Swirls And Curls of Color
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NAMM 2025
We call it Bowling Ball.
A particular style of painting, reminiscent of the swirling and curling color striations found on certain types of vibrant bowling ball designs—an especially notable standout as they pop up and onto the return rack or show up on stage.
This was an original color, created and sprayed for us by Pat Wilkins, dating back to the mid-1980s.
It first appeared as Black & White Bowling Ball, which became legendary and is still quite popular to this day. We always seem to have one or two in the works, almost at all times. We even featured two Pro Ams with the Black & White theme during our 40th Anniversary festivities a few months ago:
https://www.andersonguitarworks.com/guitar-tales/2024/89/26/when-you-have-an-ande-handy
But Bowling Ball has also covertly appeared in other variant color schemes. We were always secretly thrilled to see the alternative wild combinations that could be created.
All of these custom Bowling Ball renditions have only appeared on our Pro Am model, for some reason. A function of tradition, most likely. No one ever even thought to deviate.
Until…
Tony Higbee, at Guitar Center in Nashville, got the wildly inspired idea of doing this paint scheme in a different way…on The Classic. He also chose the Black & White theme but this time further accentuated by The Classic’s classic pickguard styling. This was the very first foray into a whole new world of cool Bowling Ball expositions. This design’s unique and super-cool dynamic is counterbalanced by a perfectly appointed, Black Pickguard.
So super cool, in fact that when it came time for NAMM 2025 we were compelled to choose a high-powered, alternative Bowling Ball blueprint (or is that redprint, in this case) to appear on a Guardian Angel Player—our 24-fret, vintage-honoring axe.
It was Eddie’s Guitars that elected and selected to profile this wonderful Guardian Angel Player with a Red & Black Bowling Ball motif, complemented by a Black Pickguard and Black appointments everywhere—propelling the powerful reds center stage.
Notable NAMM fun ensued and now it will make its way to Eddie’s Guitars in Maplewood, Missouri.
So very good.
An inside tip: Stay tuned as we may very well see more Bowling Ball color apparitions appear here in the very near future.
Editor’s Note: A heartfelt thanks goes out to Kyle Sease of Eddie’s Guitars for supplying the raw pictures for this one-and-only Guardian Angel presented in Black and Red Bowling Ball.
GUITAR SPECIFICATIONS:
