I was just minding my own business one day when John Walker called and told me we should be working with Kevin Kopp because he makes great guitars. For John, being the laconic sort, this was like a normal person screaming with ecstasy and blabbering my ear off. John, Kevin and Ren Ferguson all worked together at the Gibson custom shop in Bozeman Montana.  About a week later, Leo Kottke happened to show up with his two Kopp guitars. Leo had us put a pickup in one of them so we got to try his while it was here. 
 

Among our first instruments from Kevin was a K-35, Kevin's version of the the 14 fret slope-shouldered D. I had my friend Dakota Dave Hull bring his 1934 Gibson Jumbo in for a comparison. His old Gibson is a pretty nice example of what a fine slope-shouldred D ought to be,  so I figured it would be an unfair comparison with such a green guitar - but thought it would be interesting, nevertheless.

Well, we went back and forth playing the Gibson and Kopp and I was stunned to find that Dave actually really liked a new guitar. After I checked his temperature to make sure he wasn't hallucinating with fever, I thought that maybe we were onto something here.  We even had to put new strings on his Gibson so it would stand up against the Kopp!

 

A couple of days later Dave brought in another pal, Paul Geremia,  who was playing in town.  If you don't know of these guys you are missing two of the legendary musicians in American roots music (or at least they think so).  Anyway, I pulled a Kopp Trailboss off the wall and with trepidation handed it to Mr. Geremia.  You need to remember that both of these guys are notorious whiners about how new guitars suck and only old guitars are any good...and, I'll be damned if they didn't  just love the Kopp.  With all the smarmy platitudes flying around,  it was almost embarrassing.