Gibson MK53

I wanted a Gibson guitar ever since I found out that there were such things. Perhaps since I was fourteen or fifteen years old. But it was the impossible dream, which made it all the more desirable. One evening coming home from work I passed a music shop and there were about ten Gibson guitars hanging in the window with a sign saying "Half Price". They were of a design that I had never seen before. I think that I had only once before seen a Gibson acoustic in a Birmingham shop. Les Pauls and SGs were fairly commonplace but acoustics were rare. Anyway, I had to find out what was going on so in I went and asked. The story went that the people who handled the franchise for Gibson had dropped it and sold their stock off at half price and this store had bought the lot. Later the story changed that they were a new line by Gibson that hadn't proven popular, so the whole lot had been sold off by the wholesalers. Whichever was true, they were the MK model by Gibson designed by PhD Physicist Dr Michael Kasha (evidently that is what the MK stands for). They were a revolutionary design and the result of many years research. But, they never caught on with the guitar playing public and were discontinued.

The following Saturday I was in town with my wife, and to humour me she agreed that we would go in and I would play them to see what I thought. I did play all of them, and a Gibson J200 that was in the shop. Most of the guitars including the J200 were not very good but there were two MK53 models that felt "just right". Anyway, as we were only just married with a huge mortgage and no furniture. I said, "I'll think about it" which was a euphemism for "sorry but I'm a time waster who can't afford to buy anything". We were just leaving the shop when my wife said, "If you want it, buy it". I pointed out that we couldn't possibly afford it. To which she said, "If you live to be a hundred years old, you will never get the opportunity again to buy a new Gibson for half price. If you want it, buy it and we'll find some way of paying for it."

In the manner of Blind Gary Davis, I started referring to it as Miss Gibson. Many guitarists (some very famous) call their guitars Miss Gibson. When I do, it is generally in jest. There have been many times that my wife has returned to the house to find me on the sofa with Miss Gibson in my arms when I should have been doing something else. Over the last 30 years or so, it feels as though that piece of wood has grown into my hand. It probably isn't half the instrument I imagine it to be but I still think it's a dream come true. Well, that is exactly what it is.