Anderson Drop Top

My Transparent Cajun Magenta (gorgeous!) DT was finished on 4-3-96@Noon. This was one of the last non-Buzz Feiten Tuning Drop Tops. It has a quilted maple top on a basswood body, maple w/rosewood fingerboard, pull-pot for combined split coil hum cancelling on the two TA passive humbuckers(H3, H1), and a chrome original Floyd Rose, sunken into the body. The frets are so perfectly dressed, they look like a jeweler did them. I bought this guitar at a show in NYC that had skylights, so that I could see it in all its glory. It was sitting next to a more expensive EVH Music Man, and there was just no comparison. the non-locking Grover tuners would not have been my first choice(I don't like the look of them), but since TA decided to use them, I figure they had their reasons, so I won't change them for simply aesthetic reasons of my own. TA sends you one of their matching straps (or a t-shirt) when you register your warranty, which is lifetime, transferable, unlimited, and completely unnecessary(unless you alter any specific area of the guitar-duh).

Whatever I play on this guitar, it speaks with authority. Notes jump out of it. I use a few different amps- Mesa/Boogie Studio .22; Hughes & Kettner Tubeman plus preamp and M/B fifty/fifty power amp; a Sundown, and an amp made by a guy in Holland named ROY (but because the NA distibutor is such a jerk, I refuse to give the name-you figure it out...). The sound of this guitar is simply chameleonic. It can go from a LP crunch mid to a stratty sparkle in a flick. All the electronic parts are ultra-high quality. It sounds unbelievable and feels even better.

Flawless everywhere, of course.

I got the catalog, and it says to be sure to wear something sharp, or the guitar will upstage you. Too true. I don't even take mine out of the the house unless I know I'm going to be seen in a positive environment. I'm too paranoid of somebody stealing it from me.

Top notch, all the way. Roy is a very knowledgeable and patient guy who will answer all of the questions you may have pertaining to the guitars.

I've been playing for 20 years. I have an '82 Fender '62 strat RI, a '93 Parker Fly Deluxe non-trem, an Ibanez prototype(secret, one of a kind), and a bunch of other guitars I bash on when I don't want to take out the TA or the other three. They can have my Drop Top when they pry it out of my cold, dead hands. I love that it's one of the last non-Buzz Feiten TA's made. I can always get another with the system installed. This guitar has character without it. Unless you are prepared to part with (at least) a grand and a half, do not even pick up a TA. Otherwise, you'll start looking for gas stations and convenience stores to knock over to come up with the cash...

My 1992 Drop Top was made in California like all Andersons. It's a quilt maple top in Bora Bora blue on a basswood Strat-style body. Neck is 22-fret, 25.5-inch scale maple neck with matching paint headstock, pau ferro fingerboard with medium jumbo frets, Schaller license keys. All hardware is gold. Kahler Floyd Rose license trem. Pickup configuration is humbucker in bridge and stacked singles in middle and neck, all passive made by Anderson. The "switcheroo system" is on board (three on-off-on switches which taps the humbucker and the stacks and the Anderson "blower" switch bypasses any toggle combination to go straight to bridge humbucker) are on board with master volume and tone.
This guitar is decked out with every thing a player could dream of but don't let the hot-rod super-strat thing fool you.. It's so versatile, it's the first guitar I've owned (including high end pieces like ESPs, Jacksons, old USA Charvels, Gibson, even a Steinberger) that remains totally stock, down to the strap pins.

You'd be hard pressed to find a guitar more versatile. I play primarily hard rock and Texas-style blues. It does the "super Strat" thing great due to the humbucker in bridge and single stacks. Very quiet guitar noise-wise and only feeds back when you want it to. And I have yet to find a non-Fender Strat that can do a better job emulating classic strat tones better than this guitar.
It does pristine clean, kinda clean, little dirty, getting raspy, and down-right obnoxious, you name it. If I show up at a gig or recording time with one guitar, it's this one.

