Heritage Eagle Archtop Guitar from 1997 Review

I’ve always wanted a Heritage archtop guitar ever since I read their story, but the local guitar shop just down the coast that specialises in such things charges a huge premium for Heritages and I just couldn’t justify the outlay.

Then came one of those odd epiphany moments that very occasionally happen to me. Although I love our closest local music shop, I hadn’t had any need to go in for well over a year. However one day someone or something seemed to be telling me to just go into the shop and have a look around. After telling myself not to be stupid, I did just that and for quite a while I saw nothing of great interest amongst the racks of guitars. Then suddenly a brown sunburst guitar caught my eye, hanging sideways half out of sight, right next to the old Hofners. I checked it over and it looked in reasonable condition and I then saw that it was a Heritage, but it didn’t have a price on it, and all the staff were busy with customers and someone was playing a distorted electric guitar badly and loudly in one of the side rooms.

I walked out and did the shopping I’d come into town to do, but the thought of the guitar wouldn’t leave me. I did some reading up to find out exactly what the model, age and construction was. Then I rang the shop to find out what the price was. It was half the price I was expecting!  I still didn’t do anything more at that stage and went home to think it all over and research some more as it was going to be a significant unexpected outlay. 

Having slept on it all, the next morning saw me at the shop first thing asking to try the guitar out. The shop was selling the guitar as part of a private sale of someone’s estate and it had literally just come in. They didn’t quite know how to price it because there are very few of these out there to give an idea of the value. Thanks to Heritage’s serial numbers it was easy to date the guitar to 1997, and to see that it was the first guitar manufactured that day in April! This one has certainly been well loved and well used, nothing to put me off: one of the tuning pegs is slightly bent, the nickel all has a well worn “patina”, there are quite a few dings on the front (but hey you pay a specialist hundreds to make a new guitar into a holey [sic] relic!), and there was a bit of fret wear.  I do like a guitar that wears its history and hasn’t just sat in a case remaining pristine for a collector to sit and admire it. The acoustic tone on this model is really lovely, even with the dead and sticky flat wound strings on it at the time. It chimed beautifully through the fender amp they gave me to test it out.

The shop I bought it from is one of those gems of a place that defies the odds and keeps going as a bricks and mortar store though with an increasing presence on the internet.  I’ve bought a lot of things there over the years. Before I pulled the trigger on buying the guitar we put it down on the guitar rest and the tech tweaked the truss rod to take some of the bow out of the neck for me, all smooth and good. Apple Pay and I was away!  

It’s so difficult to know what these guitars are really worth as there’s not a whole lot on the web to give a sense of value.  I think I got it for an extremely good price, but of course it is not in pristine condition.  Brand new Eagles go for eye watering sums these days. I think this has pushed up secondhand values in its wake, and meant I had to insure the new purchase for a huge new for old value…

It’s only as you delve fairly deep that you come across the truly excellent Heritage owners’ club forum: http://www.heritageownersclub.com. One reason why I’m writing this as there is very little out there on these lovely archtop guitars with floating pickups. 

I really recommend that you do a search on the history of Heritage guitars: https://heritageguitars.com/pages/about-us. It’s an inspiring story of entrepreneurship. In my mind, as a lover of good old fashioned archtop guitars, Heritage is a really important “Reformation” moment in the apostolic succession of Orville Gibson and Lloyd Loar’s genius. These guitars are still made in Kalamazoo in the old Gibson factory and, certainly in 1997 were being made by builders tracing their skills and experience way back into Gibson history.  We could debate for ages who are the true successors to the archtop faith!  I’m just grateful that both companies are still around (just) keeping the faith alive.

My guitar is a 1997 Eagle Almond Sun Burst with a Heritage floating pickup. It shares its dna with the Gibson L5, a slightly shallower body at 3” deep but sharing the same lovely acoustic tones and craftsmanship.  A lot of these Eagle guitars came with mahogany tops, but mine is an X braced spruce topped guitar with solid carved mahogany back, pickguard and sides and neck. The fretboard and bridge are rosewood, hardware is nickel plated. All is beautifully carved, and with a sunburst finish which makes any of my other guitars I stand it next to look rather one dimensional. Heritage clearly had some superb workers at this stage of their history. This is where Heritage guitars are a bit intriguing: they seem to have often built to different specifications according to the dealer or customer requirements. Mine comes from Wolfe originally, as I discovered when I took off the pick guard and found their sticker.  

There’s no bling on this guitar, and strangely that really adds to the look, no neck binding and only a single binding to the body. The wood is fairly plain. But what stands out is the tone. The 17” body gives it a lovely depth, with all the bark and projection you expect from an archtop.  I like the pickup too, but I haven’t played this away from home yet so there is a bit more to add into this account as time goes on.  I’ve made some adjustments to the action to get it where I want it, not too low to give the acoustic voice some authority. I’ve put DR Zebra 13 strings on it at the moment so I can enjoy the acoustic voice, and I do recommend these as one of the best compromises for an electric/acoustic like this. The action is so lovely I can’t believe these strings are 13s, they feel much lighter even with the relatively long scale of this guitar!  Once things open up again in the world and I can play out I will probably try micing and amping this to get the best of both worlds, the acoustic voice is too good to ignore.

These are lovely guitars.