Top Gear London

[bramley]

Top Gear in Denmark Steet was a focal point for guitar players in Seventies London, and indeed many of the more famous instruments discussed here passed though it's doors at some point. Many instruments and customers went on to write rock history.

(I worked there and remember sitting at a bench scraping violin resin off the bridge of Page's LP.)

It was an amazing and storied establishment, also home to guitar authors Ken Achard and Ian Courtney "Sid" Bishop.

I am searching for anyone with recollections, pics , instruments or any Top Gear/ Guitar Village related material for a possible book.

Thanks.

 

[Red Baron]

Damn, when I saw Top Gear in the heading I thought we were gonna discuss the tv show :ahem

Actually I wish I could have had the opportunity to scrap the resin off Page's LP... imagine what you'd get for it now on ebay

Hope you get what you need for your book :salude

 

[keef]

Maybe that is where Mr Clarkson once started out...

I have a book by him called 'I know you got soul' which is about twenty machines that according to the author have 'got it' (I only bought it because a) it was in the bargain basement and 2) my car is in it..). Anyway, in the preface he says that he may have forgotten to include a few items...and specifically mentions the Gibson Les Paul.
Never thought of that as a machine, though. As Top Gear, yes...

 

[bramley]

Sorry if I wasn't really specific, Top Gear was a London guitar store and also had an amp/electronics repair guy out back named Ron Roka who gave Seymour Duncan his start.

For those interested another former employee was the world's leading guitar tech Alan Rogan (The Who, Clapton, Keef,Angus Young), and freelance repairs were carried out by the very talented Roger Giffin ( Roger built Jimmy Page 's personal #1 replica and ran the Gibson custom shop) who both hopefully will have plenty to contribute.

 

[Kluson]

Sadly I am of the age to remember Top Gear and all those great denmark street, shaftsbury av, Charring x road shops. I remeber Roka well . I was working for Good Earth,(Tony Viscvonti ) in Museum street. Roka started a shop which was always fuyll of guitar parts a bit like a breakers yard. This was an age when people were doing horid things to guitars routing early sixties starts, stripping custom colur strats , stripping 59 les Pauls. I remeber Kossof at Macaris and all the little studios, agencies and rehearsal rooms round there too.
Good luck with your book.

 

[sidekick]

bramley.....From memory, circa '68, although it's not a good 'admission', I, together with a friend, would 'bunk-off' school and take a visit to the guitar shops in the area you speak of....... You could walk into certain shops, pull a guitar off the wall, (often Fenders, as I recall) and have a play them acoustically whilst the sales staff turned a 'blind eye'..... At the time, I was particularly into Burns guitars, ('The Shadows' connection) and there was shop that dealt with both Baldwin, (who had taken over the Burns line) and Gretsch........As for Top Gear......I'm afraid to say that a guitar shop was 'just a guitar shop' at the time and a shop name mean't nothing to me.....Have to say that I never even saw a Les Paul for sale, as they were seemingly like 'gold dust' in the UK back then.......

 

[freecap]

Damn, when I saw Top Gear in the heading I thought we were gonna discuss the tv show :ahem

Actually I wish I could have had the opportunity to scrap the resin off Page's LP... imagine what you'd get for it now on ebay

Hope you get what you need for your book :salude

What did you think of Schui going into the wall and DNF the Race last week?

 

[Red Baron]

What did you think of Schui going into the wall and DNF the Race last week?

I think he was trying to get too much from a car that obviously wasn't working for him, tricky corner too.
Amazing race though, I think we're in for an exciting season :salude

...you know we're gonna get told to take any F1 talk to this backstage forum ...I vote that we have a dedicated forum for us motor sport loving Les Paul freaks :jim ...we could call it the Les Paul Pitstop Forum

 

[Rafael]

Excelent idea Red Baron... even though the brazillian racers are not doing good since Ayrton Senna died (he was THE MAN!!!!), I still like to watch the races. Sorry to bug you, but it did became more fun after Schumi stopped winning 9 out of 9 races.

How could it would be to drive one of these things with HTWWW blasting thru your iPod....

Rock on

Rafael

 

[zorglub!]

