars and the story surrounding BC Rich.
If your'e in the second hand market for USA BC Rich's PRS, Gibson, Kramer or vintage guitars in general. You should be aware of this.
0:00 Intro
1:48 Modification
2:18 Ed Roman
1:00 Gibson Conversions
5:16 The Reason
6:58 PRS
9:26 Vintage Destruction
11:21 Contradictions
12:39 Fabulous Fakes
13:39 The BC Rich Story
16:52 Moser Statement
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around 1500 LP standards were made 58 - 60 there are now only 30,000 of them left
Underrated comment.
This took me longer than I'd like to admit to understand! But it's definitely funny!
Took me a second, too. Fantastic!
And counting.....
Still only four lefties
I have the best Ed Roman story ever. When I was in the market for my first expensive guitar, I unknowingly went into a store he ran in Connecticut before he went on to his infamy. He personally talked me into a used ESP Horizon, that did end up being a great instrument, but nonetheless, he "agreed" to knock it down to 1000.00 with no receipt. Being a dumb 17 year-old, I agreed. When I got home, there ended up being an electrical problem. My father, who back in his heyday was not a person you would mess with, went with me to either return or exchange the guitar. Ed "pointed" out to me the no returns sign, that was about a 5x7 size in the middle of literally hundreds of celebrity photos. After arguing back and forth, with my father ready to rip his head off, he suggested we go outside to continue our conversation. Being a complete scumbag, he stepped back into the entryway of the store, locked the door behind us, and no lie, did the whole moose ears tongue wagging at us like a child. I will never forget that ridiculous experience. He was dirt through and through.
😆yeah, that sounds about right. East Coast Music in Danbury? His luthier Barry Lippman wasn't much better. Good guitar builder, but the same level of dirtbag. Went in to buy a set of tuners, nut and general hardware for a neck I was re-doing, asked Barry's advice on a few things as he was ringing me up. Like he didn't even hear me because he was too busy eye raping my wife, who was standing next to me. I'd ask a question and he would tell the answer while checking out my wife. I was like "Dude WTF?" That whole store was shady.
My friend & I used to drive over to East Coast sound back in the late 80's. On one trip, Ed was behind the counter and a twentyish looking guy asked if they bought vintage gear. He asked what he had, and this guy opened the case & in it was a gorgeous Fender Jazzmaster in Lk Placid blue as I recall and the guy said pre-CBS. I just remember Ed quickly going into some shtick of how these weren't popular, yadda yadda and at the same time looking over at me & my friend ( still in awe of this guitar) and noting our expression - as if concerned we we're going to say something to F up Ed's "honest appraisal". This haggling went on & we had to go so don't know what came of it.
@@dacktracker sounds about right
Lol what the fuck…that’s messed up. Why didn’t you or him just fix the issue? Probably just a loose solder wire or bad pot or jack or whatever. Can be fixed in five minutes…
It’s still on the shop. And with electrical it could be 5 mins soldering a loose jack, or hours of re wiring an entire harness. An honest shop would take care of it.
Spoke to him on the phone one time to ask if he had one of the 70’s era Ibanez Destroyers for sale. Said he had several but that they weren’t for sale because Ebay had driven the market down, and that he sold them regularly to insurance companies for $3,000. I found one a couple weeks later for $1000 and bought it. I called him back and told him I had a 70’s Ibanez Destroyer for sale. He asked how much, and I replied $2,000. He said he never heard of those guitars bringing that much. I told him that I spoke with him a few weeks earlier and he said he sold them regularly to insurance companies for $3,000, so I was giving him a chance to make a $1,000 profit. He didn’t know what to say. 😜
Just blew his mind with that one huh lol. His brain cell’s exploded trying to decide if he should tell you to go screw yourself or if he had an opportunity here lol.
Just a born Iiar doing his thing.
I called Ed and described what I wanted to do. He listened to the entire thing. At the end all he said was, "Can't do it." and hung up on me. 2 months later he was selling the guitar I described on his website.
wow LOLOL.. describe the guitar though!
No offense, but your story is very logically flawed.
1. He ran a custom shop.
2. True Custom shop guitars have poor resale value Vs initial cost, because they are so specific to one person’s tastes.
3. So, you’re essentially saying, Ed didn’t want YOUR business, but wanted to take the chance, to build without a deposit, because he recognized your idea was so awesome, he stole it because he knew someone else would want the same guitar as your dream guitar?
4. I’m in no way defending any of Ed’s business practices, but this story feel more self-aggrandizing.
5. What would fall more inline with Ed’s business practices, is if you paid for a custom guitar that you spec’d out, then found out Ed built several of them at the same time he was building yours, but charged you the “one of a kind price”, but made several for a better profit margin & made yours not “one of a kind”.
@@TheStacanova fair points. I have no idea why he didn't customise my guitar and just hung up on me, but the fact is: that's what he did. It wasn't some super awesome custom guitar. It was just cosmetic mods for my current off-the-shelf guitar.
I have a 1994 Steinberger GM2T. I wanted it re-topped in quilted maple with paua or abalone purfling and binding, re-inlayed with a paua vine, paua topped volume and tone knobs and to chrome plate the tuning knobs, so I called him and told him what I wanted to do.
He listned to me, said "CANT DO IT" and hung up. I was surprised by this because he even said, "If you can dream it we can do it!", and that's what he spent a lot of time/money advertising.
A few months later he started sellling re-topped, bound, inlayed, shell topped knobbed Steinbergers. The only thing that was missing from my specs were the chrome tuning knobs. He called them "Jewelbergers". There is still one on his Steinberger page front and center in the Steinberger group shot sans vine inlay. Believe me, don't believe me. I don't give a shit either way. Maybe he didn't take me serious thinking an 18 year old kid wouldn't have the money to actually follow through with it? I don't know. Either way I got almost everything I wanted done through other channels.
It would appear that Ed's logic was flawed. Why TF would I fabricate a story about something so inconsequential about something that happened 30 years ago?
@@wampaku2 Maybe he bad mouthed your ideas and others in the shop called them cool.. I'm an inventer, and the level of crap that could be made many times better, but has been the same for decades, that I notice "everywhere" is absurd. I've sometimes asked experts in the given field: "How can I avoid this or that problem?" and never got anything but "There's nothing to do - you just have to avoid it.".. Meanwhile I've had cheap easy to make sollutions for years - even decades for some of them.. Sad part is, that I can use them, bcz if they are seen in public, all patent rights die.. Oh the irony..
HAH Carvin did the same thing to me except they showed it off at the NAMM show and the guitar I got was nothing like what I asked for. I sent it back, sold my Carvin C66 and swore to never give that company another dime.
Ed Roman died in 2011 and millions upon millions of guitars around the world gave a hail Mary and a sigh of relief.
🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣👏👏👏👏👏👏
This comment should be on top
@kdh
While in no way condoning Ed Roman's sketchy behavior, I almost admire his blatant disregard for precious muso's and their instruments.
@@dannygray4898 Why?
In 2005, I visited Ed Roman's shop in Las Vegas, looking to buy a new guitar. I spotted a gorgeous SG on the wall, and asked a clerk if I could plug it into an amp and see how it played. Y'know, as you'd do, if you were thinking about buying a $1,200 guitar.
He looked at me with a perfectly straight face and said, "Oh, no. We don't let customers touch our instruments. If you want to play it, you have to buy it first."
Needless to say, I gtfo of there and never went back ...
