- Joined
- Feb 11, 2009
- Messages
- 23,176
- Reaction score
- 18,905
- Location
- NJ (The nice part)
- Guild Total
- 112
It sounds great plugged in. I have two X500s in hand, having bought LA's walnut model. That one is much livelier acoustically since it doesn't have the big honkin' post under the bridge. It also feeds back like crazy whereas this one doesn't which is as expected given the post.
The neck, though. I'm not sure what's up with the neck. To me it looks like it took a hard whack or something, but there are no other signs of that happening. What it almost looks like is that the bottom part of the neck was pried up unsuccessfully. There are odd marks in the finish all around the neck, too, that I can't explain. The binding has some rot on the fretboard and around the neck joint, but nowhere else.
The neck seems stable. It plays well, though there is a very slight hump in the neck over the spot where it joins the body. I'll give it a day or so to acclimate with new strings and see if the truss rod does its job unless I decide to just up and return it, which I may do. If he offers a partial refund I may take it and see what it would take to make it right, but it would need to be a sweet deal. It's a good deal as it is, but not if it's going to require $1000 worth of work. It's so damn pretty, though! What could have happened to it? The gold isn't even worn off of the pickups!
I have a borescope that I've been playing with so that I can look inside these guitars. I don't see anything obviously wrong inside it at the neck joint.
Oh, and the case is a wreck and smells like pipe tobacco, so there's that. Yay. That's the second Guild in a week shipped to me in a case that I have to keep in the garage. Yuck. Thankfully the guitar does not smell.
Oh, and the guitar was wrapped in bubble wrap inside the case. Sigh... Don't use bubble wrap on lacquer guitars. Luckily it was cool out.
Oh yeah, I complained that the pics didn't show the original volume knob so he put that on and put the dopey brass one in the case pocket where it fell out and rattled around during it's long trip in a box with inadequate packing material. Oddly enough, the freaking bubble wrap may have saved the guitar from that stupid knob. This is how I found the knob when I opened the case. Oy.