I had recently sent a copy of the above photo (which I got years ago from Gary Dean Smith) to Larry (HLG) and
who is friends with Dale Hyatt to ask if he could identify some of the various G&L guitars in this photo.
He sent the photo to Gabe Dellevigne, who also is a friend of Dale's and I received this email from Gabe:
I'd love to have that Skyhawk with the two Z-coil pickups!Hello Craig,
Larry forwarded me an old photograph that Dale Hyatt had taken in his office back around late 1990 or early 1991. I have seen this and a few other similar photo's taken at the same time as this one many times over the years...they sure do get around!
The band was called "Force of Souls" and they were a local Fullerton band around at that time. The primary song writer and lead guitar player was a guy named Leland Jeffries (Real name is Jeff Smith) and he spoke at Leo's memorial service and organized and played at the Leo Fender benefit concert at the Bren Center in August of 1991. I spoke to him a few different times during the 90's...back when he was trying to sell his Skyhawk with the two Z-Coils for ridiculous sums of money. One thing for certain, Force of Souls did get some gear deeply discounted and some of it for free. Gary Smith was for positive a test player Dale used and Leland spent a lot of time down in Dale's office trying to get access to Leo.
Yes, Leo is holding an ASAT with two Z-Coils...many different incarnations of instruments were assembled with Z-Coils in different configurations. Not just 1, 2 or 3 Z-Coils but different versions of the Z-Coil...Leo had several variations on the theme. Many of them were lifted from the lab...how do I know this? Because they were offered to sale to me over the years. Anyway, not just ASAT's got Z-Coils...other body styles did as well though only the Comanche line made it to the price sheet. The Z-Coil was something Leo wanted to evolve but never finished developing.
The ASAT Classic with the gold hardware has an HG-2 bridge pickup and two MFD oval bobbin single coils along with it. I believe I have some decent pix of this guitar somewhere in my stash of photos. There is actually another version of the same basic guitar with some old rectangular bobbin single coils mounted in it. This was not a one-off guitar...quite a few variations like this were built in the 1990-1991 time frame including a lefty version.
OK, back to the individuals in the picture...they are:
Bottom Row (L to R): Mike Nado (Vocalist), Jim Monroe (Drums)
Middle Row (L to R): Randy Maluy (Bass), Leo & George
Back Row (L to R): Leland Jeffries (Jeff Smith), Gary Dean Smith (Guitar)
Picture taken by Dale Hyatt. Actually, anytime you see a picture with the famous "carpeted wall" as a backdrop, Dale took it (unless Dale is in the photograph of course).
Some more interesting tidbits...
Ginger Baker had run and advertisement in "Music Connection" Magazine looking for bands to audition and possibly record with him. Force of Souls ended up getting a chance to record with him. They also did a project with another musical legend, Bill Ward of Black Sabbath fame recording drums with the band.
Force of Souls never had any commercial success but they did play G&L's for certain.
Dale told me that he really liked Gary Smith...he and John Jorgenson were two of his most favorite test players to work with. Dale also located and brought in the then moonlighting musician/school teacher Richard Smith and several other young, unknown musicians. In the early days of G&L, Leo was still using the same test players he had worked with for decades. Roy Lanham, Hank Penny, Buddy Kendrick, Thom Bresh, Alvino Rey and a host of others. Most of them were hopelessly out of touch with what was going on musically during that timeframe so Dale went out and found some up and coming local talent to help get a different, more modern, perspective. Dale pointed out that most of the old test players had cultivated relationships with Leo and made for nice lunch partners but most of the time they were just looking for free gear and would tell Leo that everything he came up was fantastic. Meanwhile, Dale's trying to peddle F-100's and build the brand and the dealers are telling him that they cannot sell it at those prices and nobody wants these guitars just because Leo Fender designed them...they were right. Fortunately, for Dale, the L1K was well received, and he did have very good success selling the basses early on.
Dale made it clear that the dealers wanted the following:
A G&L Stratocaster that looked like an old Strat.
A G&L Telecaster that looked like an old Tele.
A full line of G&L Superstrat's with locking nuts, fine tuning vibrato's, crazy paint, etc.
A more affordable line of instruments to compete with the Japanese imports of that timeframe quality and price point-wise
If you follow G&L's 1980-1991 evolution, this is exactly what happened though it took a few years to get Leo to agree to this approach and then execute on the new direction. Of course, all this came to an abrupt end with the passing of Leo...
But it sure is interesting to see what those three legendary instrument building veterans came up with during that decade. Nobody else during that same window was nearly as prolific...but then again, most of them weren't as well funded or seasoned either!
Best Regards,
Gabe Dellevigne
