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c. 1966 Voice Frontier Custom 1000
c. 1966 Voice Frontier Custom 1000
Voice Frontier 1000 headstock. The logo is flaking away. This is a common problem with the early Elk logos as well. I believe it has something to do with the type of sticker/seal backing reacting to the lacquer.
I was able to arrange for a second meeting with Iwase-san, the man who invented/made/was Iwase Desnhi - the company that made Voice Amps and Guitars. It was a great honour to meet him a second time, and this time I brought along the Voice Guitar which I had found and put back into playable condition to show him and ask him about it. Such a great guy, and so sharp and active, friendly and full of life. I thought it would be nice to do a little background on him and the guitar and shed some light on an obscure part of guitar history. I recorded an hour and a half of interview with him, but am just going to give some of the highlights.
Iwase-san holding the Voice Frontier 1000 that he built in 1966.
Iwase-san was born in what is now known as Shinagawa, Tokyo. He was born in 1931 (making him 84 years old at the time of this writing - I was previously under the mis-impression that he was actually 90.) He didn't finish high school because his class was disbanded due to an outbreak of tuberculosis (a serious health issue in pre-war Japan).
During the 1950s he joined Teisco, and produced amp and guitar designs for them, including a shifting bridge which allowed a pedal steel guitar player to switch between three different tunings with the flick of a lever. He left Teisco in 1963/64 (shortly before the Tokyo Olympics) after he felt the company was taking a wrong direction.
He formed Iwase Desnhi (Iwase Electric) in 1965 and began producing amplifiers, and on a limited basis, guitars.
Iwase Denshi Sign
Unfortunately, he formed his own company just as the first electric guitar boom was beginning it's decline, and he ran his company on a very limited basis out of his house. While his amps and guitars were very well received, including appearing on the cover of some Terauchi Takeshi records, there wasn't enough demand, and he quit the guitar business in roughly 1970 and went on to work on Ultrasounds.
Iwase-san in front of the house where he built Voice Electric Guitars. Most of the neighbouring houses have already been torn down to make a new roadway for the Tokyo Olympics. Iwase-san's house will be torn down at the start of next year.
While the amplifiers were actually assembled in a separate factory (and produced in greater numbers, though still very rare), The Voice guitars were made by hand by Iwase himself at his house. He made three models - the Delicate (an earlier version of the above guitar, featuring slightly different pickups) which he discontinued soon after an American told him that "delicate" was associated with "weak", the Frontier 1000 as shown above, the Rich Man - a 12-string version of the above, which he estimates he built roughly 10 of, and an SG-8 Pedal Steel Guitar (I have never seen one of these except in catalogs).
When I asked him again how many he made, he wasn't sure and gave a funny answer - he said "more than 250, but less than 1000." He didn't number them. (Another figure bandied about when I met him the first time was roughly 250 to 300.), and depending on how early the model is, they range from 80 to 95% handmade. Even the tuners on the earliest ones were made by hand! (the Voice Guitar featured on page 64 of Frank Meyers "History of Japanese Electric Guitars" is one I obtained for him, and features the handmade tuners, which uses plastic buttons which were adapted from a local plastic factory that made toy costume jewelry necklaces.)
close up of the pickup covers and also revealing the hand-filed pickguard.
The pickup covers on the Voice Guitar pictured above were made by carving a mold into a wooden cutting board, and then melting melamine, keeping it pliable with boiling water, and pressing it into the mold with another smaller block, trimming away the excess, letting it set, drilling holes, and then polishing them. They look incredible. Hard to believe they are handmade. The pickups themselves sound great. He used the best grade Alnico magnets he could get from Mitsubushi - the magnets themselves are fairly strong, and wound them on a machine he built himself. They measure in the 5k region. They have great character, and sound particularly good in the middle position. They are also incredibly quiet in terms of hum or noise (compared with other pickups from this era). I was very tempted to open them up and take a look at the coils, but they're actually sealed with hot glue, which would make for a very messy opening procedure, so I figured best to leave them alone.
Tone knob turns backwards towards treble (this is somewhat common on older Teisco and Guyatone guitars, as well as a few other Japanese manufacturers) the rhythm circuit tone and volume also run counter to what one gets on a Fender guitar. Also, very thin plastic roller knobs on this version. There were some versions which had flat plastic knobs that were located above the pickguard.
photo of another Voice Frontier 1000 which features the alternate knobs for the rhythm circuit.
The pickguard is a hand cut and filed piece of metal (for shielding) and then the plastic is overlaid on top of it. The bridge is stamped, but the saddles are various bolt threads cut to size and then tapped for screws. The bridge is grounded via contact with the bridge thimbles which are connected to the pickguard, eliminating the need for a ground to the tailpiece. Tailpiece and tremolo were also stamped and pressed in his home.
Image of the underside of the pickguard, and the cavity routes. Note that I have mistakenly put the bridge thimbles back here, mostly so I wouldn't misplace them - they actually enter the wood via the top of the pickguard, where they make contact with the metal. Also note the convenient diagonal cut in the cavity for the rhythm circuit wiring.
Though he used different woods at different times, he said a large number of the guitar bodies were made out of Sakura (Japanese Cherry Blossom) as he had access to a good stock of it at that time. Necks are maple, usually 3-piece. Rosewood fretboard. He always chose the best wood stock he could get.
The neck is a 24.75" scale neck (he actually remembered it as being smaller, and may have actually produced an even shorter scale at one time) with a zero fret. It plays incredibly well and is very comfortable. They use very unusual (probably custom made or custom ordered) fretwire which are almost like bar frets, but with a small tang. The headstock on the neck is actually pitched slightly, which is why there are no string trees like there would be on a Fender.
Sorry for the somewhat rambling way I've presented the information here. I just wanted to write it all down while it was in my head. I need to go back and listen to the recording of our conversation to re-check some of the details, but I believe that is all correct. Please excuse any typos. Hope it's of some interest.