I string my Drop Top with Dean Markley Hybrid Slinkys (9-46). I have not had to intonate the guitar since I got it, I only touch the keys to re-string and I rarely have to touch the fine tuners, tuning is that stable (according to both my ears and the Peterson strobe tuner at the guitar shop). This Anderson was made before Feiten Tuning became a standard factory option and most Anderson owners who play it swear it's a Feiten-equipped guitar, it's that perfectly in tune up and down the neck.
There's not a flaw on this guitar, construction wise or set-up wise. Fretwork that's this clean will spoil you. The action will go as low as a 70s Les Paul Custom without buzzing if you want it that low. Electronics are quiet and six years later, not even the slightest dust scratches in the pots.
Visually, the Bora Bora (originally a blueish turquoise) has yellowed slightly over the years, making it a hint greener than brand new Bora Bora-painted guitar. Don't let that scare you. Between the severely quilted top and the color, this guitar looks like the floor of the Caribbean from a plane. It's so beautiful, my wife doesn't mind if I leave it in the living room and uninvited guests pop up.

Never had a tuning problem live and only broke a string once at practice, playing a Metallica song requiring heavy downstroke picking on month-old strings. Not one crapped out switch, pot, not even a broken tremolo part.

The guys at Anderson seem very helpful by phone. I don't know why they even warranty their guitars because apparently nothing on the guitar is breakable. And I have yet to find a non-Anderson-dealer guitar shop owner, manager or employee that doesn't have nice things to say about them (and I don't tell them I have one before I ask).

I've been playing 16 years and I've owned a lot of guitars, but when I got my Drop Top, I noticed I stopped playing my other guitars and I started selling them off. Whether I'm at rehearsals, on stage or just playing around at the house, I'm using the Anderson, a Mesa-Boogie Mark III half stack and a cable. Very rarely I'll throw in effects, and even then it's only a Crybaby and a cheap delay pedal for soloing. The guitar literally sings and it would be a sin to color its tone with effect grease.
The Drop Top iis the ultimate workhorse and it's beautiful on top of that. Not a weakness to be found in the instrument and they carry solid re-sale value if you're stupid enough to get rid of it. You can't ask for more in a guitar.
If it dies in a house fire or is stolen, I will likely need therapy...and another guitar just like it within 24 hours on top of that.

Anderson, made in the USA, 22 frets, maple top with basswood body, switcheroo switching system, volume knob, tone knob, SSH config, anderson pickups SD-1, SD-1R, H2+, bora bora blue quilted top, floyd rose, grover turners, tom anderson standard fretboard, rosewood fingerboard/maple neck, came with anderson case.

This guitar suits my music style perfectly. Im into a lot of instrumental rock, satriani, vai, and others. Im also into stuff like dream theater, pat martino (jazz), metallica and many other bands like these. Im using it with a Gallien-Krueger backline 100 amp, the pickups are very very quiet, the tone is awesome, best tone in any guitar bar none. the varitey of this guitar is mind-blowing, i can go from a shredding metallica solo, to a soft jazz solo, to about anything you can imagine.

Anderson guitars come with a FLAWLESS set up, the action is very very low, it plays like butter. the pickups are adjusted PERFECTLY, everything is perfect about this guitar, no flaws at all, as i said before, this guitar is flawless.

this is a VERY reliable guitar. taking one look at it, it is a VERY solid made guitar. perfect is the word i use to describe it.

the BEST customer support out there, bar none. and yes there is a lifetime warranty.

I have been playing for around 2-2 1/2 years and played about every guitar make out there. this is the perfect guitar period, nothing beats it. ive tried various ibanez, prs, gibson, parker, fender, you name it. ive owned a yamaha and a ibanez js100 guitars, if this guitar was stolen, i would hunt that person down. what do i love about it? i love EVERYTHING about it, i compared it to MANY guitars as ive mentioned above and this one was way above all of them. this is the perfect guitar.

