I traded a 'dime-a-dozen' Fender strat for this. Nothing against the Strat...it was a nice guitar but they are everywhere. This thing is F'n cool!!

The Marauder is a fairly rare Gibson made from '75 to '82.

From a Gibson site:
The Marauder
Making its debut in January, 1975, the Marauder came first. Like the L-6S, the Marauder featured pickups designed by Bill Lawrence—a hot Super Humbucker in the neck position, and a loud, yet cutting, angled singlecoil at the bridge. In lieu of individual polepieces, the bridge pickup sports a wide blade that runs the length of the coil. Both these pickups are cast in clear epoxy, so it’s possible to peer inside and see the coil wire.

Though the Marauder first sported a standard Gibson three-way pickup switch near the single cutaway, this was replaced with a unique—and extremely cool—continuously variable rotary pot and chicken-head knob that effectively lets you pan between the neck and bridge pickups. The blender pot was originally located on the right horn, but in later models was positioned between the volume and tone knobs.

Thanks to the blender, you balance the two pickups anyway you like, from full neck to full bridge, and all points in between. Panning between pickups was radical in its day, and it’s still a valid and toneful concept.

Measuring 13” across and 1-3/4” deep, the Marauder’s solid body is built from alder, maple, or mahogany. Here’s the twist: The guitar has a bolt-on neck, a huge departure from Gibson’s traditional glued, set-neck design. The laminated maple neck sports either a rosewood or maple fretboard with 22 frets and a 24-3/4” scale length. While standard Marauders have dot position markers, the Marauder Custom boasts a rosewood fretboard with neck binding and pearl block inlays. The Marauder’s headstock is straight lift from the mighty Flying V.

Ads of the era:


...now...my 'new' 1976 Gibson Marauder!!

nice, looks like a precursor to the nighthawk from the 90s.

My ES-340 has a pickup blend. Can't have both pickups on at full power, though. Then there's the toggle switch: standby (just switches everything off) and out-of-phase (pretty useless as well) positions. Sort of a failed experiment, I guess.

So, the marauder is like an LPS, with bolt-on neck, Flying-V headstock, and weird electronics.

Cool.

The Grabber has the bolt-on neck thing, too. Cheaper to mass produce.

Yes, I suppose there have been a few 'experimental' models over the years by many manufacturers but Gibson seems to have been involved in a great share of them!

I like this one...it's nice to have something different in a large herd of stringed instruments particularly when it isn't just a freak for freak's sake and most of the collection is more along the lines of classic or common models.

I'd probably pick up a Marauder if I saw one.

At my band's rehearsal, I noticed that my friend's Grabber has the Flying-V headstock as well.

That single coil "blade" pickup looks interesting. Outside of the P-90, I don't know of any other Gibson single coils.

Regarding my ES-340: I'm glad that I own a small piece of guitar history. Even if the electronics are kind of stupid, it does sounds great.