My Trip to Kiesel Guitars
Kiesel Guitars is a 71 year old custom guitar shop out of Escondido, California that used to be known as Carvin Guitars. About 2 years ago they changed their name back to the original family name after splitting the Carvin Corporation into 2 different entities. Carvin now handles amplification and Kiesel handles the custom guitar production. When Kiesel launched as a new company they started producing some new unique models that caught my eye. I had been looking at the Vader model specifically, with it’s radical headless design, so after a year I finally bought one and fell in love with not only the guitar, but the brand as well. This is my little story about a recent trip that brought me to their showroom, which was super exciting for me.
After ordering a Kiesel Vader on June 30, 2016 and waiting four months to get it, it finally arrived on October 19, 2016. I couldn’t be happier about it. It’s kind of like a Ferrari compared to my Gibson SG, which I of course still love, so it’s not a dig at all towards my SG. The Vader is just different and plays much ‘faster’. That makes me think that the rest of the Kiesel Guitar line plays just as fast. How would I be able to play other models to find that out? I would have to go to their showroom in Escondido, California. A bit of an expensive trip to play all the models I’m interested in trying and perhaps buying. Fast forward a few months to January.
My new job at Certify just happens to have an office in San Diego, and after being hired in November I found out the whole company was flying out to the west coast for their first annual company meeting in January. Seriously? A cab would cost a fortune because Escondido is 31.7 miles away from where I was staying in San Diego. I hadn’t ‘Ubered‘ yet, but I thought that woul dbe the most cost effective way of travel.
On the fourth day of the conference we had a free day to do whatever we wanted. We were released at 10 in the morning to explore the city. I did some internet searching and found out an Uber to Escondido would only be $36 to $50 each way. Completely doable, seeing how I paid no money to fly out there or pay for my hotel because my company graciously paid for all travel. So I downloaded the Uber app, configured payment options and hailed my first Uber. My man Vahid picked me up at 1 Market Place and we headed on up the coast to Kiesel Custom Guitars. Forty minutes later we were at 2015 Alder Grove Avenue in Escondido, California right on front of Kiesel’s new shop and showroom. I made it. I had seen pics online of what it looked like, so it was kind of cool to pull up and see what I had only seen online. Just a building with a logo, but a big deal to me.
As I headed to the front door, I come upon the monument that had been at their old location. The same monument that I had seen Jeff and Mark Kiesel standing in front of in online photos. I opened the door and walked in and saw the familiar setting I had only seen in Google Chrome. The front desk had that big ol chunk of buckeye burl and a little to the right was the showroom full of all things Kiesel, including Jason Lee, aka, Flock who I had seen on a few YouTube videos reviewing and playing different Kiesel models. A knowledgeable dude who I was lucky enough to chat with about all things Kiesel. Flock asked me where I was from because I believe my Maine accent had given me away as a non-California native. He assured me that he had heard thicker Maine accents.
After asking me to put my coffee behind the counter and verifying my hands were clean, Flock let me play any of the guitars I wanted to try. Cool. I tried out a green SCB (single cut bevel), an orange Aries 8 string monster, the new Vader models loaded with new Hipshot tremolo system and a few DC7’s. I loved them all and think I may be ordering a DC7 later this year.
Flock asked if I wanted to see his Vader, which I of course I did, so out of the gig bag it came. A beautiful blue flamed maple denim monster. It was one of the first models with the ‘Zero Fret’ and was about two years old. I of course whipped out my iPhone to show him pics of mine. He seems very cerebral about guitars so it was a pretty cool to chat with him about his as well as the options I was thinking about for my next ‘build’. He seemed to like my Vader too, so I thought, ‘I like this guy’. After spending around 45 minutes at the showroom noodling around on Kiesel models I figured it was time to go, so I bought myself a t shirt and headed out the door to hail another Uber and head back down to San Diego. In all the excitement I forgot my coffee behind the counter, but I think I was probably jacked up enough without it.
So check that one off the list…I made it to Kiesel. It was definitely the highlight of my San Diego trip along with the weather, which was 45 degrees warmer than an icy January in Portland, Maine. In close second was the mac and cheese bar we had on our last night. I keep thinking about that too.