G & L Guitars Comanche Solid Body
Review Setup: Solid Swamp Ash Body, Hard Rock Maple Neck with Rosewood fretboard. Z-coil pickups. Price as configured: $1700.00 (custom setups available) Summary: I give this 4.5 Tone Bones! The G&L Comanche is an excellent, hand-made, versatile guitar from the shop Leo Fender and George Fullerton started after Leo sold the Fender company. Incredible playability, and sweet, sweet sound from the Z-coil humbuckers. Not only that, with the flick of a mini-switch, you can engage all three pickups at once for a truly aggressive sound. This is a guitar that is not for the faint of heart. It wants to be played, not babied. Read on! |
I love writing this blog because it forces me to check out gear that I wouldn’t otherwise take a second glance at, and sometimes make new discoveries of gear that I didn’t even know existed. This entry is the result of one of those chance discoveries.
I thought I knew my guitar builders beyond the mainstream and semi-mainstream such as Gibson, Fender, PRS, etc. So it came as a HUGE surprise to walk into a small shop in Sacramento yesterday and see what looked like Stratocaster and Telecaster knock-offs hanging on the walls, only to be informed by the shop owner that the guitars were made by the prototype shop that George Fullerton and Leo Fender (hence, G & L) started after Leo sold the Fender company. Building on the traditional Fender body shapes, their creations extend the lines with solid and semi-hollow versions with various pickup configurations that reach far beyond their corporate counterparts. The results are guitars that push the envelope with design and innovation, while retaining the visual pedigree that made George Fullerton and Leo Fender famous in the first place. Also, all G & L’s are hand made. I know that alone may deter some players from even considering this brand, but amazingly enough, they’re not as expensive as you might think; more on that later. I had the chance to play the solid-body Comanche with tobacco sunburst through a ultra-sweet Rivera Venus 3 (I’ll write a review on that later 🙂 ).
At a distance, when you first the see the Comanche, you recognize the familiar body shape and pickup positioning, and you might say, “Hmmm… nice Strat.” Then, as you move forward, you see that the headstock is slightly different from a Strat, the bridge is really different from a Strat. The body is also a little narrower. Then you notice the absolutely weird-shaped pickups. These are an invention of Leo Fender. They’re actually two, hand-wrapped and offset three-string, single coil pickups with reverse polarity to eliminate hum. They’re almost like hybrid humbucker.
Look and Feel
The Comanche I played had a gorgeous tobacco sunburst finish overlaying a swamp ash body, with a hard rock maple neck and a rosewood fretboard. Surprisingly, this wasn’t a light guitar. In fact, it felt a little heavier than my own Strat, but the feel was luscious. The only ding that I gave the Comanche was that the back of the neck is gloss-lacquered. I personally prefer a silk finish, especially with a maple neck. It might be psychological, but that’s what I like. Speaking of the neck, it was a nice, C-shape, and the rosewood fretboard was a dream to play. I’m a big fan of rosewood fretboards. They provide great tactile feel, plus add warmth to the overall tone.
Sound
The best way to describe the tone of the Comanche is “a bit thicker than a Strat, but thinner than a Les Paul.” It’s this balance that is very appealing about this guitar. Just like the body style, with the sound, you recognize the pedigree, but it’s… different. Since I’ve played it , I’ve read some other reviews and most mentioned that the Comanche has an aggressive tone. It does, but that aggressiveness can be easily tempered by dialing back tone and volume controls; plus, tone also depends on the amp you’re using. I happened to test the Comanche out with a Rivera Venus 3, and the tones it produced were sweet and clean, owing a lot to the high amount of clean headroom available in the Venus 3. In typical Class A fashion, increased input gain produced nice pre-amp clipping, and with all three pickups engaged, this guitar could get as dirty as the best of ’em.
