66' VOX MARK VI ACOUSTIC Cherry Red, V252 "TEARDROP" Vibrola. Excellent Conditions, very little ding&dong. Strong neck/fingerboard with good frets, low actions, ready to play. Come in the original Vox Case code VA24
Introduced in 1966, on the heels of the Phantom VI, this had a Stratocaster inspired triple single coil pickup arrangement. This attracted many great players, most notably Brian Jones of The Rolling Stones. This is an extremely rare guitar, in exceptional condition!
Soon after Vox entered the guitar marketplace with student
grade models in 1961, their development of professional level instruments
commenced.
Vox determined that "copy cat" guitar designs for their professional models
would be unacceptable. Their new professional guitar models would need to have
body designs that were unique and iconic, making them immdiately recognizable as
a Vox instrument. To help accomplish this styling goal, Vox entered into a
contract with the London Design Centre in 1962 to suggest guitar body shapes.
The result of this initial effort was the "coffin" shaped Phantom VI guitar. On
the heels of the introduction of the Phantom VI, a new solid body "teardrop"
shaped guitar was developed at Vox. This new guitar had the same "Stratocaster"
inspired triple single coil pickup arrangement that Vox used on the Phantom VI.
It also used the same bridge, vibrato arm and Eko manufactured "paddle head
stock" neck as the Phantom VI. The Phantom had a three position rotary pickup
switch, the Teardrop used a three position toggle.Vox named this new "teardrop"
model the "Phantom Mark VI" guitar when it was introduced in 1963. Before long,
the Phantom name was dropped on the teardrop model to avoid confusion with the
original Phantom VI. The teardrop was simply renamed the "Mark VI". Vox expanded
the "teardrop" line to include the V231 Mark IX nine string guitar, the V223
Mark XII twelve string guitar, the V252 Mark VI "thin line" electro acoustic
guitar, the V258 Mark XII "thin line" electro acoustic, the V224 Mark IV bass
guitar and the V248 Wyman bass. A white two pickup Mark VI model was
designed for Brian Jones of the Rolling Stones, but oddly was not offered
commercially by Vox in the 1960s. The "Mark" series guitars and basses had the
largest commercial success of all Vox guitars produced during the British
Invasion. By 1965, the popularity and world wide demand for Vox guitars caused
JMI to supplement UK production at Eko in Italy. The Vox Mark VI Acoustic guitar
was first offered to the US market in the 1966 "Vox, It's Whats Happening -
Beatles Cover" catalog. A black and white reprint of this catalog is available
from North Coast Music. The 1966 US Vox catalog described the V252 Mark VI
Acoustic guitar as follows: "Tear drop electro acoustic; true spring action
vibrato; 3 multi-pole extended range pickups; chrome pickguard and switchplate."
The 1966 US Vox price list indicated that the retail price of the Mark VI
Acoustic guitar was $349.90 USD.