The 330 was available at first with one or two pickups, and the October/November 1959 issue of Gibson’s Gazette promo magazine announced the pair as “beautiful professional-type guitars, economy priced by Gibson”. To understand how Gibson positioned the new Casino in its revised and reworked Epiphone range, let’s briefly consider the ES-330. The Sheraton remained as the only semi-solid among the Gibson-made Epiphones until it was joined in ’62 by the Riviera, which broadly corresponded to the 335. This extremely rare 1961 Casino might be the only example ever made in Royal OliveĮpiphone’s semi-solid Sheraton (originally intended to be called the Deluxe) was roughly equivalent to the Gibson ES-355 in its fancy appointments, while the Casino was a close relation to Gibson’s hollow 330. They were quick to apply some of these approaches and ideas to the new Epiphone lines. These were the stereo 345 and the high-end 355, and also a full hollowbody version, the ES-330. Gibson had recently introduced the ES-335, its groundbreaking semi-solid double-cutaway thinline electric, and in the wake of its success the company’s bosses created a series around it, adding a few more models in the same style. The Epiphone Casino fell into the second category and went into the catalogue alongside the similar if high-end Epiphone Sheraton, which had been introduced in 1959. Some of these ‘new’ Epiphones continued the look and intention of existing Epi models, while others were Epi near-equivalents of Gibson models, with different pickups and varied feature sets so there were still distinctions to separate the two brands.

In 1958, Gibson released the first of its new Epiphone-brand guitars, which had the effect of creating an ancillary tier to the Gibson lines. As for the guitars, you only have to look around today to see how well they have gone for Gibson. In fact, the basses never went well for Gibson, and production was short-lived. Gibson did the deal in 1957 to get at Epiphone’s successful upright bass business, with the guitar lines an afterthought that happened to come along with the brand name. READ MORE: An oral history of the Fender Stratocaster The brand’s original Casino was launched in 1961 as one of the models Gibson introduced following its acquisition of Epiphone, a company based for many years in New York City. With the recent launch of a made-in-USA Casino, Epiphone chose to mark an important 60th birthday in some style.

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