By: Rick Landers
The Burst Brothers Interview: Part 2
In anticipation of the upcoming Julien’s auction of significant gear and personal items of the late legendary Les Paul, we got with Dave Belzer and Drew Berlin to get the inside scoop on what to expect and if the bids are expected to be astronomical or within reach of those of us with thinner wallets. We were pleased to find out that the auction proceeds will be used to support the Les Paul Foundation. The foundation is honor bound to reflect the spirit of Les Paul by supporting music education, engineering and innovation, as well as medical research.
Some may recall that one of the last projects of Les related to his foundation’s intentions – the development of a new and innovative hearing aid. The Les Paul Foundation offers scholarships at music schools, provides medical research grants for hearing impairment efforts, along with creates exhibits that highlight the remarkable life achievements and accomplishments of Les Paul.
Dave and Drew, more commonly referred to as a vintage guitar team, The Burst Brothers, are working with Julien’s auction house in order to support the interests of the Les Paul Foundation. And, during our interview, they emphasized their enthusiasm for the auction’s support of the Les Paul Foundation, as well as their immeasurable respect of Mr. Paul.
Not only are Dave and Drew known for their expertise in the world of vintage guitars, but they paid a critical role in the Guitar Center’s acquisition of three of the most historical guitars in the instrument’s modern history: Eric Clapton’s Stratocaster known as Blackie; Stevie Ray Vaughan’s Lenny Strat and Claptons cherry red Gibson ES-335, from his days with Cream. Recently, the two parted ways with the Guitar Center and for a brief moment, went their separate ways. Today, The Burst Brothers are a re-energized team committed to guitars and guitar music, along with their business aspirations that target the vintage guitar market.
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Rick Landers: Awhile back, I understand you split with Guitar Center and I’ve seen a few rumors going around that you two went your separate ways.
Dave Belzer:: Yes, we did split from Guitar Center. Myself, about a year and a half ago and Drew in the last six months.
Drew Berlin: Yes.
Dave Belzer: Yes, we are back together again and kind of doing our search for Bursts out there in the world.
Rick: How do you go about that? Do people come to you and say, “Hey, I’ve got an old Les Paul for sale.” Or do you have to hunt them down?
Dave Belzer: Many of them do come to us, because we have kind of become known for that. A lot of them are guitars we’ve known over the years, right, Drew? Guitars that we’ve sold, it’s the kind of business. You might know, Rick, that guitars go from one person to another and back and forth.
Rick: Sure. So, over the years have kept track of some, and when you find out something’s for sale, you start investigating?
Dave Belzer: Yeah, nine times out of ten they contact us. People will just contact us. They know that this is what we do. We’re pretty easy to get along with and we try to make every situation between the buyer and seller a win-win for everybody and put the guitar in a good home.
Rick: When the bubble burst on the vintage guitar market, did you guys see that coming or were you surprised at the amount the prices dropped for the high-end guitars?
Dave Belzer: I think in some ways we may have seen that coming. They did appreciate so much in such a short period of time, from 1999 or 2000 until 2005, and it kind of coincided with the housing market and a few other bubbles that happened in collectibles.
Drew Berlin: Yes, I think that when Dave and I went to the Crossroads Festival that we realized that Strats were desirable and everybody wanted a Strat, because most of the artists were using Strats at the time. We were paying so much money for them, we said to ourselves, “This is just a bolt-on guitar and they’re so expensive, it seems a little strange,” to be paying for a guitar that wasn’t hand-carved or a Burst or something like that. We realized that prices were getting a little out of hand, but for us to stay in the game, we had to have inventory. We were continuing to have to buy, but we weren’t surprised, I don’t think. Like Dave said, they got too hot too fast. Usually with any commodity when that happens, there’s a bit of a reaction to that.
Dave Belzer: Also you have a number of people just jumping into the business that have never been in it before. All of a sudden there were a lot more guitar dealers out there than there ever had been. A lot of guys jumped in on that market figuring, “I can go into the guitar business now and buy a guitar and by next year or two months down the road, it will double in value and I’ll sell it.”
Rick: Yeah, I recall a couple of years ago people were saying that the next wave was going to be the pointy guitars of the ‘80s.
Dave Belzer: And there were people who actually did speculate on that and started speculating on ‘80s Stratocasters. We did a couple of collections for a gentleman who just bought nothing like ‘80s Fenders.
Drew Berlin: I agree with Dave. We did see a lot of people, when it became more of a commodity after 2000, attracted by the ability to make money and buy something and flip it to make money. Most of the people that were in it for the passion, the guitar, appreciation of guitars and playing, collecting them, using them, those people seemed to do okay, because I think there were so many people who saw a quick dollar to be made. In fact, Dave and I met people who really didn’t even play guitar. They just saw an opportunity to make money. That made the business a little less desirable for me, a little less attractive, because we like dealing with people that are passionate about guitars, who love guitars, love to play them. The industry changed a little bit when the dollar amount got so high.
Dave Belzer: It got to the point where we weren’t talking about the instrument or the qualities or the value in the instrument itself. It was more like, “How much will that guitar be worth in six months?”
Drew Berlin: We like finding guitars because they’re so unique and rare and play so good and sound so good. We were more excited about finding someone that magic that’s gonna inspire them. We were getting people we were selling to before the bubble, people like Dave said, what’s it gonna be worth in a few months rather than how great is the guitar. That was a little disheartening on our part when the market went that direction.
Rick: I think people were also looking at some of the early Japanese guitars as well, like the ’82 domestic market Japanese Strats.
Drew Berlin: There’s that market; we call it the pawn shop guitar market. They’re affordable guitars that are over 20 years old that are still considered vintage. Maybe kids that are in their 20s can’t afford to buy guitars that are over $10,000, and there are some pretty cool guitars that are older that are fun guitars to play, that sound good and are cool. That is a market that I think is legitimate.
