I picked up a nice 17" thin crash last night for 75 bucks. Beautiful sounding cymbal. It has the hollow stamp zildjian on the bottom, and only "thin crash" on the top. The seller told me he bought it new in the early 80's. My question is, how long where the hollow stamps used/produced? Is this a good era for zildjian? Thanks
Larry
[COLOR="DarkRed"]Early 70's-early '80s....so seller is right in there.
IMHO, they were really the last of the consistently good A's.
I have never had a bad one. I have had some OK ones, and just as often have had some very good ones.[/COLOR]
The hollow Zildjian ink stamp started in 1978. It went on until about mid-1981. I don't remember where exactly I found that out, but that's my recollection of it.
I think it is mid 70s to early 80s.
I think they were mid 70's? The trivea I've heard is they went to the solid ink stamp so the "Zildjian" logo was more visible for the MTV craze.
I bought an 18" medium crash with hollow logo new in 1982.
Ha ha, don't you mean the last of the consistently good Zildjians??
Seriously though, nobody could touch Zildjian in the 70's/80's (when there was actually good, readily available competition for virtually the first time in Zildjians history).
The drummer in my Dad's trio (who is my earliest influence) got a hollow logo 12" Splash for Christmas, in either 1980 or 1981. That is THE BEST sounding splash I have EVER heard in my life. It literally sounds like a child jumping into a pool.
I don't mean to knock on Zildjian, but I just think that since the early 90's, their quality and consistency has gone downhill. And it shows. They certainly have lost a TON of market share. 20-25 years ago, your local drum shop would carry about 50 Zildjians and about 10 of everything else combined. Now everything is pretty much equal.
I go to drum shops/music stores often, and even the really good quality Zildjians (K Custom , K Dark, A Custom) just sound very clangy, harsh and un-musical anymore to my ears. The days of a true "splash" cymbal from Zildjian are long gone. They might as well just re-name it "Clang".
(Off soap box).
I don't mean to knock on Zildjian, but I just think that since the early 90's, their quality and consistency has gone downhill. And it shows. They certainly have lost a TON of market share. 20-25 years ago, your local drum shop would carry about 50 Zildjians and about 10 of everything else combined. Now everything is pretty much equal.(Off soap box).
Not exactly true. Zildjian’s is still by far the largest cymbal company. There are more cymbal manufacturers today than there were in 1980. However, the market has grown exponentially since that time as well.
