Danelectro Longhorn Baritone

Mine was probably produced in 2008, I think as a re-issue of an earlier re-issue of the original 1950s model. It is blueburst. Do not think of chique turquise or ocean emerald, but hard polaroid-blue fading into pure white, with a formica gloss. It has all the charm of a 1$-Hawaian shirt.

This is a truely strange instrument. Apart from the colour and the long horns:
- It has (sort of) a hollow body, made of a masonite outer shell around a plywood inner construction.
- The sides of the body are finished with adhesive tape.
- It has a peculiar bridge, with saddles
- that don't allow for action adjustment (you can
lower / raise / tilt the entire bridge, though);
- that are so low (relative to the bridge holes)
that they do not actually bend the strings
upwards as they should.
- Various parts rattle: the bridge, the pick-up switch (and what not?)
- The neck is rather loose (substitute for a tremolo arm?;-)

So why would anyone buy it at all? ... Well: the sound.

The secret weapong of this guitar is its sound: warm, twangy - instant spaghetti-western. It seems that the pickups are the best part of this instrument.

The aluminum nut, that was skrewed into the neck, was way too high which made the guitar very heavey to play. I unskrewed it, filled the skrewhole with a small peg, filed the bottom of the nut (about 0.5 mm) and re-attached it. A well-spent hour: now it plays well.

The adhesive tape was not properly attached. I wondered why there was tape at all. I checked, and the masonite had some cracks (presumably at the joint).

Intonation and pickup adjustment were fine.

I can't imagine that this is a reliable guitar, but I don't intend to use it a lot: just as a sort of gimmick intermezzo (I am a bass player). If it breaks down, I'll just get myself a new one.

This is a reissue of a true cult instrument: quite trashy and seemingly proud of it. It's cheap, and given the price you get good value for money. I like it a lot - a >1000??? sound in a <300???, eye-catching body: better than the other way around!

2006 Reissue. As far as I can tell this guitar is pretty much the same as the original 1958(?) model. Longhorn (lyre) body shape, 24 fret neck joining the body at the 24th fret, 30 inch scale length, two lipstick pickups, three way selector, master vol & tone controls. Ply and hardboard construction, metalic gold finish. No case or accessories included.

I have the tone control set at about a qarter from the bottom most of the time and don't use the bridge PU on its own at all. These pickups are very bright and "crashy." With the controls set like this I can get lovely deep twang sounds down the neck on the middle strings, clear punchy bass sounds from the bottom strings and mellow jazzy tones played with the fingers up the neck. Great for spooky spidery tones, low slow chords(great with long reverbs and delays) and jazzy fingerstyle.

Very good finish, especially the neck. Action needed adjusting, but then I changed the tuning from B down to A and put heavier strings on. Adjusting the truss rod on these guitars is a bit of a pain coz you have to take the neck off to do it. I had to adjust mine a couple of times and let it settle in, then adjust it again. To get the correct (lack of) curvature on the neck the truss rod has to be adjusted so that there is a positive curvature without the strings on.

Construction seems very good although it is in the nature of these guitars that they are light. Would benefit from a change of machine heads. Bridge is fiddly to adjust and attachment seems a little flimsey although I have not had any trouble with it so far. Now I have it well set up it seems solid and reliable enough.

I love this guitar! Before I bought it I had used a standard Les Paul guitar with heavy strings as a baritone. I had looked online for baritone guitars and pretty much decided on an Epiphone Les Paul. As luck would have it my local music shop had an Epiphone which I tried out and thought, "yeah this is quite good," I then tried out the Danelectro that they also had in, just to compare it and was absolutely blown away by the tone and character of it. The Epiphone was really bland by comparison. If this guitar was lost or stolen I would not rest until I had got another one! I have been playing for thirty years and own various acoustic and electric guitars of different kinds.