Westone Guitars
Westone Guitars is a manufacturer of electric guitars and basses.
History
The history of the brand Westone began in the late 1970s with the Japanese company Matsumoku, until then electric guitars, among others had made for Epiphone, Washburn, Aria, Vantage, Westbury and Vox. In 1979, Matsumoku decided then to bring instruments on their own under the name of Westone on the market. The first original models were "Thunder", "Concorde" and " Prestige".
From 1981, the instruments of Westone in Europe were available through various distributors in the commercial for the musician. Matsumoku built the model range from continuous and landed great success with their production quality and innovation.
In 1984, the international rights to the brand Westone to the St. Louis Music Company (SLM ), a prestigious instrument sales in America. Production remained at Matsumoku in Japan, but the decisions on marketing and model policy was then in the hands of SLM. The original models were hardly made and new models that fit into the trend of the 1980s, have been developed. For guitar and bass models such as " Pantera ", " Spectrum" or " Raider " came on the market.
In 1987 the production was relocated to South Korea. From the time Matsumoku also no longer manufactured the guitars. Most of the innovative instruments disappeared from the market. The factory building was probably an earthquake or a fire victim and was not rebuilt.
SLM kept the production running until early 1991, but failed to strengthen against the Westone are always stronger competition from brands and manufacturers and continue to build. Production was stopped and the brand name of Westone has been replaced by the Japanese brand " Alvarez " in their models many of the Westone ideas were to continue to apply.
The mid-1990s appeared in England the name Westone again briefly, but with completely different models and an entirely different direction, namely the production of handmade instruments in limited numbers.
It was not until 2003, the Westone brand was brought back to life in Germany and growing steadily since then in model and choice.