Nash Guitars Custom Telecaster Thinline

Beautiful brand spanking new telecaster built by Bill Nash of Nashguitars in Olympia, Washington. The guitar is a thinline (semi-hollow body with a single f-hole) telecaster design. Standard telecaster configuration with a three-way switch, Seymour Duncan hot tele rhythm PU on the neck and a Rio Grande Muy Grande in the bridge position. Three saddle compensating bridge. All hardware selected for high quality, durability and a vintage look. Alder body, compound radius maple neck and board with medium frets. I selected a nice sturdy tweed, vintage style hardshell case to house the guitar. The finish is 100% nitrocellulose lacquer over a custom color design that Bill worked very closely with me on and is absolutely stunning. I'm not sure how to rate this particular category since the scale seems to be based on the number of features instead of the quality of those selected. Given that the configuration of this guitar is straight-forward by choice and the expertise and advice that Bill rendered in helping me decide from a variety of options such as pick-up types, neck-type, frets etc. I feel I have to give it a 10.

I play mostly a blues, R&B, and rockabilly mix. I run the guitar through a Groove Tube Soul-O 45 1x12 combo. Effects used are typically a Fulltone Fat Boost and a Fulltone Fulldrive II. The guitar sounds wonderful and nails my needs on the head. I attribute this again to the advice and knowledge of the builder. I spent a long time discussing with Bill the sound I wanted out of the instrument. I explained all of the different guitars I had played over the years, what settings I liked or disliked about them and why and he steered me to the two pick-ups and advised on the selection of the alder body over other options. The guitar has big warm tone on the rhythm selection, a fat aggressive punch in the middle and a mean telecaster growl on the lead. In particular and of importance to me, the lead pick-up is not overy bright or shrill like some telecasters (including my vintage '72 thinline). Moreover, in working with Bill I was assured that if I was not pleased with the pick-up selection he recommended, that he would swap them out and install another set at no cost until "we got it right."

Okay, okay, so I have one tiny issue. The action was a bit too low for my tastes when it arrived. Please remember that this was all done via telephone and internet correspondence so I can find no fault here. I simply picked up the phone (and yes, when you call you get the guy that actually builds your guitar) and got some assurancers and advice on raising the action and I now have it up, just a tad from where it was, and it plays very solidly, very sure footed, and very smooth. Pickups seem just right, nice clear tone and rich volume all the way across. The fret work is top notch. The guitar seesm to be constructed with attention to detail by a very qualified builder. Everything works perfectly and feels nice and solid. The finish, as mentioned above, is just jaw-dropping. I had seen a few of Bill's custom sunbursts on his website and found one that intrigued me that he called a cherry cola burst. I asked him if it could be modified to attain a slightly different look and was told it was no problem. He sets up a webpage off his site for you when he builds a guitar so he was able to start out with the bare wood photos and then posted pics each time he applied paint. In this way we were able to communicate, review and make adjustments at every step of the process to get the color exactly where I wanted it. When it arrived it was actually a tad darker than it appeared on the jpegs (digital photo gremlins) but was even more gorgeous than it looked on the webpage. The nitrocellulose work is lovely, it shimmers like glass and the colors are deep and rich. It is a two-tone fade that starts as a deep black cherry one the edges and very slowly lightens into what I would describe as a rich burgandy in the center. Complemented with a cream-colored three-ply guard and a neck with a slight vintage hue and this thing is just beautiful. Did I mention that I'm really pleased with the finish???? This one "goes to 11."

I have only had the guitar for a couple weeks but I believe that it is very well constructed and durable. Given the beautiful finish work I can assure you that this baby will get serious TLC so I can't imagine running into any issues. Everything about it feels nice and firm, like the parts all fit just right and were snugged together with care. As to the finish, I suspect it will wear more quickly over the years than today's polyurethane approach but this is something I realized going in. As far as I'm concerned, polyurethane finish is the equivalent of dipping a guitar in a vat of melted plastic. The increased quality in the feel, playability and sound of the nitrocellulose finish is more than sufficient to warrant the tradeoff against the potentially increased durability of polyurethane in my book. As to gigging without a back-up, would I, sure if I didn't have another guitar. I suspect this will be my primary guitar when playing live and my '72 thinline will be the back-up and used if I happen to break a string in the middle of a set, but that's about the only reason I can think of to have another guitar on site.

The "company" is a guy named Bill Nash. He is incredibly friendly, very helpful, and always has the time to address your questions and concerns. I was absolutely confident that he wanted me to be more than happy with his product and was willing to do what was necessary to achieve that end. I came away feeling like he doesn't build guitars so he can sell them, but that he sells guitars so he can build them. In other words, the building of a quality guitar is the most important aspect of what he is doing. And the price was very fair. He posted a parts list with each wholesale cost, labor, applicable mark-ups etc. and I feel that I received a high quality product at a very reasonable price. It was a couple hundred dollars more than going into a music store and buying a "similar" guitar off the wall but there is no way you will do that and receive the quality, personal attention to detail, and support that you get from dealing with a builder like Bill. I read another review of one of Bill's guitars before making the decision to have mine built and I hae to echo that player's sentiment, this was a no-brainer. If I decide to get another high quality guitar sometime I'll be speaking with him again.

I've been playing on and off for about 20 years. In addition to the new guitar I have a '72 Fender Thinline a '75 Stratocaster, an early 70s SG that is close to dead, and an early 80s Japenese manufactured Fender Telecaster ('62?) reissue. I won;t lose it, and if it gets stolen I will track the F*!&!%@$!! down who did it and take it back.