Lmao. EVERY musician here in Vegas knows that you can't play the guitars at Ed Roman unless you've been on the cover of a magazine.
@@joelglanton6531that… is the weirdest thing ever.
Years ago, I was in Vegas for a business convention and I had some time to kill so I took a cab to Ed Roman's guitar shop. I bought a bunch of parts and when I went to leave, he would not let me use his phone to call a cab. I asked then if he would call me a cab and he said no. I had to walk back to the strip in the middle of September. I will never forget that customer service lesson.
wow, that is a total slap in the face.. Took your money and then treated you that way. sorry
I woulda said "Hi, I'm here to return these parts..."
I would’ve just tried to get a refund, or steal something of his that’s quite expensive… that would get him back haha! Then use a public phone to get a cab or ask if a stranger would call to get a cab for me?
@KeziHarris I'm guessing he means before cell phones. It was a different world back then.
@@Randy-jz9ox Oh was it ever. Not only did you have to find a payphone, you had to have had the correct change to make it work. He was in a strange city. Going back far enough there was no 411 service. Might be a tattered phone book hanging from a chain... Yeah he knew what he was doing. Some people just need to be taken out in the yard and taught a lesson. Sadly, the law frowns on that.
The best Ed Roman story ever is ….he is gone…. And all guitarists lived happily ever after…. The end
I went into his Vegas shop years ago out of curiosity. So many guitars. So many overpriced, crappy guitars. What, you want to play one? We’re here to SELL guitars, not let people waste time in here. Asked about MIJ Strats and the prices they gave me were so totally out of line. This shop was a worse bet than any slot machine on the Strip.
"We are now going to hand-carve this body" but nothing could have ever prepared me for what was to follow lmfao
Every night I try to sleep, but all I can hear is the sound of the neck splitting from the body
PT Barnum of guitars... a prick/character depending on what day you visited the store.
They hand carved it alright!!!
What must he have done to the 50s Les Pauls...hope he got splinters from hell!!
That was an awful watch!
@@KDH thanks for the new nightmare fuel.
Chin up, though! most popular channels have only 10 - 15% subscriber rates.
@@KDH Hand job gone wrong.
How do I know that this is a legitimate KDH video and not an Ed Roman video?
Back in the 80s, a friend of mine had an original, rare, and moderately expensive Ibanez that he sent to Ed for a simple repair when he used to work out of New England, before the Las Vegas shop. Ed just outright kept this particular Ibanez and sent back a brand new, cheaper version of the same Ibanez model. When my friend called the shop, furious, Ed told him to "prove it" and take him to court. I wonder how many people Ed outright screwed over just by ripping them off. And just like this video shows, it's not like the guy couldn't do the work and didn't do good work, it's the fact that he was an outright crook! Before there was a mainstream online infrastructure with a digital trail of everything, Ed knew how to get away with this criminal business model. Shame...
When it comes to damaged Gibby's, "damaged" almost always = the neck and not the body. Either the headstock or neck is snapped but it's very rare a body is so damaged you can't repair it. Roman obviously knew that original necks were the key to reselling guitars and avoiding lawsuits. The dude spent so much energy creating these scams it makes you wonder what he could have done if he just focused all his effort and energy on making his own designs.
He did make his own guitars but they didn't sell. The way the market was then people really wanted a head stock that said Gibson.
Also, this video acts like he was the only one doing this at the time when most of this kind of thing was happening in Los Angeles and done by luthiers with a lot more talent than anyone Ed ever employed.
@@davidmckean955 Were they REALLY his designs or did he just scour for lesser known manufacturers with odd shapes that he could make more famous versions of?
Another point with the Iommi BC RICH is that Iommi is left handed, and the SG's are all right handed... supposedly 3 went to Iommi but he cant even play them!
Comment that needs to blowup
I guess Tony wanted a challenge...
Ed Roman ghostbuilt many guitars for famous musicians too so I’m sure he made custom left handed for him and then went on and built those right handed guitars and tried to scam buyers with those guitars
Those are the limited edition BC Rich/Tony Iommi/Jimi Hendrix models
I think the effort put in those projects was off the charts.. unbelievable, was much more complex than making a whole guitar to preserve some authenticity. But here comes the gap, why on earth change a whole body or retop it to counterfeit? It s like using original papel moeda (dont know how its called in english, the paper who money is printed) to erase and print 100 bucks instead one's
There was a guy on Reverb who listed his Travis Bean a few months back. He had purchased it from Ed Roman and was under the impression that it was a 100% original vintage piece when he bought it in the early 2000’s. He listed it believing it was original, but it ended up that the entire body was not original and had been an “improvement” by Roman’s shop. He had to knock the price down from $9k to $3k. I felt really bad for the guy.
Hooooly fuck. Ouch, man.
This hurts my soul, the fact there is a Travis Bean he did this to
@@jaysonc9690 That's what I'm saying, like, fuck a '59 burst, but a Bean?????
Serves him right for wanting to charge 9k for a guitar.. I rather have a Chibson for $100 and upgrade the pickups
@@MybeautifulandamazingPrincess You clearly dont know what a travis bean is. It's not a normal guitar.
Here's my Ed Roman story. When I was 13, I came upon his website and fell in love with all the guitars. I became a fan and began emailing him, telling him how amazed I was at his collection and all that. I have to say, given his reputation, he was actually very nice to me. I even wrote a few of the articles about rock star guitars on his website (I won't say which ones, because half the info was wrong!). Eventually on a trip to Vegas at 15, I got to see his store just a few months before he closed it and went to selling guitars out of his house. It was pretty cool seeing so many awesome guitars on the wall. At that time I bought one of the many "brands" he owned, a Baker, and it served me well for 5 years before I grew out of it. When he did end up working out of his home, I visited twice and both times he had me in his office and reveled in telling me stories of the rock stars he met, and he seemed to be impressed with my own knowledge about various guitars, rock music and the like. Not to say he didn't have his shady business dealings, but he didn't have to give an annoying teen guitar nerd the time of day, but he did and was always very nice. He even let me play some of his super rare instruments, including an aluminum neck Axe bass that (he claimed) belonged to Gene Simmons. It seems like a lifetime ago, but it was fun times and like others have said, he was quite the character.
You fell in love with pictures on someone’s website? Man that is shallow… I mean, if it was porn, maybe we can understand.
As for Vegas locals, kids typically weren't allowed in the shop unsupervised and no one was allowed to play any guitars- unless you were famous. That's right, you could be prepared to spend 5k on a guitar and they wouldn't even allow you to try any out. It's cool that he was a nice guy to you but he was a huge POS and there are dozens of stories in these comments that are totally opposite to yours.
@@TwistedRiffsterAre you retarded?
@@joelglanton6531 - It's unfortunate that you had a bad experience or heard about something that got your hackles up. I am not a person of note. Nor am I wealthy. In 2007 I bought a guitar from Ed (actually one of his salesman) after visiting the store many times over a 3-4 month time period. Not one time did I step foot into his store when there wasn't a guitar being played. I personally handled and played with dozens of guitars... and amplifiers. And I saw a lot of other walk-in customers do the same. I never saw anyone performing on the stage, but I did see Ed walk away from a conversation he was having with a celebrity to thank a couple for coming in and offered them a ride back to the strip in his limo.... And they were walking out empty handed. You probably could have stopped after the first time you said the same thing in response to someone else's comment, but you didn't. Clearly you have a rather large chip on your shoulder. Perhaps you should hit the reply button and unload a bit more. You'll probably feel better.
