My good friend Jeff recently lent me his Nash Tele – a T-52. He’s one of those guys who’s totally into that relic look. Me on the other hand? Give me a nice shiny guitar any day! And even if I found an old guitar at an estate sale, I’d have it cleaned and brightened – though to retain its value, I wouldn’t do anything other than to freshen it up). But as you can’t judge a book by its cover, so it goes with guitars. Just because a guitar looks beat up and old, in the end, it’s how it sounds and plays that really matters, and the Nash Tele I just got done playing with is a total joy to play, with very nice tones to boot!
One thing that really impresses me about the guitar is how fast the neck is. It is so easy to move around on the neck that I was making tons of mistakes at first because I was able to play with a lot of speed. A lot of that has to do with how easy it is to play a note. Just lightly press, and the guitar starts to sing! Of course, there’s not much sustain, but that’s to be expected out of a Tele or tele-like guitar.
Just in case you missed all the excitement, I had written an article about the Fender Roadworn series awhile back. I basically said in the article that I just really don’t get the relic thing, and that I’d rather to the “relicing” myself. If that’s your thing, more power to you – what inspires us is what makes us great. But cosmetics aside, it’s also how a guitar feels and it enables you to express yourself. So even though I don’t get the relic thing, just based on playability and sound, I could easily own one of these. They are very nice guitars!
Rating Summary:Surprisingly enough, my little ding didn’t come from my not “getting it” with the relic look. The guitar I tested had a weird buzz in the second string, and it wasn’t due to fret buzzing either. It didn’t really show up when the guitar was plugged into an amp, but it was really evident. Otherwise, the guitar played and sounded great!
Guitar Gear 