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Morris is another Japanese line that made some killer Gibson copies in the 60's and 70's if you can find one from that era.

pigmaker wrote:Word. Yeah I was pretty surprised to see some Burnys with asking prices at $1200 and whatnot

I own a Bury SG and a Flying V bass [both way over ten years old] and even though I paid in the $600 area they are so much better than a new Gibson non-copy of the same thing it isn't funny, and when you take gibson's prices in comparison to $1200 for a better ok [meaning a new one and not old... buy a old one... do it... you know you want to] guitar....

Zounds Perspex wrote:If you don't mind more recent Japanese copies, the Edwards copies of Gibson guits are pretty darn good.

I picked up a used Edwards '56 style goldtop LP that had nice wiring put in and an aftermarket P-90 in the bridge - sounds and plays very nice - for $500. Looks good, too!

pigmaker wrote:

Zounds Perspex wrote:If you don't mind more recent Japanese copies, the Edwards copies of Gibson guits are pretty darn good.

I picked up a used Edwards '56 style goldtop LP that had nice wiring put in and an aftermarket P-90 in the bridge - sounds and plays very nice - for $500. Looks good, too!

thanks bud, will def check those out

It might differ on region but $500 for that guitar is a very good deal and not something you'd find too often.

I imagine you're find a lot of MIJ stuff ala Burny, Greco, Orville, etc at around $650 and up. Orville by Gibson and the higher end stuff like old Tokai and Navigator going into the thousands, especially old Tokai Les Pauls.

folks I didn't see it mentioned but I had a Les Paul and a Jazz Bass made by Bacchus and they were both fantastic. definitely worth checking them out.

Yeah, Bacchus is another one. Heard good things about them.

likewise. apparently they're much more common in the UK than the US. i've seen several Brits online talking about their Bacchuses (Bacchae?), but have never seen one over here.

Correction my Les Paul was Orville, the Jazz Bass was the Bacchus. Great instrument though. They offer a lot of cool natural finishes.

I had a Greco once. It was nice. I hear many fantastic things about Burny, Tokai and Bacchus. Also Edwards seem to get a lot of love online.

It would probably be worth looking at somewhere like Ishibashi U-Box if you're interested in MIJ stuff. They're kind of like the Japanese Guitar Center so they're not a fly-by-night operation and the U-Box wing is dedicated to international sales. I've used them a few times and they are probably the best store I've ever dealt with.
More importantly, they price this stuff fairly. You could pick up an Edwards of Greco for 500 all day long whereas if you try to by one in the UK you're looking at £800 and up because "MIJ Lawsuit mojo toanz". Whilst shipping is more expensive it has always worked out cheaper in the long run for me.

i bought both of my Tokais from overseas in the 2000s. the Les Paul Special was from Japan, and i got the sunburst Standard on eBay. for a few lovely months in 2009-10 there was a UK Tokai dealer with a HUGE eBay inventory, literally about 100 guitars from their pro-quality range. (they had a Les Paul with a transparent seafoam green finish over a flamed top that still haunts my dreams a decade later.) i was able to pick my favorite sunburst and top flame from six or seven otherwise identical models. it arrived set up so perfectly that i haven't done a thing to it in nine years other than changing the strings. unfortunately, they disappeared. i assume Tokai cracked down on them for selling to unauthorized territories. the Special was something like $750 plus shipping; the Standard was more like $900 which would be ~$1100-1200 now. even with shipping, they were dead cheap compared to contemporaneous mid-range Gibsons. and for the time (late 00s, the worst time for Gibson since the Norlin era) the Tokais are IMO superior to the contemporaneous Gibsons.

What year/era Tokais were they?

both built in the mid 00s.

Ahhh. I see you said that but I wasn't sure if that was the year they were made or just when you bought them.