# Bill Conklin died.



## KnightBrolaire (Oct 30, 2021)

https://www.notreble.com/buzz/2021/10/29/in-memoriam-bill-conklin/
RIP.
I always loved how cool his bass builds were .


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## odibrom (Oct 30, 2021)

Man, that's sad...


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## StevenC (Nov 1, 2021)

I first came across Conklin years ago after seeing Steve Vai's snake guitar. I then checked out their website and saw so many things for the first time: 8 strings, fanned frets, ERBs, melted fretboard, etc. Such a willingness to build anything is incredible.

RIP Bill


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## Crungy (Nov 1, 2021)

Damn, RIP. A real innovator in the bass world for extended range stuff.


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## bostjan (Nov 1, 2021)

Damn.

He was too young to leave us.

Rest in Peace...


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## MaxOfMetal (Nov 1, 2021)

It's a damn Greek tragedy that this thread is so empty. The impact on the extended range guitar market and community that Bill had is immeasurable. Not to mention luthiery. 

RIP


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## bostjan (Nov 1, 2021)

MaxOfMetal said:


> It's a damn Greek tragedy that this thread is so empty. The impact on the extended range guitar market and community that Bill had is immeasurable. Not to mention luthiery.
> 
> RIP



Conklin's guitars were the first I had seen with fanned frets, melted top, melted fingerboards, eight strings, etc. etc.

There was a solid 5-10 years that a Conklin was at the top of my "If I ever make it big" list.


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## eggy in a bready (Nov 1, 2021)

bostjan said:


> Conklin's guitars were the first I had seen with fanned frets, melted top, melted fingerboards, eight strings, etc. etc.


yep. i remember staring at the Conklin galleries for hours as a kid and being awestruck at all these insane specs that i've never seen before. funny how all that stuff is commonplace these days.

this thread should be 400 pages long.


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## narad (Nov 1, 2021)

eggy in a bready said:


> yep. i remember staring at the Conklin galleries for hours as a kid and being awestruck at all these insane specs that i've never seen before. funny how all that stuff is commonplace these days.
> 
> this thread should be 400 pages long.



Yea, I mean, I don't know what to add that would make the thread longer, and a 'like' seems like the wrong reaction, but certainly sucks. The old guard of the ERG.


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## maliciousteve (Nov 1, 2021)

Such a shame. Rusty Cooley's 8 string was the first time I'd seen a Conklin and thought it was beautiful. Always wanted a Conklin but way out of my reach.


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## KnightBrolaire (Nov 1, 2021)

Some of my personal favorites of his builds (in no particular order).


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## spudmunkey (Nov 1, 2021)

Never really knew much about him. The only thing I knew of Conklin is that, when I was starting out on guitar in the late 80s early 90s, the bass players I would talk to consistently mentioned two brands when it came to the ultimate high-end: Modulus and Conklin.


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## Sermo Lupi (Nov 1, 2021)

Owning a Conklin was the pipe dream for me circa 2004/5. It sparked my interest in extended range guitars and Bill's instruments were every bit as beautiful as they were unique. For well more than a decade, no one was building guitars like Conklin was. His influence on the industry via the ERG boom (directly or indirectly) has been immense. 

Hearing this news actually makes me quite sad. I know he had shop hands doing most of the work for the last few years. I wonder whether they'll continue the company in his name?


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## odibrom (Nov 1, 2021)

KnightBrolaire said:


> Some of my personal favorites of his builds (in no particular order).
> View attachment 99513
> View attachment 99515



These are awesome, super inspired builds...


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## Captain Shoggoth (Nov 1, 2021)

This predates the RG2228 and people are still barely doing multiscale trems in 2021. Absolute titan of the trade, RIP


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## Randy (Nov 1, 2021)

Ironically just read this a couple days ago

https://sbj.net/stories/business-spotlight-the-sound-of-engineering,57851?