I'd read thru Eds site since the dialup days, and went on to be a small scale amp and guitar builder myself, and lots of repairs. My fave topic is addressed at the 10min mark - "where are they now?". In the 90s I remember the majority of vintage or used guitars in vintage classified sites or on ebay etc. had some sort of modification or repair mentioned in the ad, such things as- replaced pickups, jumbo refrets, locking or new tuners, swapped neck, new paintjob, different bridge, floyd rose with locking nut, coil split switches, stickers on the guitar, finish sanded off the neck, on and on.
When last did you see an ad for a vintage strat with a floyd rose and humbuckers, or any mod I mention? Where are they now?
Somehow every vintage item is now original specs, all parts present and working perfectly, shiny finish, no fretwear, original case, hang tags and oh you can get the original cardboard shipping box too.
It's only gotten worse since then too.
🤔
this guy really was the gothic horror butcher for guitars.
The Ed Gein of the guitar world.
Ed Roman is like Reverse Gibson “Don’t Play Authentic Play Ed Roman”
But Ed is authentic, or better! Just ask him.
@@RByrne That would be a good trick.
@@POOKIE5592 oh, yeah I forgot that part
Thank you so much for confirming that Ed Roman was either clinically insane or the most unscrupulous businessman in the music industry ever. Used to love his old site and yes the contradictions were stupefying. But I kept going back because of the variety and he did inform eg the ghost building thing .
Yes! The ghost building- that blew my mind when Ed exposed it
I dealt with Mr. Roman's East Coast Sound on a number of occasions. "clinically insane or the most unscrupulous businessman in the music industry ever" is more of an "and" proposition.
yeah the ghost building thing demystified a lot of industry myths.
Definitely not the only unscrupulous POS in Vegas.
I know a local builder that did some ghost building in the 90s. It really happens.
Being a professional cabinetmaker and semi pro luthier, I remember spending hours looking and reading thru his website way back when. Many of his ideas I thought made sense regarding the technological advances of guitar design and some I use to this day. But what really floored me and in part still does was his Colour Gallery of the different transparent finishes on figured woods: I used those photos as a reference and target of what to try to achieve. This was before the time of YT and now everybody is demoing finishing techniques like sand-back on figured maple. Back then you had to “read-thru” the finish and try to deduce the finish recipe on your own…uggghhh!
This is the kind of journalism I long for and enjoy. Keep up the good work.
Was in his shop in 2005, total uncanny valley...being pretty versed with brands and styles, all the guitars looked close but eerily wrong. A true legend of dodgy shite.
"Uncanny Valley Guitar Shop" - very Twilight Zone
Fun Fact: In Connecticut where he opened his first store, he was known as Sluggo. Named after the comic strip character which he closely resembled.
East coast music
Interesting. There used to be a "Sluggo's Music" in Tacoma, Wa on 6th Ave. Definitely not Ed Roman. The guy who owned it was pretty cool.
Omg I forgot about that 😂 I used to hang out at the store when it was on Main St in Danbury..
@@effsixteenblock50 The first thing I thought of when I saw the name Sluggo.
East Coast Music Mall I spent a good deal of time there in the 1990’s for all the bad things you will hear about Ed here he was good to his friends.
Now that’s a name I haven’t heard in YEARS, I used to look this guy’s lore up in highschool during class and get lost down the rabbit hole that seemingly felt bottomless!
I had one interaction with the man. Phoned in to buy a guitar and he was truly vile rude and vulgar. Blew up when I asked why shipping from Vegas to Colorado was $200 for a single guitar, and at this time normal shipping from either coast was around 30 dollars. Cussed me out and I just landed up hanging up on him, glad i never did business with him. Serious issues.
I wish he were still alive I'd pay longmont potion castle to call him. maybe go down there a bump him around.
He sounds like my Ex-wife ( and Donald Trump ) a classic Narcissist. This is why I am happily divorced ...
@@1970borntorun probably because you can't recognize greatness. Also, do you do that thing where you hate relentlessly those who out succeeded you in life? You seem like that's the real case here.
@@caiusmadison2996 🤡🤡🤡🤡
@@caiusmadison2996 Damn, son. Put some ointment on it.
I’ve visited Ed Romans guitar shop in Las Vegas when he was still alive. About 1/4 of his inventory just plain looked sketchy. There was all kinds of parts under the counter and on the wall behind the counter and they were all unfinished. Nobody has that many different brands of factory blanks. He wanted ridiculous money for them too.
I doubt doubt he tried to sell his own necks and bodies as real "factory blanks"
Solo many blanks
@@andrewgarcia3136 no he really did, the place was a mess and had tons of the worst looking esp bones guitars you could imagine, high action and sloppy paint even, it was a wild experience
Ed's definition of a guitar is just the neck. Everything else is replaceable. A real Chop Shop mentality.
Yea cuz thats the only shit that would confirm its identity as a "real" guitar lol goddammit
Yep. It is like a VIN on a car. No matter how matter how rusted or burnt out a valuable vintage car is if you can fabricate a new car around it.
To be fair, that's how Gibson repair shop also treated its own guitars for decades.
Ed Roman was the rage on TGP and Harmony Central 20 years ago. Guys swore by his copies and customs. Quite a few horror stories as I remember from some customers.
Can you share some of the stories?
I remember the rambling, SUPER long blogs on his website. He was arrogant and talked a lot of shit, but he was entertaining and did have some good points.
We were all bashing him by the mid-2000's.
KDH: mentions all the brands I'm in the secondhand market for.
Me: nervous sweating intensifies
There are books and videos showing what to look for when dealing with used gear. So do your homework or take along someone that deals with older gear. It'll save you alot of headache.
is it possible that Trogly's fake Snakepit Les Paul is an Ed Roman guitar???
Okay here's my Ed Roman story.
I'm in Aus and I did a trade deal with Guitar Center LA...my Ibanez Crystal Planet for a Jem DNA and some cash (I already had a dna and wanted another; they were really hard to find at the time; triple that for a well swirled one like this). Promptly paid my deposit to GC and shipped the guitar. Once it had been delivered I rang GC to confirm it had arrived safely and was informed they had accidentally sold the Jem. You can imagine how happy I was...to add insult to injury they then lowballed me on the Crystal Planet and would not pay to ship it back.
After calling many stores I ended up speaking to Ed who offered me a great price and though there was enough rumblings in the forums (even back then) to make me concerned after talking to Ed a few times I ended up sending to him.
So now I'm waiting for the money to arrive in my account...waiting, still waiting, it's now a couple of weeks so I ring and he says he posted a cheque, you should have it soon...waiting, waiting, a few weeks later I call again this time after some research he says so sorry it actually didn't get posted he'll send it.
Couple more weeks go by and I was now getting worried and angry. I rang Ed again and gave it to him over the phone, he took it well and promised me he had it sent when we last spoke (I did say that's not the first time I heard that)...I was skeptical and thinking this was about to be a police matter.
Then the unthinkable...the cheque arrived and not only did it not bounce in the over two months it took to arrive the Aussie dollar crashed hard and I cashed in...turned out to be more than what I paid for it.
Ed then nearly sucked me into a franchise and I went back and forth with him (ex amount of dollars for so many guitars and ongoing) but I ended up pulling the pin, think I really dodged a bullet and now I look at this video and wonder how many of those guitars I would have purchased would've been fakes that I would have then distributed.
I wonder if/how many others like me he managed to hook and how many fakes he managed to sell through them.
