Looks like he had left by 1986...
Tokai Move (Making Music, Feb 1987)
If you bought a Tokai guitar up until December last year, you would have bought it indirectly from Blue Suede Music Ltd. They were the UK distributors of Tokai guitars - in other words, they imported the guitars from Japan, and distributed them to your shop.
If you've only just bought a Tokai, it's likely that you bought it via a shop from a company called Blue Suede Music (Products) Ltd. Sounds a familiar name? Similar, for sure - but, crucially, not the same company. Not quite.
In the middle of December, Blue Suede Music Ltd went into voluntary liquidation. The boss of that company was Rick Harrison. Mr Harrison told Making Music that the reasons for the voluntary liquidation included the amount of money that the company owed to Tokai Japan.
Earlier in 1986, Blue Suede Music (Products) Ltd started. The boss of that company is Rick Harrison. When we spoke to Mr Harrison in January, Blue Suede Music (Products) had just received its first batch of Tokai guitars from Tokai Japan.
How could someone deal in guitars through one company, when his previous company was in liquidation after dealing in the same guitars, we wondered? Mr Harrison said,
"I asked Tokai Japan in October '86 whether it would be possible to supply Blue Suede Music (Products) with guitars on a letter of credit - in other words guaranteed payment - which they've agreed. This was sorted out when Blue Suede Music Ltd was not in liquidation. We've just received about 150 guitars," he told us in January.
We asked Mr Harrison what he would say to someone who owns a Tokai guitar or is thinking of buying a Tokai guitar and finds all this business disturbing. People might be worried about future repairs and parts supplies, for example. "It's not a problem," he assured us. "Tokai supply guitars to Blue Suede Music (Products). But the situation could alter in February or March." And Tokais have always been accurate enough copies for non-Tokai Fender-style parts to fit should they be needed.
So the future of Tokai's UK distribution still looks intriguing as we go to press. Mike Cooper of Groove Tube's UK distributor Scott-Cooper Marketing told us he was "looking at" Tokai UK distribution and had had discussions with Tokai Japan bosses to that effect. In January — before the NAMM and Frankfurt trade shows where distribution deals are clinched and renewed — Rick Harrison told us, "Tokai isn't quite as viable a guitar as if was two years ago because it is not a cheap Japanese guitar any more. If I don't want to go along that road, then someone else will do it. But I do feel an obligation in a way."