This Drop Top was born on 10-12-97 in the afternoon (or "p" as on the neck plate). This is a tortoise shell (or Rootbeer finish) with binding, quilted maple top on basswood body, hard rock maple neck with madagascar rosewood fretboard, matching headstock, satin back finish on neck, 1-11/16" nut, heavy frets, Buzz Feiten Tuning System, gold vintage trem, grover locking tuners, SD1R -> SD1 -> H2+ pickups (S/S/H), switcheroo, vintage voicing.
If you have the 1998 Tom Anderson Catalog, you have seen this guitar. It is the cover. Yes, it really is the exact guitar shot for the cover as confirmed by my dealer, the folks at Tom Anderson and Brian Tong at The Brainyard who did the catalog.
The switcheroo system is explained well by John Ou's review of his Drop Top Classic, but here is a quickie run down of how it works: Each pickup has a on-off-on switch. Up is either parallel or split coil (as per you choice on EACH pickup inside the control cavity), middle is pickup off and down is pickup in series. The fourth mini switch is the "blower switch" which is up = off and down = full series humbucker no matter how the other mini swithes are set. So you can go from a bright single coil tone to ripping humbucker and back with a quick flip of the wrist. In use, this is a very powerful and intelligent solution.

This guitar fills a void in my sound (which is primarily Gibson'esque rock guitar ala my three PRS's) by giving me true single coil tones. My equipment list consists of: Amps: Rivera Rake 55 (with NOS Mullard 12AX7/ECC83 in preamp and Svetlana EL-34's in power amp), Rivera Knucklehead (GE NOS 12AX7 in preamp and Svetlana EL-34's in power amp)
Speaker Cabs: Rivera Rake 2x12 (Celestion G12T-85 wired in series 16 ohms), Rivera Q-Cab 2x12 (EVM-12L's wired in series 16 ohm), 1980's Carvin 4x12 (reloaded and rewired with Celestion Vintage 30's wired in series 16 ohms), Peterson Custom Shop 2x12 with Naylor Special Design 50's (wired in series 16 ohms).
Effects: Fulltone Clyde Wah, Fulltone Deja Vibe, Fulltone Supa Trem, Ayan Signal Conditioner. (All mounted on a custom Fulltone pedal board powered by Fulltone Black Box Jr. power supply and travels in a Custom Fulltone Road Case)
The sounds generated with my Anderson are smooth. There is no better word to describe it. I am a very happy Anderson owner because the guitar has lived up to its billing and given me the Fender'esque tones I was lacking with the PRS's. In the studio and live, the guitar sounds very good as compared with the PRS's. It is inherently a brighter sounding instrument (probably due to the maple neck) even with the humbucker only on in series as compared to my PRS's. Very detailed sounding, complex overtones, fairly even spread over the sound spectrum with a slight upper midrange hump on the humbucker, but this is all another way of saying, "Very smooth sounding." This is not a grungy sounding bluesy guitar. The tones are too round, full and pretty sounding. Although you could make the guitar do the nasty tones if you wanted too, you are better served by being seduced by its silky sounds. The single coil sounds share the same descriptions with the spanky and undeniably fun sounding Fender Strat tones.
My quick 2? on the Buzz Feiten Tuning System: the overtones that beat or pulsate on many chord voicings are not present here. Open string chords ring true, diads and triads that I would normally shy away from with a real clean tone sound more pleasent. To my ear, the system does in fact represent a real improvement.

Now here is where this Tom Anderson Drop Top outshines even my beloved PRS's. This is mostly because of the following: the fret work is the best I have ever seen on any level instrument bar none. If there is ever a more perfect fret finish, then it can only be as good as this guitar, not better. The set-up from the factory was good, but I have specific wants and needs and do my own set-ups, so only minor tweaking was necessary. The Feiten Tuning system threw me a bit on this part, I cannot do my own intonation without a tuner that can be adjusted for tempered tuning. But the pickups, the fit and finish overall are just what you would expect from a guitar at this price level or beyond.
The neck is so sexy and seductive feeling, when I first sat with this guitar I must have played for 20 or 30 minutes without plugging in. The neck was so inviting and acoustic tone unplugged is very appearent and very rich. I had just played a 10th Anniversary PRS, an Artist IV PRS, and even a couple of other Anderson models (Drop Top Classics) at that store. This one just spoke to me. Once I plugged in and was met with the rich and creamy sounds I paid for and walked out of the store with the guitar.
I do not use trem at all anymore and added the fifth spring and set up the guitar with the trem base flat against the body. Tuning stability is good.
I am not crazy at all about the grover locking tuners. You need a key or screwdriver to unlock/lock them, making stage use limited IMHO. I am not going to change them for this reason, but if this was my live axe, I would in a hearbeat.