Absolutely brilliant! I love how much research you've done and your analytical, logical and humorous tongue-in-cheek breakdown of all the things you cover in your videos. Respect!. I know it takes a lot of effort to produce the kind of videos you do. Your level of output is outstanding
No tale was too tall for Ed Roman to tell 😄 Dude was the Saul Goodman of the guitar world
That's an insult to Saul Goodman.
@@NinjaRunningWild Steven Seagal would have been a better comparison.
Del Trotter from 'Only Fools and Horses' like the broom reference in the video.
Best video you’ve ever done. I remember reading his site back in the day and getting the feeling he was an egomaniac. But as I knew very little about guitars at the time I could have easily been taken in. The sad thing is the number of fakes he has put out there in the secondhand and vintage market now.
He calls the replica guitars "Fabulous Fakes".
Ha ha, are we talking Ed Roman, he was up to a point right about PRS guitars, he proclaimed the pre 1990 ones are the best for many reasons and until about 2010 he was right, now however I believe Paul is making the best guitars he has ever made.
As someone who knew him personally he could be tolerable on a good day, but Ed didn't have many good days...
Roman was known as a slippery fish for decades.
"A skidmark in the shorts of the guitar industry."
Much as everyone likes to point at Ed Roman and call him the bad guy of the guitar industry, I think it's safe to say that much of the guitar industry as a whole is sketchy. Everyone is selling a story, trying to convince you that only a real Gibson can sound like a Gibson, this vintage guitar will sound better than anything new, this 'magical' circuit can never be re-created, this expensive 'tonewood' makes your guitar sound better, etc, etc. Ed was a scumbag, there is no arguing that. I would argue that perhaps the rest of the guitar industry hated Ed Roman so much because it was like staring into a mirror and seeing a parody of themselves. He didn't do anything they won't do, he was just more brazen about it.
@@R3volutionblu3s
I never considered Roman "the" bad guy of the industry. As you pointed out, there are plenty of snakes out there. Ed was certainly one of the worst!
I agree that a properly set up, non-vintage "player's grade" fiddle can sound and play as well (often better) than a costly vintage piece.
The market for the old stuff is driven by condition and rarity.
Misrepresented products unscrupulously muddy those waters.
@@rickquist3992 "A skidmark in the shorts of the guitar industry."
Rick, you just killed me with that statement,
So eloquently said. 😂🤣
Wow this brings up memories (not Ed direct but Ed related) One of my bf's close friend is a guitar collector that comes from old money. He was a teen in the late 70's / 80's era. He used to go to Vegas all the time (his pops was a pal of Trump's) would bring guitars to troll Ed's shop for kicks, and he had to be on top of his game as Ed's could "BS better than running of the Bulls Espana." . He said what wasn't talked about much in the industry was that Ed Roman and his team was known for making vintage fakes and copies and were good enough to pass expert review. Ed's shop was one of originators of "relic-ing". There was a story of Roman had made 60's era Gibson / Fender vintage fakes and took it to a guitar show with the top 4 vintage dealers at that time and they couldn't tell the diff between roman vintage fakes and the real vintage guitars roman copied from.
Ed said if he could fake and fool them, in the future with new techniques, materials etc, it would be impossible for experts to tell a fake so the vintage guitar market would hide that fact. He also said you could easily get Ed to fly off his handle by taking about how Heritage and PRS revoked him as dealer (building fake copies) or really great guitar players don't mind the "New PRS heel" .
Ed had raged against Asian guitars but Ed ranted in the shop, "Those Japanese (Ed used a derogatory WW 2 term that I'm not using) copy better than me. They got all the 50's and 60's Gibson / Fender etc specs because back them the record keeping was looser and the companies used what stock and parts they had, and thats all they do is copy this year or that year, day in and day out. And they're good at it. And those Japanese copy of American guitars, I get them, and that's how we get the specs for the years."
He got Ed's Mosrite copies / fakes and said it felt and the pick ups sounded like a real Mosrite. I remember he had this old PC (pentium II lol) with a sony triniton monitor, that held all his websites, and showed the ed roman site as he told us stories . . . but when we showed him the net archives he was stoked. He said Ed kinda of wasted his talent. If Ed went legit and focused, and instead of being a used car sales man but a guitar brand, he Ed could have been like PRS but for pointy 80's guitars as he said even as the 90's came on Ed was still stuck in the 80's. Fun times.
That story about those fake relics is one that Ed wrote about on his site.
I live in Las Vegas, and I used to dream about going to Ed's store after discovering the website. I'm glad I didn't now. After learning more about guitars, I realized there was just too many red flags. I figured he would have had to hire an entire factory overseas in order to fulfill what his website promised. I didn't know he died.
His shop was actually rad. It was complete sensory overload for a guitar nerd. Yeah he had lots of his own brands in there and they were pushed, but just the huge number of guitars in there was insane.
@@DasRightfortyforfo but tbh would you feel comfortable buying one now, knowing this? When I was in high school I took lessons at this shop the my dad's friends owned. The son of the owner would show me the guitars that he got from Ed's store when they would go down to trade shows. They weren't the same, I don't remember what exactly it was but I remember not liking any of them, compared to the normal Gibsons or Epis he had in his shop I'd play all the time. It felt like a prop rather than a nice instrument.
The shop is still there and is called 'Roman Guitars'...instead of Ed Roman Guitars. His old staff runs it...and they make incredible guitars. I didn't have any dealings with them during the Ed days..but I can assure you that they make incredible stuff. I am lefthanded, so finding good guitars locally is next to impossible. So in December of 2020, I ordered a lefthanded copy of a 65 Mosrite with a stoptail piece (essentially the Johnny Ramone guitar with some changes). The guitar is an absolute dream and was well worth the wait. At one point, they were Mosrite dealers..so they had an actual guitar for reference ...and weren't building mine from just looking at pictures. I know that Ed Roman had some shady practices, but the crew running it now are legit. My GF went to pick it up for me when visiting Vegas and she said that the guys there were super great to her and that the place had a great vibe.
@SyX9
I went there once long time ago. A fuckton of overpriced instruments that you couldn't touch. There were 2-3 customers in the store and it took me 10 minutes to get a sales rep's attention. The guy started pushing hard their guitars on me (whatever the name was) and I said I wasn't interested and looking for an LP Std, so he basically told me that I "was obviously a nobody, because they were the best and all the famous guitar players wanted them" and walked away.
At that time, I only knew that it was "the largest guitar store in the world" and was completely oblivious to the controversy.
@@RByrne I wouldn't have recommended buying from them even before this video! Some 10+ years ago I bought a parker fly from them. It was a special order right when US music took over and the way the shop handled it was a total mess.
Ed Roman is infamous. My friend spoke with him when he was alive and he was held up to his reputation of just not giving a single fuck.
Kinda based?
My friend spoke with him when he was dead. Still not giving a single eff
That is a true statement. He ripped me off once and told me I deserved it……
I've never even heard of this dude before, what an amazing story. Subscribed.