Unlike a Strat, the “hybrid” Z-coil pickups add nice amounts of sustain, which is further helped by the resonant swamp ash body. Bends and slow vibrato created nice, subtle overtones. On top of that, the touch sensitivity, even at lower volume levels, was very, very nice. All in all, I didn’t find the Comanche as aggressive as other reviewers found it; certainly more aggressive-sounding than a Strat, but as I mentioned, not as fat as a LP.
Click here to listen to some audio clips.
The audio clips sound really Texas-twangy, which is actually quite cool, but the clips don’t really show what this versatile guitar can do. The Comanche is capable of showing many faces, depending upon how you adjust it.
Playability
As I mentioned above, this baby wants to be played. The action is just right, and the neck is real fast despite the glossy lacquer finish on the back. The rosewood fretboard is especially nice, providing excellent tactile feedback. As I mentioned above, this guitar is not for the faint of heart. It’s meant to be played and coaxed and caressed to produce its wonderful song. While it’s easy to coax incredible tones from this guitar, its versatility might scare away those who won’t take the time to discover all its virtues.
I recommend this guitar for serious tone freaks who are in search of a “fatter” Strat sound, but want to retain that natural high-end ring. While not cheap, it’s also not unreasonable, especially for a completely hand-made instrument!
It took me a while, (a few years really) to warm up to my Comanche. I have a very unusual Comanche, in transparent Mary Kay white with a rosewood board and white mother-of-toilet seat. I have always found the bridge pickup to be a little too bright even by comparison to a Strat. Lately I have taken to rolling back the tone about 20 to 30% and getting a nice, fatter than single coil tone there. I recently played three gigs with it. I always bring a Strat and a Gibson style guitar, and I’m finally enjoying the G&L. I’ve been using an Orange tube amp that is somewhat darker than my usual Vox. This also warms it up a bit. I get some really good Robin Trower tones on the neck PU because the tone hangs in there when the Univibe sound is on. I came close to selling it a few times, but now I’m glad I didn’t. I do wish there were some after market pickup options tho.
Al K.
One thing you might consider doing to take the edge off your tone is to get a compressor pedal. To thicken up my tone with my Strat that has really bright ’57 Re-issue Tex Mex pickups, I run my signal through a Maxon CP9 Pro + compressor. I usually just do about 2.5/3.0 to 1 compression ratio, and that fattens up my signal just the right amount, without changing the tonal characteristics.
I reviewed a lot of compressors before I chose the Maxon, and I found it to be the most transparent out of the lot.
[…] But no matter, I picked up a Comanche off the rack, and instantly fell in love. So much so that I just had to write a review about it! But I had to temper that love with the reality that the street price for the guitar at $1700 was […]
I owned a Comanche for a little more than a year. Like Al Knight said, DON’T put the treble and the bass knob to the max, like we usually do on a Strat and LesPaul. These don’t have and shouldn’t always be set to max. Then..you..will..experience.. ..the..magic..of..a..Comanche. I own 2 Strats, one being the Eric Clapton and also a Gibson ES-335. They are all magic guitars, none are better than the other, they are just different princesses. I will dare to say that off the rack, the G&L is the little princess that will one day be a queen. It’s a super guitar, no noise, no batteries and a lot of sustain plus a lot of tone. What else does a king want? I will always be proud to have one of Leo’s best creation.
Nice. I’m still jones-ing for that guitar, but got a bit sidetracked with others for the time being. It’s still on my list!
I’ve had my Comanche for about 3 or 4 years and love it. Cherryburst with natural wood trim. I play into a hot rodded Blues Junior in tandem with a Native Insturments Guitar Rig 4 setup. I almost always have a Keeley modded Boss BD-2 and Keeley Compressor on. This is one sweet rig.
I play this guitar about 60% of the time and alternate off with a tele.
I got it for versatility, and I think I made a good choice. Like you said in the write-up, it (obviously) depends what you plug in to. Crunch to clean, this guitar does it right.
Looks good, feels good, is good.
I’d buy another one in a second. I am jonesing for a ASAT semi-hollowbody, though. Used G&L’s are a freakin’ bargain!!