This guitar has been played live in rehearsal halls and at a controlled atmosphere party, but because of its cost and my inability to see it bumped and scratched, it will most likely be mostly played at home, in the studio and at rehearsals only. The finish will withstand it fair share of use, it hung on the wall of a music store for a few months with no scratches or wear evident at all.

Here again, Tom Anderson stands above the rest of the Guitar makers out there. They answer the phone, they talk to you and treat you with respect. I requested a catalog long ago, it was sent promptly. I called when I got this guitar to get the offsets for the tuning system. It was sent with my free guitar strap (or you can get a free t-shirt). Very nice touch.
Because this guitar was on the cover of the Anderson Catalog, I wanted a copy of the photo. I called Tom Anderson and they put me in touch with their catalog producer, Brian Tong, a fellow Tom Anderson owner. He sent me the original transparency. That is gutsy. I had it copied and sent it back. That is cool. Highest kudos.

This guitar is the Mercedes of guitars. I have always been a PRS lover and player, this guitar is a beautiful contrast to that type of sound. IMHO, PRS is the intelligent evolution of Gibson-esque guitars, and Tom Anderson is the intelligent evolution of Fender-esque guitars. I spent more money on this one instrument than any one instrument ever. I do not spend money lightly. An incredible guitar that more than lived up to the hype.
Here is my full gear breakdown, plus my influences and style:
Guitar Related Stuff
Guitars: 1991 PRS Custom 24, 1995 PRS Custom 22, 1997 PRS CE-22, 1995 Peterson Custom Shop Signature, 1982 Guild S-25, 1994 Parker Fly Deluxe, 1996 Taylor 810S.
Amps: Rivera Rake 55 (with NOS Mullard 12AX7/ECC83 in preamp and Svetlana EL-34's in power amp), Rivera Knucklehead (GE NOS 12AX7 in preamp and Svetlana EL-34's in power amp)
Speaker Cabs: Rivera Rake 2x12 (Celestion G12T-85 wired in series 16 ohms), Rivera Q-Cab 2x12 (EVM-12L's wired in series 16 ohm), 1980's Carvin 4x12 (reloaded and rewired with Celestion Vintage 30's wired in series 16 ohms), Peterson Custom Shop 2x12 with Naylor Special Design 50's (wired in series 16 ohms).
Effects: Fulltone Clyde Wah, Fulltone Deja Vibe, Fulltone Supa Trem, Ayan Signal Conditioner. (All mounted on a custom Fulltone pedal board powered by Fulltone Black Box Jr. power supply and travels in a Custom Fulltone Road Case)
Misc: Mesa Boogie V-Twin Pedal, Furman PL-8 Plus, Tascam 424mkII, Pro Co 10 gauge 2ft speaker cable with Switchcraft plugs, D'Addario 10's (Phosphor Bronze 13's on Acoustics), D'Andrea .73mm Delrex Formula Picks (the Yellow ones), Boss AD-5 Acoustic Preamp, Monster Cable Rock Cords, Spectraflex Fatso Flex Guitar Cords. PA Stuff: Mackie 1604VLZ, Mackie FR-1400i Power Amp, Fender Artist 115-ELC Speakers, EV Monitors, SKB Rack Cases.
Music Related Stuff
Band Name: Marilyn Mack Group
Favorite Music: Guitar rock/pop/funk/jazz.
Favorite Musicians: Brian May, Jeff Beck, Alex Lifeson, Tim Pierce, Seal, BB King, Edward Van Halen, Wes Montgomery, James Brown, Miles Davis, etc.
Favorite Music to Play: Guitar rock/pop/funk/jazz.
If something happed to this guitar, I would go out of my way to find another Tom Anderson that meant as much to me. I love the way it feels, sounds, looks and plays. I do not like the grover locking tuners. The Buzz Feiten Tuning System and Switcheroo pickup selection scheme are very useful and make this guitar very important in my mix of tones I can play.
If you can not afford it and want it, start saving now. The Tom Anderson guitar will not disappoint -- it is worth the money.