I loved the counterfeit BC Rich guitars of Ed's. I wanted a Warslinger to replace the BC Rich NJ series Warslinger I had in the late late 80s. I described it to 3 different people in his shop and on the 3rd guy I told them money wasn't a problem. I was looking for one of the very few USA Gunslingers. I got on the phone with the man Ed himself. He did the whole yeah yeah I know about those models very rare yeah. Then he offered to build me one out of genuine BC Rich USA parts. He was above reasonable on the price which was what a USA Warslinger went for brand new. A Warlinger is a Gunslinger, but with a Warlock body instead of the ST style. They are rare in both the USA and NJ series. I went for it. He sent me a plywood BC Rich Platinum series body mated to what probably was the neck that it came with and an obvious reshaping of the reverse 6 in line pointy headstock from the ugly Platinum style. It had an origional Floyd Rose on it and an actual EMG 81 humbucker. He went ahead and painted it solid red and black binding on the body. It took 6 months to get to me. It sucked. Sucked bad. Really bad. I got hosed and he wouldn't honor anything he claimed on his website. He's a snake oil salesman with a silver tongue.
Geez, those guitar destuction video is a guitarist snuff movie. I need to hug my guitars now.
umm.... Me Too.
Crazy timing, I just randomly went back and read through some of Ed's old "rants" on his site earlier this week. The guy was definitely a whacko, but he ended up being right about some things. One that caught my attention was his story about manufacturers building in the collector value to the purchase price
Ironically his prices were for a "collectible one of a kind Ed Roman Gibson Les Paul"
Say what you want about the guy (and there's certainly a lot to say), but a lot of what he said in his "rants" was pretty true.
Greatest rants of all time- even when he was wrong he was entertaining
@@user-do2ev2hr7h I agree. His viewpoints on Guitar building ( Neck-thru vs Set-neck, Vintage PRS vs Modern PRS, etc etc ) were pretty spot-on. Too bad he was such a sleazy asshole.
Just seeing his business practice, I can tell this guy was in the motorcycle/automotive business. Typically, with rebuilt cars, or modified bikes, it doesn't matter what you do to it as long as the vin number is intact. If you got a junked-out Harley, you could modify and rebuild it however you want, but registering it requires a Vin number. More nefariously, people will get wrecked cars, poorly rebuild them or "fix them", and as long as the vin and credentials are in check, you can sell it and scam someone.
Seems like Ed took that practice to the guitar world.
Spot on. It's a shame really because he must have had some serious skills as a builder and he knew his wood enough to find the right stuff to match 50s Gibsons. He could've just made his own guitars and hawked them round trade shows, like everyone else.
For old Harleys there is a limit though. You cannot just cut out the serial numbers and weld them into a new frame. Enough mods and the titles get changed to "special construction" which severely impacts their desirability.
and he reused the same 'vin numbers' over and over...
I bought my first bass from Ed when he lived in New Milford Connecticut. He had a bunch of guitars in his house on Candlewood lake and was transitioning from motorcycles to guitars. It was rumored that he was using stolen parts on his custom bikes.He and I remained friends with him over the years he lived in Connecticut. He built a huge house on the lake made entirely of urethane foam molded onto balloons. It looked like a giant toilet. Very appropriate. I got used to his abrasive personality. When he died I felt bad for his longtime girlfriend because he didn't have a will.
Because of course he didn't
Shortwoods Rd? I thought it was Sherman or New Fairfield.
@@JoeR203 Might have been. But it was in that maze of roads around Candlewood Lake.
He had a girlfriend?
@@GerryBlue she wasn't real either. Made her in his shop.
I remember calling Roman put for his fake George Lynch models back in the day. Oh did he get pissed!
I own a real custom Lynch Kamikaze lll that I got from Drum City Guotrs on Colorado back in 98. So I was always looking for Lynch guitars neck in the dual up days of the internet. I found his website and spent days looking at his J Frog copies.
Thanks for doing this KDH, I always knew I was right about him being a fraud.
I got a J Frog off ebay about 18 years ago and it was so bright sounding it was unplayable. I mean looking back on it I can't even believe it. What causes that? I couldn't stand the thing. It had the a serial number that indicated it was number 8. I called them to ask about my really really bright sounding new guitar with the low serial number and they were like "it must be counterfeit". It was the worst sounding guitar I've ever heard in my life. Thank god I didn't buy it new off the website for full price.
@@thomasjefferson3481 there are a lot of counterfeit J Frogs out there.
@@jeffallen3382 Really huh? I didn't know that. I would never ever buy one again because of what happened.
i remember his website from back in the day. now, in a humorous spirit, i've found out why the language used was so loud - he was a harley enthusiast!
This just makes me happy to have never wasted my money on any vintage instruments.
guy takes instruments and butchers them and then flips them both flooding the market with counterfeits and ruining any possibility of accurately telling the difference between legit and forged materials. did I miss something more?
honestly, the vintage market is stupid anyway. old ass wire and wood does not give instruments magical powers. would rather just stick to modern and inexpensive.
@@riffsnoleads I’m sure you prefer you 2015 Prius over a 1964 Ferrari 250GTO. They’re just metal and rubber. New cars get much better mileage and are more reliable. Why in the world would anyone want an old car?
@@richsackett3423 I actually prefer Subaru wagons. What does an old car provide? Tell me? An old car don't make my cock any bigger despite what marketing trickery suggests. So why waste the money on it? Same thing goes with musical gear, you can spend $5k on a hunk of wood and wiring and still be a shit player. People are so easily fooled into shelling out cash on things that do not make them any less of a dumb ass.
@@richsackett3423Bro complained about a bizarre, misbegotten conclusion and proceeded to come to a bizarre, misbegotten conclusion😂
@@riffsnoleads There are a few factors. Old wood is often different for a few reasons. 1) It's using prime species no longer commercially available. 2) Back in the day they were cutting big old-growth trees; the stock was better, even if it was bad for the environment and unsustainable. 3) The trade meant there was lots of good affordable wood and it may have sat for years before being worked with. This is good for moisture reduction and stability. Today you can bet every cost-cutting measure is in place. 4) Because the wood was available, there was less bullshit and it was exactly what it said it was made from.
More hands-on craftsmanship from people who were paid better comparatively. Much more honest products. Lived for many decades and might have a fun history tied to it. Old Nitrocellulose paint/lacquer aged and wore away in that cool way and even modern Nitro guitars don't really react the same.
I met Ed a few times over the years. What he was doing was such an open secret in the guitar community(pre-Internet) that we always used to say that to deal with Ed you had to have more money than brains. He was a character & was patently full of shit most of the time, but he was far from the only one doing such things in the 80's & 90's before the vintage craze kicked off. I mean, 'original' Max Les Pauls are going for $40,000 or more & I'm sure Kris Derrig Les Pauls would be more than that if anyone could find them. Several people tried passing those off as real 58/59 LPs when the vintage guitars were at their peak. Some Mom & Pop shops would make you a Fender in any color you wanted & then just stick a Fender neck on it. Yes, Ed was 100% taking advantage of both customers AND guitar companies. It was just in an era where the resources to educate consumers or to catch him in the act really didn't exist yet. I always found it odd how he couldn't keep from showing off what he'd done when the Internet rolled around but then again, self-awareness was never Ed's strong suit.
TBH even "open secret" seems a stretch given how completely open he was about what he did.
@@user-do2ev2hr7h - True, but we see it today through the lens of the Internet. Before the internet, the main way buyers outside of Connecticut( where Ed initially owned East Coast Music Mall) knew of Ed were the big, full page ads that he ran in every guitar magazine. In an era where BC Rich was a super popular brand, there really wasn’t much selection or distribution nationally. If you were dead set on a BCR, the glossy ad with HUNDREDS of BCR guitars was too good to pass up for some people. It was seriously a ‘caveat emptor’ situation. Today if a shop were to operate like Ed did, they would be dragged through every guitar forum on the net.
@@JV-rx3ov fair enough.
