Goya 116 Rangemaster

Italian wackiness made in 1965 this is a sunburst solidbody electric, semi-strat double cutaway body, adjustable truss rod, 4 screw bolt on maple like neck with rosewood fretboard, 21 frets, 4 half width single coil pickups where two pick up the bass strings and two pick up the treble strings (like P-bass pickups for guitar), 9 pushbutton switches (Vegamatic City!), one knob (volume), roller bridge and vibrato, weird (but cool!)grayish pearloid striped pickgaurd with "Goya" inlaid in the upper bout.

The four pickups are arranged so that each one covers three strings only and each is paired with another pickup to cover all six strings. So a pair covers the bridge position (pickups 1 & 2) and the other pair covers the neck position (pickups 3 & 4). Six of the switches control which pickups are on and off for these options: ALL (all four pickups on), 1 & 2 (Both bridge pickups), 1 & 4 (bridge treble strings and neck bass strings), 2 & 3 (bridge bass strings and neck treble strings, 3 & 4 (both neck pickups, and OFF (all pickups off).

Three pushbutton switches for tone: Hi, Med, Lo or more plainly: no treble cut, some treble rolloff, and heavy treble rolloff.

The vibrato is a one spring (adjustable tension) affair that works really well at putting your guitar out of tune! I locked it down by tightening the spring tension very tight and tucked the handle back in it's optimum position.....where you're not tempted to use it! Actually this might have some possibilities for mild vibrato use if your tweaked it a lot and worked on the nut, but I wouldn't buy one for this feature!

I'm giving this a 9 because of the pickups and vegamatic switches. Lots of sounds available which is the whole point behind this wacky guitar!

This is the best thing about this guitar. The pickups work really well and give you a great palette of sounds to choose from. All of them are somewhere in the Fender-ish Strat-Jazzmaster-Jaguar realm, but still different. The output is a little less than a Standard American Strat, but fairly comprable. The pickups sound really good for clean, overdriven or flat out fuzzed over the top distortion.

There is a great quality to the attack of the notes on this guitar that gives a nice snap or elastic quality to the sound. Very hip. Also good sustain with some fair hang time. But, combining the pickups in ways you can only get on this, or a Teisco Spectrum V, is where the fun is in this beast. Jangly, snappy treble strings with deeper (though still snappy) bass strings or vice versa and all at the push of a button is just FUN!! If you do any fingerstyle playing you will love the variety you can get by alternating your bass and treble string sounds, and all while you continue playing.

At first I was put off by the Tone pushbuttons since I'm so use to a knob to turn for that perfect EQ adjustment, but then I got where I REALLY liked the concept and find them much easier to manipulate while playing a phrase than a knob can ever be! Start out on Med with some treble rolled off, build up intensity and hit the HI button for a trebly tone and then go to LO and back to HI, etc...

This is a 10 because it is not a Strat, Tele or LP sound and gives you many tone choices, literally at your fingertips!

Well, either you like this weirdness or you don't. If you find Americana instruments the benchmark and old European models just plain junky, weirdo, me too, entry level sruff than stay away from this! But, for those more adventurous souls this thing plays really well. Intonation is easily set up with the adjustable saddle bridge and action on this guitar is extremely low without any buzzes. (So low and easy that 10's feel like 9's and 9's feel like rubberbands.) But, since to me a 10 in this category is limited to custom guitars hand made and expertedly finished I give this a 7, which is what I would give most factory guitars if they are well made, so this is pretty darn good for a 40 year old!

I can't complain! 40 years old and still going strong. the Vegamatic pushbuttons need some TLC once and a while to keep them making good contact, but other than that...

Not applicable.

I was pretty surprised that nobody had reviewed this guitar model yet. Even though it's not the best known guitar out there, you run into them at vintage shops/shows enough that there must be quite a few around. I have played Rangemasters at shops or borrowed from friends over the years and always meant to pick one up because they are a fun guitar with different, but really good, sounds.

I've played for 30 some years and have owned and played many Fenders, Gibsons, PRS's, Ricks, Wandres, Nationals/Supros/Airlines, Silvertones and many more than I can remember.

Overall this is a great OTHER guitar to most people, as in "I play a Strat and a PRS and some other guitars". Probably not the main one most people would bring on stage, though theres no shortcomings in the guitar to stop it from being your main axe. If you need/like other sounds than traditional Fender/Gibson this is a very fun alternative!