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| AIRLINE ’59 CUSTOM 3P |
Sadly, I never get “win the California
MEGA Millions lottery” lucky, but occasionally
a droplet of luck does splash across
my plane of existence. For example, one of my
bands—The Trouble With Monkeys—“punks
up” the classic hits of the Monkees, and when
these five Airlines dropped into Guitar Player
Central, they were the perfect instruments
to take onstage with the act. True, the actual
Monkees did not rock their TV show with Airlines—
guitarist Mike Nesmith usually wielded
a Gretsch—but the wacky visual appeal of these
retro beauties in bold white, red, black, and
cream definitely struts the zany vibe the foursome
brought to the airwaves back in 1966.
Unfortunately, the Airlines were a bit too perfect
for the gig. Whenever I walked off stage,
all anyone wanted to talk about were the guitars!
Lady Luck can be so fickle…
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| AIRLINE ’59 CUSTOM 2P |
While the Airlines evoke cheapo ’60s European
and Japanese designs, none of the five
models revamped by Eastwood Guitars suffer
from mercurial construction, tone, or playability.
All the models tested are well-built, goodplaying
instruments with fairly unique tonal
characteristics. Build quality is excellent and
was consistent throughout the group, although
the ’59 Custom 2P has very minor over-paint
splotches on the headstock, and a less-than-tight
neck socket that allows a business card to be
inserted between the top edge of the neck
and the body. The Airlines are setup at the
factory with pretty low actions, so some fret
buzz here and there was noted, but nothing
that a slight adjustment couldn’t fix.
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| AIRLINE ’59 1P |
For live shows and rehearsals, I plugged
various Airlines into either an Orange Tiny
Terror and Mesa/Boogie 1x12 cabinet, or a
Mesa/Boogie Stiletto and two Mesa/Boogie
1x12 cabs. In the studio, I routed the guitars
direct through a Manley VOXBOX, or into
a collection of amps, including a new Marshall
50th Anniversary JTM1 head, a Quilter
MicroPro 200, and an Acoustic G100FX.
I’d be totally untrue to the ’60s vibe if I
didn’t also toss a few fuzz pedals into the
mix, so I sometimes added an E.W.S. Fuzzy
Drive, an Orion Effekte Deluxe Motor Fuzz,
or a JMI Mick Ronson Tone Bender to the
signal chain.
Airline ’59 1P
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| AIRLINE ’59 CORONADO |
The 1P is the bratty punk of the Airline
family. But while it’s a simple and straightforward
mean machine with one pickup
and one Master Volume control, it’s not
fair to label it sonically monochromatic.
The basic tone is sharp and edgy, with a
snotty midrange punch and a nice zing to
the highs. Admittedly, you can’t get very
far from there, but the lone Airline Vintage-
voiced single-coil is very responsive
to picking dynamics and guitar-volume
manipulations. As a result, you can tame
some of the snarl by picking lighter, using
your fingers and/or thumb, and/or lowering
the Master Volume. It’s certainly not a bad
thing to have to really work the guitar to
create timbral variations—after all, dynamics
should be a major part of every guitarist’s
trick bag—but if you simply want to
plug in and bash away, the 1P’s unaltered
tone is powerful enough to explode out of
a band mix and turn heads.
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| AIRLINE ’59 TOWN & COUNTRY DLX |
Airline ’59 Custom 2P
The 2P adds another Vintage-voiced singlecoil,
a Volume control, and two Tone knobs
to the Airline ’59 tonal recipe, and the result
is a major expansion of sonic possibilities.
Thankfully, you don’t lose any of the snarl
of the 1P—you just get a lot more dimension.
Let’s take the bridge-position pickup
that’s on both the 1P and 2P, for example.