I've been playing guitar long enough to remember Ed and his website. Always got bad vibes from the guy but wow this is just next level. As someone with a fascination and respect for nearly all types of guitars, seeing what this guy was doing to instruments hurts.
I saw his website in the early 2000's and that's how i found out about him amd his replica fabulous fakes guitars and i actually went to see him in his shop when i went to Vegas for a vacation. I got curious about his guitars. Quite a few of them i tried to play and found out they were okay although not perfect like the real deal.
To be fair if he had only butchered Les Paul studios I'd be okay with it cause they're dime a dozen and not worth much. But the guy gave off mad sleazy salesman vibes and clearly didn't care about the instrument. He said we are all backwards for not taking our guitars apart and rebuilding them lol. He's insane. The point of a guitar is playing it as it is, not rebuilding it. The actual number of mods you can do without hacking it apart turning it into something it's not is fairly small
@@andrewgarcia3136 I tend to agree with most of what you said but wasting totally usable guitars always kills me. Like there is some kid out there who doesn't have the money for a Les Paul studio but would make the world of difference to them but another guy is just blasting them apart. I forget which company it was, I think maybe Gibson, but I remember a company lining up a bunch of guitars that weren't selling well so they drove over them with bulldozers to destroy them. Break one guitar every now and then? Fine, thats rock and roll and its your instrument, trash a bunch of guitars just for fun? Thats wasteful and so much better could be done if they were donated to a school or somewhere to underprivileged youth. I mean the amount of workand care that go into making a decent instrument to not even see it get any use is just unfortunate. I have a low end Japanese Aria that I picked up in a pawn shop for $120, it looks beat up but it sounds and feels as good as an American Strat. Just because a guitar is of little value to one person doesn't mean it wouldn't mean the world to someone else.
My dad bought me my first guitar at his store when they had the big Warehouse store on industrial Street. The year was 2004. I was only 15 at the time but I got bad vibes just from entering the store everybody in there had an attitude except for the guy who helped us. I think his name was Richard Klein.
@@musicman9901 Yeah, it was Gibson. There's video of them running over a bunch of Firebirds with a bulldozer, but there's also a tale that Jusciwicz (or however you spell his name) had Gibson Execs target practice at Fender Guitars. Is it true? Heck if I know!
I think that the most egregious part of his "restorations" & customizations is that he turned one legit guitar into one guitar into one guitar of questionable provenance while with a bit more patience he could have turned it into two guitars of questionable provenance.
If I ever start a fraudulent guitar factory, you're hired!
I think he thought he was doing the right thing by doing it the way he did. You could also buy outright fakes at that time made by exceptional luthiers in Los Angeles for ~$800. Ed thought that by starting with a real Gibson neck and serial number he was doing it legit.
Really the only reason Ed or anyone else could do this was Gibson was so rigid with their models at the time. It seems silly today because you can just easily buy something you'd actually want to play from Gibson now.
A great, illuminating video. Great info and delivery. I did not know any of this before.
You're a gem! Well done on gathering and getting this information out.
Love seeing the KDH notification!!
Same here, always interesting fringe topics and takes, unique to the YT music landscape!
With all the lawsuits in the guitar world how did Ed Roman not get sued ? It’s mind blowing
He did.
Gibson and ErnieBall
Didn’t PRS come after his ass for claiming they made the bodies out of Bondo?
Lawsuits are just a cost of doing business with criminals. They get sued all the time. Win some, lose some. Its just money
When it comes to BC Rich... because he was also selling many real guitars for them.
Which only attributed to the mist and confusion, of course.
I remember when the Beasts first came out. And Roman was offering them straight away and had at lease a dozen in stock.
You cannot fake a new guitar model that fast.
All we can hope is no more Ed Roman's pop back up in the industry. What he did to guitars and his business practices were nothing more than criminal.
Holy crap! I remember lusting after guitars on his web site back in the early internet days. I may have even contacted him about one or two, but fortunately never bought one. A real eye-opener!
I didn't know he died either. Great video though dude - and I can tell lot of work went into it! :)
this guy is like if Matilda's farther was a guitar salesmen instead of a car salesman
So glad you made this video! I used to love Ed Roman's site as a teenager.
I realize now that a lot of my biases about buying guitars come from the information I'd absorbed from that website.
In a sense i feel like he was selling his own stuff by using half-truths about how many of the big brand guitars were giving people inferior products for overinflated prices.
He seemed to have a big vendetta against Gibson in particular!
Again, thanks for putting this up brother! Peak content as always =)
He had a preference, and as an amateur builder, my opinion is that he extrapolated further to try to justify the cost of his custom shop work. an example of his preference would be the fascination with direct mounting pickups - something I still don't really get.
Gibson is a piece of 💩 company so not surprising at all.
@@daw162 Probably some idea that vibration created by the strings would pass through the tone woods in the body, and would be better transmitted to the pickup, coloring the sound. I'm 99 point somethingorother % sure it's BS, though I admit I haven't tested whether or not I'm right by checking output waveforms with an oscilloscope. Still, everything I can hear says I'm right. And direct mounted to body surely makes it harder to get pickup height just exactly where you'd like it to be.
Just now found your channel , I really enjoyed watching the story of ed Roman . Looking forward to watching alot more of your videos .
I used to work in a morgue and this video caused more trauma in the first few minutes than that ever did.
As sketchy as his ethics were with regard to guitar building, his store was even worse back in the day.
The whole “I swapped out bodies on vintage necks” BS he stated on the website would not be mentioned at all in the store if you were considering a purchase. As far as they were concerned, you were paying top dollar for an all-original guitar, even with gaudy non-original paint job. The kind of nonsense that went on there went well beyond what you’d see at a seedy used car lot, needless to say.
The worst part was that the sales crew there had tremendous attitudes going on when they tried to sell you product, too.
The one and only time I went there was with my dad in the early 2000’s- they literally told him he had no clue as to what he was talking about regarding vintage guitars (despite the fact he’s done repairs on a great many of them back in the 70s) when he called them out on their chicanery and threatened to have us thrown out. We ended up getting the REAL story on Roman’s outfit from other retailers in town who were well-aware of his game.
The quality of his stuff was spotty at best, too- some were actually kinda decent, while most were just outright unplayable junk. I’m talking stuff BELOW the quality of what would be churned out in China.
But they still had the audacity to want a ton of cash for their stuff, though…
I got tossed out of the East Coast Music Mall because I asked a question because something seemed amiss on a particular guitar. They called the cops and stated I threatened them and wound up getting yanked from my truck at gunpoint a mile away up the highway! Spent a weekend in jail and Monday afternoon was released with no charges?!?!?! I told the judge... "Uh, I asked a question... is this guitar LEGIT or is it reworked?" as it seemed to have an 'iffy' paint job that didn't match the guitar year when manufactured. I was held at gunpoint because of that skankbag's bullshit lies, sat a weekend in jail because of that fu*kbag's lies... You bet your ASS I went back there with my attorney and sued his ass for $1M just to get his ass into court. Seems many had issues with his company and he left CT for good. BTW I got nada. The court dropped all charges from myself and 27 others the month he left the state...... a TOTAL scumbag and a half!!
The guy was an obvious P.O.S.
The word spreads far and wide quickly on these types.How do they stay in business for years,that being the case?