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## Crungy (Nov 1, 2021)

I never knew about his multiscale instrumens, I had really only seen the basses and more specifically the GT series with the 7 string bass being the pinnacle to me.

Some years later, I had seen a ocal band that had a guitarist that I _*think*_ had a Conklin 7 string guitar. @KnightBrolaire did you ever see/hear Quazar when they were a band?


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## KnightBrolaire (Nov 1, 2021)

Crungy said:


> I never knew about his multiscale instrumens, I had really only seen the basses and more specifically the GT series with the 7 string bass being the pinnacle to me.
> 
> Some years later, I had seen a ocal band that had a guitarist that I _*think*_ had a Conklin 7 string guitar. @KnightBrolaire did you ever see/hear Quazar when they were a band?


nope. I did see chris from scale the summit play his conklin 8 opening for Dream Theater back in 09 though. Pretty sure he still had it when I saw them with Periphery a few years later too


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## Dayn (Nov 1, 2021)

Man, over a decade ago I was enthralled by the custom builds, resigned to the fact I'd never own something so crazy.


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## odibrom (Nov 1, 2021)

Captain Shoggoth said:


> View attachment 99522
> 
> 
> This predates the RG2228 and people are still barely doing multiscale trems in 2021. Absolute titan of the trade, RIP



I remember that one, only the 6 high strings were "trem'ed"... He did such cool builds with extraordinary elegance...


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## crg123 (Nov 1, 2021)

RIP to a great innovator and inspiration to the custom bass/ guitar market


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## spudmunkey (Nov 2, 2021)

odibrom said:


> I remember that one, only the 6 high strings were "trem'ed"...



It actually looks like maybe only the middle 4.


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## odibrom (Nov 2, 2021)

spudmunkey said:


> It actually looks like maybe only the middle 4.


Maybe you're right...?


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## ixlramp (Nov 3, 2021)

Conkilin was a big inspiration for me, but due to his extended range basses.
When i joined the internet in 2004 i quickly became obsessed with ERBs and Conkiln was the most significant and pioneering luthier for these. At the time the lowest available standard tuning string was F#0 and the largest string count was 9: Bill Dicken's Conklin 9 string bass.


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## LordCashew (Nov 4, 2021)

Wow, so sad to hear. I remember coming across a couple of the Groove Tools seven string basses in my local GC in the early 2000s and being blown away. At the time, they just seemed so wild and “out there,” not to mention the necks were by far the widest I’d ever seen.

And the Groove Tools basses were the only decent production seven you could get for something like a decade until Ibanez made the BTB7. That many aspects of the Groove Tools/Sidewinder design are actually superior just goes to show what a great designer Bill was - he basically nailed the ergonomics of something no one else was doing, even at the scale of offshore production.


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## Kyle Jordan (Nov 5, 2021)

Just read about this over in the Emmett Chapman thread. 

I remember seeing ads for Conklin in the back of guitar mags in the late 90s and the pictures grabbed my interest because they looked so different. 

If I’m correct, I remember email exchanges with Bill about 7 and 8 string guitars long, long back. Like 07 or 08, maybe earlier. 

May he rest well. 



bostjan said:


> Conklin's guitars were the first I had seen with fanned frets, melted top, melted fingerboards, eight strings, etc. etc.
> 
> There was a solid 5-10 years that a Conklin was at the top of my "If I ever make it big" list.



Yeah I have a similar story.


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## Crash Dandicoot (Nov 5, 2021)

I remember seeing his builds for Jean Baudin nearly two decades ago and thinking there's nothing else out there like that. All the inspired and unique ideas that are only recently truly gaining significant traction were definitively his own. Farewell to an actual master.


