Eagle was an importer of Japanese made instruments that flooded the European market in the 1970s / 1980s. To be honest, most acoustics are unremarkable knockoffs of Martin D-18s and Gibson Hummingbirds with ugly adjustable bridges.
This particular guitar is much rarer than that. It’s a stupidly beautiful repro of the classic flagship from Guild: the mighty D-55. I have never ever touched or even seen pictures of another guitar like this. Feel free to contact me if you have one or know about this brand and model.
Every detail about this guitar is perfect and well executed but let’s get to it real quick: it’s all laminate wood! No worries though, it’s the quality stuff that Japanese factories knew how to make. The top wood is made out of two pieces of good spruce, and a very thin layer of cross grained wood in the sandwiched in between, for the sake of stability. It is thin, resonant and it doesn’t bulge. “Musical Instrument Grade Laminate” as they used to say.
The celluloid pickguard in the classic Guild shape is a nice touch and perfectly matches the tobacco sunburst. Man, I could bath into this sunburst for days!
Classic Guild bridge in solid rosewood (yay!).
Details, details, it’s all in the details. Notice the black and white purfling on each side of the fretboard.
And a close up on the trademark Guild mother of pearl / abalone triangle inlays.
Back and sides look like some sort of jacaranda / rosewood.
The checkerboard stripe looks so much like the stuff Guild was using in the late 1970s.
Woah some tasty Guild bling right here!
The G shield and Eagle logo are not decals but rather actual pieces of mother of pearl inlaid into the wood.
The neck has a super fine feeling, reminiscent of a late 30′ Martin: very soft / rounded V with medium thickness. Lovely neck shape, with 1.11/16th width at the nut. Very low action to boot and clean polished frets for no buzz. Tuners are quality gears identical in shape as the stuff Guild was using back then.
This guitar was fitted with an interesting pickup. The pickup is an Ibanez box-shaped piezo job that is velcroed under the bridge plate. This pickup sports the old rounded 1970s Ibanez logo and is as old as the guitar. It has a great natural sound too and I wish Ibanez was still making them. If you have any info on these old Ibby pickups, please let me know.
Last but not least, a label pic. I would bet the “GW” stands for “Guild Western” and the 830 for “830000 Yen”, which was quite a hefty sum. Notice the well shaped back brace, almost knife blade style.
Overall, the guitar has a very Guildesque voice, with clean sustain, balance all across the spectrum and full range. It has strong clarity, unlike the majority of plywood guitars which fall short in that category. It begs for some fingerpicking to make those crisp overtones ring and chime, but can roar with a G run and heavy attack too.
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