I was in the market for a PRS many many years ago and called Ed and had a conversation with him. I actually had no idea who the guy was. Still don't care who he is (was). I found him to be abrasive and, somewhat, insulting to be honest. He really talked bad about PRS guitars. He actually told me that I know nothing about guitars if I'm even considering buying one. I was like, "What a d$%k!" However, he did point me in the direction of some other brands and I, ultimately, ordered a David Thomas McNaught based on his suggestion and it's BY FAR, the best guitar I've ever played. So, Ed was an A-hole but he definitely pointed me in the right direction.
The story I got (somewhere on the internet, forgot where, I think a forum) was he was a PRS dealer early on in the Connecticut Music Mall days but somehow got the ire of Paul himself for doing something shady (or just being an a-hole). After losing his dealership status he had a deep personal vendetta against Paul and his company. It was personal and based nothing on the quality of PRS guitars (which is what he claimed)
Yeah, I've heard more than one person say he flat out refused to sell them the brand they wanted to buy. He seems like an incredibly flawed guy, but I do think there was wisdom in a lot of what he had to say about the wider guitar industry.
@@Dudeitsmeee That makes PERFECT sense based on the way he spoke to me about PRS. Had to be something like that.
This really reminds me of what we see in the "classic car" industry nowadays. Building around the car parts with Vin numbers and claiming its an "Original" car.
100%. I have an almost original 1968 series 2a Land Rover.
What’s common over here in the UK, since vehicles on a classic registration (over 40 years old) are exempt from road tax and MOT laws. They must be kept road safe but are not subject to the yearly MOT, so realistically, as long as they aren’t in an accident or have attention drawn to them. They can be fucked but on the road.
There is a points system, at which after too many changes, the vehicle is no longer eligible to be a classic. However since the design of land rovers have changed so little on a structural scale, we see vehicles with lift kits, new engines, new gearboxes, new bulkheads, new braking systems, new windscreens, entire infotainment systems etc. Put onto a 60s or 70s chassis, with just few enough changes that it’s now road tax and MOT free.
Which is insane. I understand why people go for them, since road tax for a 2010 defender is somewhere stupid like £500 a year (I can’t remember exactly). But still, at what point can we say, fuck the VIN and serials, it’s not the same car.
I remember browsing the website back in the day and there was always something odd about it.Thanks for sharing that bit of guitar history!
Please make an episode about Scott Grove 🙏
Yeah, make an episode about me.
I just serviced a 1978 BC Rich Bich doubleneck for someone, now you got me paranoid that it might be fake haha great video!
That type of scam is called "The Ship of Thesus." Boyd Coddington (of the Show American Hotrod) was convicted of using the same type of scam on Hotrods. He used old cars so he could get their titles, but basically he'd make a RestoMod, and 99% of the car would be a new car, and the frame would be the old donor car.
That case was just about California wanting more tax money. The customers weren't getting scammed. They knew what they were buying. The title and therefore the license is tied to the vin and the frame.
Been waiting for an Ed Roman video for ages. Subscribed!
I remember surfing his website in the 90s and it was utterly massive - organizations such as the CIA didn’t have a database that big. It seemed like he was coming up with new webpages every other day so there was always something to look at. But I also remember the harmony central guitar forum always had people who had run-ins with him. Same with people who were regulars at the gear page. Everyone who actually tried to buy some thing from him had some crazy horror story. The few that managed to get on his good side ended up with playable instruments but one wonders how real they actually were.
I just dont know why anyone would want to destroy a work of musical and visual art. If you want to mod a guitar sure but within limits. I dont know any players that would pay for an essentially destroyed Gibson. Just craziness! By the way I subscribed a long time ago to make sure I get all your great content. Keep it up and greetings from across the pond here in Texas
I remember reading the articles (rants) etc on his website back in the day. I actually bought my first guitar (a japanese made Fender "E" series lefty strat) based on one of the articles he wrote comparing them favorably to US made Fenders. I still have that guitar today.
How does that guitar compare?
Dude this channel is amazing. Love these deep dives haha.
I’m a bit older so I was a young teen around the time I found the website and would just look at pictures of guitars because it was cool to see so many different guitars. I would just ignore the rants.
I will give it up to Ed I remember his site was the first time I ever heard about Sheldon Dingwall way back before the Nolly collab brought them to the forefront. He would say amazing things about his brand.
This is so odd, like the pure admission while pretending it's fine. "simple for some unscrupulous person to remove the green paint" straight into "I would normally remove it"
I grew up in the town in CT where Ed got his start. He had a music store on our main street called East Coast Sounds. Then he moved to a larger location called East Coast Music Mall. (You have some pictures of that place in your video) He was always known as a sleazebag and his employees for the most were the same. I avoided that place like the plague and bought my gear from local mom and pops instead. I never found out why he eventually moved and went to Vegas. It seems his reputation got even worse after the move.... and I didn't think that was possible.
Amazing, I never knew he got his start here in Connecticut. What town and when would this have been around?
Arizona, New Mexico, Nevada are arid and are great climates for guitars. there's also a tremendous amount of vintage stuff out there because people retire there. lot of older shit in closets etc.
@@aroundthefur Danbury CT.
I went to East Coast Music Mall. This dude showed me and my buddy the shop in the back. He was making left handed PRS! PRS didn’t offer a left handed model. lol
@@cliffordcmayhewiii6549 Building a right handed guitar a left handed body was a service he advertised on the site for a long time. This was pre-Vegas era.
I used to read his website back in the day! This video got me hooked on your channel. Been watching a lot. Keep it up, good sir!
The more I watch your channel, the more I like it! Awesome stuff.
It appears to be the ideal crooked scenario.... a legitimate, successful dealer with multiple brands under one roof giving him access to manufacturer intel.... with a custom shop producing fakes from real templates and serial numbers. Even if the original manufacturers got wind of what he was doing, you can guess the reaction - too inept or greedy to give a shit as the guy was shipping units and inflating prices for them.
Thanks for the insight and your take on it. We all know these sleaze bags exist but they rarely get outed. I remember a case in Leeds a few years ago coming to light - similar but not on the same scale, a used guitar dealer producing fakes, swapping necks and headstocks, ageing then promoting them as vintage with a history. Scum.
Ah yes, that would be the Harrisons from Denmark Street.
The fact that this man included an only fools and horses joke into this video has raised my respect tenfold. Of all the places I thought I’d hear one it was not here lol
You included Trigger.......!!! Dude.... you are awesome. That's one of my favourite OFAH scenes!!
And it's very applicable here. Stuff like this always reminds me of that exact scene. Very nicely done, KDH.
I watched this video when KDH released it... Thank you KDH. I went to a rare guitar auction in Langley, BC Canada last weekend.. They had 64 High end Prs guitars up for auction (and they did not go cheap), some Gibbies and what not. In the middle of the listings were (2) Ed Roman guitars and a Gibson SG "The fool" that is also available on the Ed Roman website.. This video scared me enough to basically call into question every Prs guitar they had once I saw the Romans in the collection. While impossible to confirm that any of these were in fact fakes, you couldnt help but wonder
Ed Roman was a shady businessman and a master bullshitter who bought into his own hype. I’m sure the guitars he made were of high quality but I feel like he crossed several ethical lines in his career that gave him his notoriety
Stick that dude in any industry and he would have made a negative reputation for himself. He had no ethics
Sure, but I'm not sure I'd really class him as deceptive given that he was by no means shy about what he was doing.
May he rest in piss
@@thelastvigil111 TBH I've heard mixed things on that front. While there are certainly those who claim Roman guitars were junk, I've also heard even some of his vocal detractors say he did (or at least could) make quality instruments.
@@thelastvigil111 That's not what I'm trying to do.