Alonso all the waaaay!! :lol

 

[Overdriver]

I don't think I ever saw a burst for sale in any guitar shop in London at that time. The Orange store from time to time would carry conversions with off center or three piece tops. I seem to remember them going for about 1500 pounds...

 

[gooner-cjp]

Chandlers in Richmond would have the odd burst in stock - 3 or 4 grand was the going rate back in the late seventies.

Chris

 

[bramley]

Top Gear always had the (then ) new re issue sunburst and tobacco bursts on the wall.

It was really the UK equivalent to Gruhn's, similarly most of the good stuff was sold before it was even displayed. Many of the really good vintage pieces came from guys like Steve Marriott, Mick Ralphs among many others who would buy up guitars while on tour in the US and sell 'em when they returned.

I've had a great response privately from a lot of the "names" who went on to make history with the instruments they bought or had repaired there, and hopefully more will see this.

 

[zensurfer]

I've had a great response privately from a lot of the "names" who went on to make history with the instruments they bought or had repaired there, and hopefully more will see this.

Through this Forum or other sources?

 

[TM1]

bramely; Good on you mate! Hope your efforts pay off in great stories. Wish I could contribute, but great stories about guitars and the shops in London always make for a good read. My friend Steve Russell and Tim Fletcher have a great site on Selmer and Hofner's in the U.K. with first hand accounts from people who worked t for Selmer.
Cheers!

 

[bramley]

Thanks, it'll take a while, of course no one carried a camera around then, let alone digital. I'm trying to track Ron Roka down , as he did have a camera and got a few pics of myself with Page and others. I've seen the Selmer web site and knew those boys and you're right, it's a good read too.

In answer to the previous post, most replies on that level have come from private contacts in the UK. I now live in the US.

 

[bramley]

During the course of researching all this I came across two 'burst sales from Top Gear during that period, one to Eddie Grant (later of Electric Avenue fame) and one to Mick Grabham of Procul Harum..... for ....450 pounds each !!!

 

[lento]

Just came across this thread as I was looking for any references to this shop. I sold my Flying V there in the summer of 1971 and although I don't have any pictures of it, I wonder if it was the one that ended up with Marc Bolan. I've been looking at several web pages and it looks to be the same model as far as I can tell and refers to him buying it in the late summer and debuting it in October at the Fairfield Halls in Croyden.
I originally bought it around the corner in Orange just a few months earlier and remember being told that it was already a 'few years old' but brand new. I had already had 2 previous guitars from there, a Dan Armstrong plexiglass and a Gibson SG Standard, and had took them back as I couldn't get on with them (like all kids, I was looking for 'the one')
I think the salesman who I dealt with was John, he was your typical Londoner who wore dark glasses and had seen it all.
By now they were getting fed up of me bringing these guitars back and said ' we've got just the thing for you'. So, out to the backroom and there was a large rectangular black case on an empty floor. I opened it and saw this gorgeous guitar and said 'I'll have it'. Of course, I had no money but we had a management company taking care of this .....
It was a great guitar with a big fat neck and a big fat sound ! Stupidly, a few months later, I had the urge for something different again and toyed with the idea of selling it - but not to Orange. So, I popped along to Top Gear and while they looked at me suspiciously, they decided to call Orange to check it's authenticity. Satisfied, they offered me £200 and happily I then strolled along to Pan in Wardour Street and bought a 1962 ice blue Strat for £135 - and £65 in my back pocket !

So, after all my rambling, I wonder if you would know anything at all about the possibility of Marc Bolan buying this guitar.
On a side note, about 10 years ago I happened by chance to contact Kim Simmonds (Savoy Brown) and we reminisced about these lovely guitars. I think he said his ended up in Japan.

 

[spidey]

I met Sid Bishop and Alan Rogan in the late 80s/ early 90s when they were techs. Great guys.

 

[kerryboy]

I met Sid Bishop and Alan Rogan in the late 80s/ early 90s when they were techs. Great guys.

Sid Bishop does a write-up every month in Guitar & Bass magazine were he reminisces about the great guitar shops and players who regularly came into the shops in London back in the day. He tells some great stories. Maybe the OP should contact him. I think there is a link to him via the magazine.