throg's Reviews

My first "proper" guitar.

I bought my 1528 in the early nineties, it was the first non-budget guitar I'd ever bought. I was after an electro-acoustic and a lot of guitarists I admired at the time (and still do) were playing Ovations - Roy Harper, Jimmy Page, Robert Fripp, Robert Smith to name but four.

Only four stars because I rarely play it now that I have the Taylors, but it's served me well over the years, it still holds its own to a certain extent and Ovations do have a distinctive sound. I'm planning to get it (re)set up at some point after Covid so I can play it in open G tuning.

Great to play, fabulous sound when plugged in.

Typically I wasn't actually looking to buy a guitar on the day I found this, I was just trying out a few nylon string guitars with a view to replacing my Yamaha APX-6 at some point in the future. I ended up playing it for ages in the shop, did a quick Google over a coffee and discovered that Taylor had stopped making this particular model. So as you do, I had to go back and get it.

Over lockdown this is probably the guitar I've played the most. I have two other Taylors (six and twelve string) which also sound great and I enjoy playing, but when I'm fumbling about songwriting this guitar somehow just plays itself whilst I'm thinking about other aspects of the music. Nothing feels like an effort and tonally it's superb with a just a splash of reverb applied. What more could you ask for?

I love this guitar.

It's so nice to play and paired up with the flexibility of my Helix it gives me all those classic alternative eighties tones, from The Cure to Cocteau Twins to The Smiths (of course) and beyond.

A Solid Gold Classic

I have a 2016 American Standard model in Bordeaux Metallic. I took a lot of time hunting down this particular colour and model because one caught my eye in a shop in Cambridgeshire but it was dinked, and then I discovered they were being phased out. So needless to say, I love the look of this guitar.

There's little I can add to what's already been said over the years about Strats. Any Fender or Squire model will give you those Hendrix, Gilmour or Knopfler tones you're after. Pretty much all of them are lovely to play. The American Standard is, for me, the sweet spot in the range, with a lovely, quality feel but still extremely good value for money. Everything is so much easier to play on this guitar, it just seems to want to work with you, not against you.

An absolutely cracking guitar for the money

The marketing blurb says "the G5435TG Limited Edition Electromatic Pro Jet with Bigsby and Gold hardware is available in an amazing Candy Apple Red finish. This solid body guitar features include a 22 medium jumbo fret rosewood fingerboard and pearloid Neo-Classic thumbnail inlays, 3-way pickup toggle switch, Bigsby B50 vibrato, anchored Adjusto-Matic bridge, "G-Arrow" knobs, gold pickguard with Gretsch logo and threaded/knurled strap buttons."

I say it looks fantastic, is lovely to play, very responsive and I'm amazed at the range of tones I can get out of it. Although I was in the market for a Gretsch of some kind, this was almost an impulse purchase, but I'm so glad I put my hand in my pocket.