I was around in this time in the industry. I would take anything Ed said with a pinch of salt. Divide those numbers by 10 or 20.
Great video KDH. Awesome topic.
I knew ed through a family member. even went to his wedding. didn't really know anything about him other than that he was very nice to me and showed me some cool stuff. I was just a kid at the time
Great video. He had some other tricks up his sleeve. He would take a post 94 PRS with the larger heel and shave them down to look like pre 94 guitars. About a year ago, I saw a 95 with the large PRS logo and short heel. Definitely a Roman job. He would also be the largest exhibitor at the Westchester guitar show. He would rent about 10 strippers to walk the guitars around the hall to draw people into his booth. Real sleaze ball. He was also very connected. At the same show, he also had the guitarist from Blue Oyster Cult, Richie Scarlett and the guitarist from Rat Race Quire do a killer jam session. It was cool.
So you are saying he gave the strippers a job where they could keep their clothes on? Sounds like a charitable guy to me lol.
He wasn't the only shop shaving down PRS necks, but probably the largest.
@@davidmckean955 I'm sure but he was the biggest. He had a massive showroom in Danbury CT. e did a lot with predatory lending on Stratocasters. Buy it for $199 and pay x about per month. Would end up costing $400 for a crappy guitar.
Back when Ed was still in Connecticut he wanted to purchase my 1977 BC Rich Eagle but I wouldn’t sell it to him because he wanted to modify it from original. So glad I didn’t do business with him.
I and other BC Rich classic owners and enthusiasts thank you!!!
underrated youtube channel. i love your videos
I used to shop from (and chat with) Ed Roman all the time when I was a kid and first started playing guitar - in fact, Ed sold me my 2nd-4th guitars. He was a real character!
I was always amazed by Ed Roman's audacity. On the one hand, he'd condemn what he called "fake guitar makers," but on the other hand, he built so many fakes himself that he could've easily been crowned "the king of fake guitar makers!" I feel genuinely sorry for anyone who ever spent far more for their "Ed Roman fake" than it was actually worth!
I guess P.T. Barnum was right when he said, "There's a sucker born every minute!"
I remember when Ed Roman allegedly died . I don't remember a wake or funeral , just a memorial service in the distant future . I wondered if he went into witness protection program . I assumed he did business with people shadier then himself .🎸⬅️an original Ed Roman
He _was_ ridiculously obese, and the last known video of him (linked below) showed him looking pale as hell. If he didn't really die yet, he better have lost about 450 pounds by now and gone on a healthier diet.
ua-cam.com/video/arsSvebtSgw/v-deo.html
Im good friends with a few people that know Neal Moser and they all say he is a standup good guy. I believe his version of the story 100%. Neal has a great reputation out here in AZ. Another great video KDH, good work as always.
I became aware of Ed Roman through the Steinberger community, so I was curious when this video was recommended in my feed. I was surprise to see Barry Lipman in this video (around 13:57.) Seeing him resurfaced some old memories. A friend and I interviewed him as a luthier for a high school project back in the early/mid-80's. He showed us a prototype for interchangable pickup modules that he was working on. I think they were eventually made for his Player guitars brand, but that brand never really took off. I was thinking about these recently so fell down a rabbit hole to see if there were any modern implementations of this idea. There're several! I wound up getting a Relish Trinity to scratch this very very old itch!
Off topic: Can you PLEASE get some new glasses? They are sooo crooked it distracts me in every video.
Thanks for keeping up the great quality of videos, exposing the bullshit of the guitar industry (been here since the Chappers video)
Crazy. I remember first getting into guitars in the mid 2000s and I was very interested in BC Riches. Of course, wanting to learn about the brand took me to his website a few times, and I always thought it was sketchy as hell; he just sounded like an absolute sleezeball all throughout the website.
It was pretty validating hearing the stories about him not too long after finding him.
Great video. I've heard the name but never knew the history behind Ed Roman and his "restorations". I see the name occasionally when browsing guitar listings and I had just assumed he was a guitar builder who worked for or with some guitar companies. That is technically true but now I know there is a bit more to the story.
Great. I live in Vegas; been to the old store a couple times. Nobody was ever harsh with me. I had a Roman BC Rich Flying V that did have both BC Rich and Roman identification markings on it. Very confusing and I couldn't find any information on the internet about that 20 years ago. I didn't really understand what the deal was at that time. Fortunately, I didn't buy it new from Ed. I got it used from another person who had no idea what the story was either. I traded for it for next to nothing value and sold it for three times that. Too bad. I regret selling it. It was really a beautiful guitar. I wish I had it now.
I used to hang out on the Vintage Kramer forums, and this guy was constantly ridiculed there! I think they had a thread about him that lasted for years. They HATED him with a passion.
I don't think I ever heard ANYONE say anything positive about Ed Roman. I know there was a point where he was talking about his shop could build a custom PRS or BC Rich or whatever, guitar, as if to suggest that he was actually authorized to do so, which he wasn't. Anything he offered was a "fake" guitar.
And BC Rich forums
Ed Roman also butchered countless steinbergers....conned a ton of players into cutting up original bodies and gluing flame maple tops onto the original gorgeous full body Steinbergers trans-trem units which are now worth big bucks as originals.
@@Kohntarkosz Well, I'll say one thing positive about him...
I haven't heard of him being guilty of murder, at least, so there's that. Mind, he still came across as the type of guy to never invite to Thanksgiving Dinner. _Ever._
I spoke with Ed a few times over the phone when he was still in his Conn. shop pre-Vegas. I always found him to be very straightforward about what he was selling and what he had done to "modify" a guitar. Yes he could be abrasive and short at times but to be honest I found it somewhat refreshing. He pretty much spelled out what he liked or didn't like about certain brands etc. and why he did his remakes the way he did. I didn't agree with all of it but with Ed I don't really think he cared. I knew what I was buying and agreed with it or I wouldn't have made the deal. Almost all of what he did was an improvement on the original in my opinion. The cheaply made Les Paul Studio (awful quality guitars) he was "carving" in the video was a "licensed" Chibson that Gibson sold as American anyway. Why do you think it took Gibson so long to get a handle on those DHGate/TradeTang Counterfeits? They were coming from the very factories in the Far East they used to make many of their own cheaper products. Slash's counterfeit was celebrated while others were ridiculed. It's all in your perspective I guess.
Can confirm what Neal Moser said about BC Rich. I was a dealer for them (very small guitar shop in a small town, but I WAS an authorized dealer from the Class Axe Era through a good part of the HHI era, until I hurt my back and had to close down), and Neal is right, there weren't large numbers of USA BC Rich made at the time, and the only US ones I had in during the Class Axe era were bolt-on rather than Neck thru, and they told me over the phone that they weren't making a lot of neck-thru construction models at the time. Mind you, they were still really nice instruments, I had one USA Eagle, bolt-on, flat top, ice blue metalflake finish with a Kahler "Steeler" (Floyd Rose copy which Kahler got sued over) and Seymour Duncan pickups that I have wished I had kept for myself, it was all sorts of fantastic. You're correct in that Moser knows probably more about BC Rich than anyone else did, save Bernie Rico, who is now gone. How Roman got by with what he did for so long is beyond me, SO many people were aware of it, but no one stepped in and tried to actually stop it for some reason.
I remember looking at his website many years ago. He was producing Johnny Ramone Mosrites. And I always loved the look. I ended up getting a similar style Eastwood guitar. It did look great too but I didn’t really like the zero free and neck on it.