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## technomancer (Nov 5, 2021)

Just saw this, terrible news  He was a true artist and his builds were amazing


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## tcar (Nov 6, 2021)

Captain Shoggoth said:


> View attachment 99522
> 
> This predates the RG2228 and people are still barely doing multiscale trems in 2021. Absolute titan of the trade, RIP


I was searching around for alternatives to the Rondo Music 7 string multiscale acoustic and found this site, and as I was browsing here I saw this thread about Bill Conklin and was shocked to hear of his passing. Then I saw this post with a photo of my guitar! My condolences to Bill Conklin's family and friends. He was a great guy to work with. He was open minded and would almost build anything you wanted. Yes I wanted a trem, but obviously difficult to do with the multiscale bridge angle, so I suggested just trem the center 4 and he said "let me see what I can do". It also has a Sustainiac. When I received it, the batteries were dead. His electronics guy used the single jack "ring" to turn on BOTH the sustainiac and the piezo circuit when plugged in, but this drained the batteries even with no cord plugged in. I called Bill and told him I had figured out why the batteries were DOA, then I replaced the jack with a double pole jack switch. Anyway, it is an amazing instrument! I discovered the extra range didn't work too well with my normal 6 string guitar rig, so have to run the signal through a bass amp too to have the low strings sound any good. Bill will be missed. I hope his employees can continue his work.


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## GenghisCoyne (Nov 9, 2021)

tcar said:


> I was searching around for alternatives to the Rondo Music 7 string multiscale acoustic and found this site, and as I was browsing here I saw this thread about Bill Conklin and was shocked to hear of his passing. Then I saw this post with a photo of my guitar! My condolences to Bill Conklin's family and friends. He was a great guy to work with. He was open minded and would almost build anything you wanted. Yes I wanted a trem, but obviously difficult to do with the multiscale bridge angle, so I suggested just trem the center 4 and he said "let me see what I can do". It also has a Sustainiac. When I received it, the batteries were dead. His electronics guy used the single jack "ring" to turn on BOTH the sustainiac and the piezo circuit when plugged in, but this drained the batteries even with no cord plugged in. I called Bill and told him I had figured out why the batteries were DOA, then I replaced the jack with a double pole jack switch. Anyway, it is an amazing instrument! I discovered the extra range didn't work too well with my normal 6 string guitar rig, so have to run the signal through a bass amp too to have the low strings sound any good. Bill will be missed. I hope his employees can continue his work.


so you wanna post pictures and clips of this thing or just get all of us half way there?


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## tcar (Nov 10, 2021)

GenghisCoyne said:


> so you wanna post pictures and clips of this thing or just get all of us half way there?


No problem! I've fine tuned it somewhat since I received it. I ordered a blank plastic shell from Seymour Duncan for their 8-string single coil pickup, so I could cover the 6-string Sustainiac. I also had to move the bridge (both fixed and trem) back about a quarter inch, otherwise I couldn't move the saddles back far enough to get it to intonate.


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## Hollowway (Nov 10, 2021)

Wow, this sucks. He wasn’t that old, right? I can’t find his age via a quick Google search, but it appears he hadn’t even turned 60. Like the rest of you, I wanted one of his builds since I first saw them. He was an innovator across a number of categories, and was an artist and craftsman as well. I never heard any of the typical horror stories of quality, missed deadlines, etc, either. The world needs more guys like him. RIP


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## Crazy_Guitar (Nov 11, 2021)

Oh shit! 

Bill Conklin was a true innovator! I first knew about him (through Vai, I think) in the very early 2000s.
I was mesmerized with the multi-scale and extended range guitars and basses, as well as the "molten chocolate finishes"! Incredible good taste as well, as far as finishing woods are concerned. And a real artist when working them!

It is a big loss.


#RIP


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## Mitri (Jun 1, 2022)

bostjan said:


> Conklin's guitars were the first I had seen with fanned frets, melted top, melted fingerboards, eight strings, etc. etc.
> 
> There was a solid 5-10 years that a Conklin was at the top of my "If I ever make it big" list.


Ditto on both points. 

One time, as a teenager I saw Rusty Cooley playing a multiscale Conklin 8 string during someone else's lesson at a music go round in houston. That thing was beautiful and basically had the power to mystify people on sight.


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