As the 2P offers a Tone knob, you can go
from full-on, aggro high midrange bark to
a rounder, yet still edgy tone, with a nice
snap and pop. Lower the Volume, as well,
and the mids calm down further, providing
a good sonic base for subtle fingerpicking
or soft arpeggios. The neck pickup offers a
warmer tone, of course, but it’s still pretty
edgy when left at full throttle. The midrange
snark is still evident amidst rounder
low-midrange frequencies, so you get the
benefit of a nice chunk and boom without
sacrificing articulation. This is great news
for punk, rock, and blues styles, but you
don’t get anywhere near a jazz vibe until
you turn down the Tone all the way, and,
even then, there might be too much edginess
for some jazz players. But, hey, this baby is
hardly a polite, dinner jazz ax. Let it roar.
Airline ’59 Custom 3P
When I first pulled out the 3P onstage,
audience members audibly gasped and/or
giggled at all the knobs. It’s a lot to take
in visually, and it’s a fair amount of work
to manage as a player, but I’m so glad all
those controls are there. Given the overriding
formula of that wonderfully edgy snarl
provided by the Vintage-voice single-coils,
the 3P is a super-duper, Bat Cave-like tonal
gadget station. You get Volume and Tone
controls for each pickup, a Master Volume,
and a 5-position pickup selector. It’s madness!
Negotiating all the timbral options
onstage while trying to put on a show was
admittedly beyond my reach, but I had a
blast in the studio messing around with
all the controls and pickup configurations
to craft myriad sounds. I could go on and
on until your eyes roll back into your head
detailing all the subtle and aggressive tweaks
that are possible, but I think it’s easier on
your brain, and a lot more fun, to keep my
mouth shut and let you experiment on your
own. I will say that the 3P never failed to
deliver what I needed for a track—midrange
skank, woman-tone-like warmth,
psychedelic ’60s treble (perfect for driving
cool fuzz sounds), classic rock roar, articulate
or wooly clean tones, and tons more
options. (Onstage, I cheated and kept all
the controls full up, changing sounds with
just the pickup selector—which was all I
could manage in the heat of battle, so to
speak.) The 3P is a thrilling guitar to play,
and it’s a tremendous sonic palette for
tone scientists.
Airline ’59 Coronado
It’s kind of strange to say that the very groovy
Coronado is the most conventional member
of the Airline family, because it certainly
catches the eye when viewed amongst guitardom’s
usual suspects. But it’s a tribute
to the madcap visuals and timbral options
of the line that the Coronado’s sophisticated
curves, two humbuckers, and four
knobs stand out as, well, not being eccentric.
Having said that, the Coronado delivers
all the ballsy impact you’d expect from
a dual humbucker configuration, it plays
very smoothly, and it still offers massively
cool visual appeal. (Just don’t stand next
to a bandmate who is playing the 3P if you
want the audience to notice your guitar!)
The chambered mahogany body does impart
a sense of air and dimension to the classic
Les Paul sound, which puts the Coronado
in a kind of tonal mash-up between a Paul
and a Rickenbacker (or Gretsch Duo Jet).
It’s a compelling tone combo plate of a fat,
ballsy roar and a jangly shimmer—meaning
taut low mids, articulate high mids, and very
clear highs. The Coronado is Eastwood’s
tribute to the Supro Coronado wielded by
Dan Auerbach of the Black Keys, and it can
definitely emulate the Key’s ultra-hyped,
retro blues howls, hollers, and cries.
Airline ’59 Town &
Country DLX
Like the 1P, 2P, and 3P, the Town & Country
is modeled off the Valco guitars sold by
Montgomery Ward in decades past. While
not tremendously different from the tonal
armament of the 3P, the T&C does change
things up by replacing one of the three single-
coils with an alnico Hot-10 humbucker,
and going with a 3-way pickup selector,
instead of the 3P’s 5-way option. The Town
& Country is a little less tonally versatile
than the 3P, but it’s just as hard to manage
all the controls if you dare to manipulate
tones in mid performance onstage. I have
to admit, I missed the added sonic options
provided by the 3P’s 5-way switch, although
I was also relieved the T&C’s 3-way switch
limited my ability to fall into obsessive tone
tweaking. The humbucker in the recipe is
the middle pickup, so selecting that option
provides some nice round and stout tones
with just a tad more output to drive your
amp’s front end. You can’t blend the humbucker
sound with either of the single-coils,
but it’s still a nice place to go if you want to
dial back some snarl. The Town & Country
offers its own bounty of sounds, so if you dig
spinning tons of knobs and switches on your
tone quests, a purchase decision between
this beauty and the 3P might simply come
down to which model looks better to you.
