The V-shape guitar was introduced way back in 1958 by Gibson as the “Flying V” model as a lightweight and more comfortable guitar with a modern, futuristic design for the masses, but did you know that when they were first released, guitar players thought it was too controversial to play?

The years have since passed, and more and more guitar players love the V-Shape guitars. Many prominent guitarists such as Jimi Hendrix, Kirk Hammett, Dave Mustaine, Alexi Laiho, and many more have become so synonymous with the guitar, that they have changed the game by making these guitars the coolest and meanest instruments for rock, metal music, and beyond!

It’s a jolly “V” Good season, and it’s more awesome than ever! Let’s check out the latest collection of V guitars available here at Music Bliss!

When Leo Fender started introducing the ever-famous Stratocasters in 1954, Gibson, at the time, was only producing Les Paul model solid-body guitars, and was viewed as an old-fashioned guitar maker.

With the rise of Surf music in the late-50s, more and more guitar players are leaning toward the more twangy guitar sounds as opposed to the warm-sounding Les Pauls. But the main reason why people choose to play the Strats is simply that their design was more innovative than the traditional guitar shape that were available at the time with its more asymmetrical body and deep cutaways, and that they were also more comfortable, lightweight, and easier to access at higher frets to play solo. This consequently led Gibson's guitar sales to suffer.

In 1957, Gibson president Ted McCarty decided that Gibson needed to restore its image as an innovator and industry leader. He made a bold move that resulted in the creation of three guitars to counter the Strat: the Flying V, Futura/Explorer, and Moderne (which was unreleased).

Gibson filed patent applications for those three guitar body designs in June 1957, with the patents eventually being granted in January 1958. This was an unusual strategy, as previously Gibson had filed patents only for engineering inventions and not cosmetic designs.

Early prototypes of the Flying V and Futura/Explorer that were built for trade shows had mahogany bodies, but before the models went into production, Gibson switched to African limba wood, better known as korina.

In addition to being lighter than mahogany, korina’s pale-blond color was more in step with the prevalent aesthetic of the late Fifties.

When first shown at a trade show in 1957, most dealers thought that the models were a little too far out and space age, and those that did order them purchased only one instrument, which was generally used as a window display to attract attention.

The blues-rock guitarist Lonnie Mack started using a Flying V as soon as it was released in 1958. Mack, who is Native American by descent, became fixated on the guitar's arrow-like appearance.

His instrument, which he had Cincinnati's Glenn Hughes Music store custom fit with a Bigsby vibrato tailpiece, was the seventh to leave the assembly line. Aside: The "whammy bar" got its moniker from Mack's usage of the Bigsby on his album The Wham of That Memphis Man and its hallmark song, "Wham."

Another early user was blues guitar legend Albert King, whose first V and all following Vs were known as "Lucy." King, a left-handed guitarist, was drawn to the V's symmetrical shape because it allowed him to play in an unconventional manner by flipping the guitar around while retaining the strings set up for a right-handed player.

In the middle of the 1960s, The Kinks’ Dave Davies purchased a Flying V. The Kinks' first American tour in the middle of the 1960s saw the loss of Davies' custom-built Guild guitar in transit, forcing him to find a replacement for his only instrument right away. The owner took a dusty case containing an original 1950s V from storage when he was unable to find a guitar he liked among the racks. He billed Davies $60 for the V.

After Davies made multiple television appearances with it and was seen holding the guitar on the cover of The Kinks' Greatest Hits! in 1966, the Flying V became a symbol of the British Invasion.

The most famous guitarist to use the second version of the V was Jimi Hendrix. A one-of-a-kind, unique left-handed Flying V with gold-plated gear, a pearl Gibson logo headstock inlay, and split-diamond fretboard inlays in the Trini Lopez style was created for him by Gibson in 1969.

At the 1970 Isle of Wight Festival, Hendrix became famous for performing numerous songs on his own V. At the Rolling Stones concert in Hyde Park on July 5, 1969, Keith Richards attracted the attention of many guitarists by playing a late-Fifties V.

As a result of the non-popularity of the Flying Vs in the 1960s and 1970s, many of these guitars were left unsold by some shops and dealers. With the rise of Heavy Metal music that was becoming more and more popular in the late 70s and early 80s, a lot of young guitar players who didn’t have much money to buy the gear they needed to record and perform started getting the “unwanted” Flying V as these guitars were relatively cheaper to get.

The guitar’s unconventional shape and design also helped influence the sudden rise of interest in Flying V guitars, as they coincide with the nature of Heavy Metal spirit, which is to be bold, extreme, and anti-traditionalist. With its lightweight and slimmer necks, the Flying V suits the guitar playing technique, which emphasizes speed and comfort to be rowdy on the stage, as well as the high output humbucking pickups to generate more attack and high gain sounds.

Kirk Hammett, Dave Mustaine, Rudolf, and Michael Schenker of the Scorpions began appearing and popularizing the Flying V guitars, which influenced a wave of metal guitar players and guitar makers thereafter until today.