Rick: Do you think the old ‘50s Les Pauls are still a good investment?
Dave Belzer: I’ll take that one. I think at the moment, it might be a great investment right now. The prices are down. It’s a buyer’s market. Somebody getting into a ’58, ’59 or ’60 Les Paul now is probably going to be paying anywhere from 20% to 40% less than it was five years ago. They’re not making any more of those guitars, and they really still are the best of the best when it comes to a solid body guitar. I don’t think their value is going to get hurt. They’re just going to continue to go up.
Rick: Do you expect the vintage market to expand into China, Brazil, India and other countries?
Dave Belzer
Dave Belzer: From what I’m seeing, it’s starting to happen in China. They’re starting to embrace that rock and roll ‘50s Americana. It’s starting to happen there. I think it’s going to be very similar to what the Japanese market was, maybe in the ‘80s, and how they embraced that rock and roll fever. I think it will happen. Rock and roll’s pretty infectious.
Rick: It is. I see on your website that you guys are offering appraisals. What’s the process that somebody would go through? Would they have to send you the guitar or would you do it by e-mail and photos? And what would the cost be?
Dave Belzer: It really varies depending on the situation. If they just send a picture or whether we have to actually go there, look at it, take it apart…Drew?
Drew Berlin: Yeah, it depends on the situation. If someone just wants an idea of what year they have, we’ll tell them. A lot of people like to have us go through their inventory, so they know exactly what they have and what the value is, maybe for insurance purposes or if they’re planning to leave it to someone in a will, or if they want to sell it. We have developed a reputation for being trusted, so we give people an honest evaluation of what they have. It just depends on the piece, on the situation. There’s no set fee.
Dave Belzer: Yeah, a lot of times if someone’s just e-mailing a value on something, we’ll be happy to give them an opinion on it. If they want to get a little more involved, into a collection and all, there’s more involved in it.
Rick: A little bit more time consuming for you guys. Do you ever experience what some people call ‘barn finds’ where you find like a pristine Les Paul or a Strat that’s been hidden in a closet for 50 years? Has that ever happened to you guys?
Drew Berlin: Yes, and we love that when it does. We’ve seen quite a few pieces through the 17 years that we’ve been doing this together that are that type of piece. We were approached recently with a piece where the case had not been opened for 25 years. Generally someone who passes away or left it to someone else and they’re not sure who it is; that person may be directed to us to give an appraisal or an opinion of what it’s worth. We love when that happens and we love seeing old gear that has been really well taken care of and preserved, maybe cherished by one family and passed down in that family. It has provenance that way and we love getting guitars that way.
Rick: Has that happened recently at all?
Dave Belzer: We had a beautiful ’59 Les Paul. It was gorgeous, very plain top but in 9 plus condition.
Drew Berlin: It was pretty much unplayed. The person got the guitar and never learned how to play guitar, so it wasn’t used at all. It was still a great guitar.
Dave Belzer: Yeah, great guitar. Another example would be in the Les Paul collection. One of the highlight guitars of the auction is a ’51 Nocaster that Leo gave to Les as a gift. Les wasn’t a Fender guy so it pretty much sat in the case.
Rick: I talked to Les Paul about that guitar and I was a little surprised that he said he had never played it.
Dave Belzer: He did change the pots, though. He had to mess with it [All laughing]. He didn’t play it.
Rick: All I can tell you is what he said to me.
Dave Belzer: I believe it. He was a Gibson guy through and through.
Rick: That’s a pretty amazing piece, I think. You guys were at the Christie’s auction where you bought Blackie and Stevie Ray Vaughan’s Lenny and Clapton’s ES-335. What kind of bidding strategies, or did you have bidding strategies when you went into that, and if so, did you have to adjust those during the bidding? Was there a bidding war?
Dave Belzer: Yes, we did have a strategy going in that we’d worked out with the CEO of Guitar Center and all. We did have a limit we were going to go to. It did have to get a bit adjusted throughout the auction. We did really well on the George Harrison little Double Ought 18.
Rick: Nice guitar.
Dave Belzer: And the 335 came up and I had to boost the bid, right, Drew? [Ed: Dave refers to Eric Clapton’s red Gibson ES-335 used during his days with Cream]
Drew Berlin
Drew Berlin: We had to go over on that one. Dave made the executive call on that one, which was a good thing because that was an incredible guitar. We went over our budget on that.
Dave Belzer: But, not that much. It really was just one bid over on our budget. In my mind, I figured we saved on the George Harrison one. That 335 was important.
Rick: I was at Christie’s the day before the auction and was able to roam. I was able to at least touch Blackie, Lenny, the ES-335, a couple of the other Clapton guitars and the George Harrison guitars. It was pretty cool to be in there.
Dave Belzer: Just to be in the presence of some of those, just the little George Harrison acoustic and the case, there’s a certain vibe there. You can just sense it.
Rick: And the “Tears in Heaven” guitar that was there. Are those three guitars that you bought still hidden away at Guitar Center? The last time I was at Guitar Center, I actually saw your area – this was several years ago – and I talked to Dave Weiderman. He said they were staged somewhere else in Guitar Center. They’re kind of hidden away, aren’t they?
Dave Belzer: Last I knew they were locked away in a safe at their management office. That’s pretty much where they keep them.
Rick: I hope they get to the museum at some point.
Dave Belzer: I’m not sure what they’re doing. At one point they did do a little tour with them around their stores and invited customers to come in and see them. That was two or three years ago, Drew?
Drew Berlin: Yeah.
Rick: Seems a shame to have them not visible to the public.
Dave Belzer: Yeah, I’m sure…
Rick: It’s their call. They own them.
Dave Belzer: They own them, yep [Both laugh].