As far as cool factor, playability, and sound,
you can’t really lose with either choice.
Specifications
AIRLINE ’59 1P
PRICE $899 direct, includes deluxe case
NUT WIDTH 1 11/16"
SCALE LENGTH 25.5"
NECK Maple, bolt-on
FRETBOARD Rosewood
FRETS 20 medium-jumbo
TUNERS Vintage Kluson-style
BODY Mahogany, chambered
BRIDGE TonePros Locking
PICKUPS Airline Vintage-Voiced single-coil
CONTROLS Master Volume
FACTORY STRINGS D’Addario, .010 set
WEIGHT 6.78 lbs
BUILT Korea
KUDOS Bratty, aggressive tone. Light. Retrorific
looks.
CONCERNS No Tone control.
AIRLINE ’59 CUSTOM 2P
PRICE $999 direct, includes deluxe case
NUT WIDTH 1 11/16"
SCALE LENGTH 25.5"
NECK Maple, bolt-on
FRETBOARD Rosewood
FRETS 20 medium-jumbo
TUNERS Vintage Kluson-style
BODY Mahogany, chambered
BRIDGE Tune-o-matic style
PICKUPS Two Airline Vintage-Voiced singlecoils
CONTROLS Two Volume, Two Tone, Master
Volume, 3-way pickup selector
FACTORY STRINGS D’Addario, .010 set
WEIGHT 7.24 lbs
BUILT Korea
KUDOS Bold and articulate tones. Retrorific
looks.
CONCERNS Some minor cosmetic issues.
AIRLINE ’59 CUSTOM 3P
PRICE $1,149 direct, includes deluxe case
NUT WIDTH 1 11/16"
SCALE LENGTH 25.5"
NECK Maple, bolt-on
FRETBOARD Rosewood
FRETS 20 medium-jumbo
TUNERS Vintage Kluson-style
BODY Mahogany, chambered
BRIDGE Roller-style with Bigsby
PICKUPS Three Airline Vintage-Voiced single-
coils
CONTROLS Three Volume, Three Tone, Master
Volume, 5-way pickup selector
FACTORY STRINGS D’Addario, .010 set
WEIGHT 8 lbs
BUILT Korea
KUDOS Massively versatile tone machine.
Retro-rific looks.
CONCERNS None.
AIRLINE ’59 CORONADO
PRICE $1,079 direct, includes deluxe case
NUT WIDTH 1 11/16"
SCALE LENGTH 25.5"
NECK Maple, bolt-on
FRETBOARD Rosewood
FRETS 21 medium-jumbo
TUNERS Nickel/chrome
BODY Mahogany, chambered
BRIDGE TonePros Roller with Bigsby
PICKUPS Two alnico Hot-10 humbuckers
CONTROLS Two Volume, Two Tone, 3-way pickup
selector
FACTORY STRINGS D’Addario, .010 set
WEIGHT 8.68 lbs
BUILT Korea
KUDOS Good tones. Retro-rific looks.
CONCERNS None.
AIRLINE ’59 TOWN &
COUNTRY DLX
PRICE $1,149 direct, includes deluxe case
NUT WIDTH 1 11/16"
SCALE LENGTH 25.5"
NECK Maple, bolt-on
FRETBOARD Rosewood
FRETS 20 medium-jumbo
TUNERS Vintage Kluson-style
BODY Mahogany, chambered
BRIDGE Five-way adjustable roller with
Bigsby
PICKUPS Two Airline Vintage single-coils, one
alnico Hot-10
CONTROLS Three Volume, Three Tone, Master
Volume, 3-way pickup selector
FACTORY STRINGS D’Addario, .010 set
WEIGHT 7.5 lbs
BUILT Korea
KUDOS Excellent tonal versatility. Retrorific
looks.
CONCERNS None.