G&L ASAT-3

Tele style guitar with 7.5 radius neck. Jumbo frets on a rosewood board and nice c-shaped satin finished neck. The most three dimensional Ash grain shows through a glasslike sunburst finish. G&L hardtail bridge. Body is heavy for an ash guitar. When compared to my ASAT Classic I own it feels almost twice as heavy.

Three strat sized MFD pickups are installed and connected to a five way pickup selector.

The three MFD pickups provide a unique sound. They can be very base like if you dial it in. However, even when they are dialed as such they still can provide a piercing tone when picked hard. This is great since it allows you to instill a lot of feeling in to the music.

SInce I own an ASAT Classic I have noticed differences. First, the body is heavy. This is significant since it obviously changes the tone of the guitar and it makes your back hurt! For a while I did not like the weight but after a while the sounds that were produced outweighed the drawbacks.

I can get tele sounds, strat sounds, unique ASAT III sounds, and even a very rich, full Jazz tone. However, the ASAT Classic when compared to the ASAT III produces a much truer Jazz tone since the neck pickup does not add any Strat sytle overtones.

The sustain on the ASAT III is great as well. Note: changing your pickup height has a great effect on the sound of this instrument and I would suspect the other reviewers might not have accounted for this.

Overall a great sounding guitar.

Aesthetics are beautiful all around.

The setup from the factory was not a pro job by any means. This is very common with other manufacturers as well. Once it was setup and intonated it was just fantastic.

You can't do a thing to rattle this instrument.

G&L support has been exceptional. I had a luthier tell me he would set up my other G&L, the ASAT Classic when I first got it. He ground down the frets so much it felt like it was a fretless guitar and would die when the string was bent. I couldn't believe the XXXXX ruined my new guitar. I wrote G&L and sent the guitar to them explaining my plight. Stating that I have not even played this instrument and wanted to purchase a new neck. They replaced the neck free of charge. How cool is that?!!!

Playing over 10 years. I own and ASAT Classic, ASAT III, and Ibanez AS200. If this guitar were lost or stolen I would try to get it again or maybe try another G&L with similar characteristics.

I love the versatility and sound of this guitar. Way more versatile than any guitar I have ever played.

Custom made 1998 G&L ASAT III. Left-handed. 21 Fret Birdseye Maple neck and fretboard. Lake Placid Blue Tele Body with Pearloid Pick-guard. 3 single coils w/ 5 way switch. Came with SKB Hardshell

In my opinon, this is by far teh most important category. It is true, it does sound like a cross between a Strat and a Tele. The bridge pu is a bit tinny, but good for leads. I personally use the combe of the middle pu and the neck pu for the fullest sound, with the least amount of hum. The single coils when selected by themselves, are noisy, but they are super hot.

Now, this is definitely not a guitar anyone wants to use for Korn or something like that. I play more along the lines of Radiohead, and other brit-pop stuff. BTW, I play through a Laney LC30 combo and a 1962 Marshall Bluesbreaker combo.

The action isn't bad when I got it from the factory. I live in a super dry climate, so my neck shrunk a little bit, and since then I have screwed around with the truss rod a little as well. The pickups are infinitely adjustable, from the overall hieghth to the individual heighth of the magnets.

These guitars are hand-made with the old pre CBS Fender machines in Fullerton, so you know the wood is good and the hardware is excellent.

The only thing I have replaced in the two years of heavy playing are the saddles, which were only $16 a set, so I bought 2.

I had to reorder my saddles. They were so cheap, I ordered two sets. When I ordered them from the G&L Website, they screwed up my order and sent me 1 set of bass saddles. Then they corrected it and sent me the actual 2 sets of guitar saddles, and didn't charge me any shipping, since I had to wait so long. They also let me keep the bass saddles. I only give them an 8 because the girl I dealt with at BBE Sound (that's the parent of G&L) was super nice and they did eventually get things corrected.

I have been playing for about ten years. I have gone through playing an Ibanez R470, a Samick Strat knock-off, as well as Yamaha Pacifica. It's obvious that compared to my previous guitars, that the G&L is tons better, but I did my research, and shopping around. For the money, it is a good guitar.

My next guitar purchase will probably something like a Guild Starfire IV or a Rickenbacker 360.

This is one of two know prototypes circa early '90 for what is now a production G&L guitar. Basically, this is G&L's version of a "Burton Tele" - tele body and ncek with strat electronics.
Everything about this guitar screams "artist one-off". Medium weight ash body with two-step enamel finish (like porcelain). The grain shows thru white against the pale yellow finish. Stunning! 2-pc maple neck has an ebony fret board - the only board I've ever seen on an ASAT. Sperzel non-locking tuners and the smoothest pots I've ever felt round out the package.
Originally cam with G&L "field-coil" PUs with adjustable pole pieces. I couldn't stand the complete lack of chime, so I installed a set of Duncan vintage staggered strat PUs.
As I've mentioned, I'm sure this was built for an artist during a time when dealers I knew simply could not get the factory to make these guitars for them - only ASATs and ASAT Classics were made. Every component is top-quality.

The sound of this guitar is somewhere between a tele and a strat. It is woodier sounding than my '57 RI strat. All in all, this is the most versatile guitar I own. My strat can be a little too bright for some songs and my PRS too dark. This guitar hangs right in the middle. Bridge PU is bright and round, perfect for distortion leads. Neck PU is more strat then tele. Positions 2 and 4 have decent chime.
I should add that I owned (and traded) an ASAT with the G&L soap bar PUs. I think Leo's ears were completely blown by the time he designed all G&L PUs - THEY ALL SUCK (IMHO). That's my story and I'm sticking to it. I like bright full-bodied SC PUs. Duncans are my favorite. G&L PUs are boinky and honky and (IMHO) sound just awful!
As far as the rest of the guitar, the body is fairly resonant with a nice warm woody quality. The ebony fretboard adds a nice touch of firmness to the tone. Very reminscent of a RW strat.
Rating for this category is for the stock config - add 5 points if you swap the PUs out or find one with Duncans factory installed. The difference is night and day!

I sometimes wonder if perhaps an artist refused this guitar because it wouldn't tune well. My guitar tech finally dialed this one in, but he had to turn it out a bit. The frets were extremely high, I had them taken down. It still requires a light touch.
Bottom line, it plays very well now.

What's to go wrong?

It took awhile to really bond with this guitar, I've contemplated selling it on several occasions. I'm glad I didn't. Some of the best deals are the ones you never make! I'd say about half the time, this guitar goes to a gig just because I consider it so versatile. I love the fact that it's a one off with a story but I would consider it a better value if I didn't have so much into it. I'm probably into it for around $800 (that's about average for most of my bolt-on solidbody guitars) considering the PU change and various setups. I'm deducting some value points for this. However, I'm finally very happy with it and don't foresee selling it. I think G&Ls in general are some of the very best values in new guitars today.