Gretsch G6119 Tennessee Rose

I bought my 2002 used (barely, it is in showroom condition) at Willies in St. Paul, MN for $1250. I never really considered buying a Gretsch before seeing mine on the wall. But after I picked it up and plugged in, I couldn't walk away.

This thing really has musical range! The reissue Filtertron pickups are clear as bells. The neck pickup offers deep rich non-muddy jazz tones. The bridge pickup has vintage Beatle/60's sounds. With both pickups on you get this great Chet Atkins type of solid warm yet glassy sound that is very hard to come by out of the Gretsch family. Distorted it has a sweet & singing sustain. For a large guitar (2-1/2" thick) it feels good and the neck plays very fast The finish is beatiful (a real looker) and the setup is top notch. Quality parts for the most part. Nice Bigsby unit and Grover tuners.

The pickup switch could be of better quality, although it works fine. The strap pins are the type that you must unscrew to attach the strap, it's kind of a hassel to put on and take off, but once on the strap is NOT going to slip off, which is cool. Mine fits really tight in the Gretsch hardshell case and the case is not relieved for the Bigsby or the goofy strap pin making it a little struggle to put in. But once in all is good.

This is a beauty, a very detailed piece of work, which would have many opportunities to come up short in the finishing. In this case, NO PROBLEM, the closer you look, the more you're impressed. Binding, frets, neo classic position markers, knobs all very nice. This guitar was mfg. in Japan and I don't think it could be made better any where else. My other guitars (5) are all american made, the "Rose" does not have to take a back set to any of them.

You could probably find a nicer guitar if you looked hard enough, but it would be almost impossible to find one this nice in this price range ($1870 new at Guitar Center) So, unless you can shell out big bucks for a vintage Gretsch (although I don't know if they would sound any better) this is an great choice for a rich sounding guitar with great musical range. Rock, Jazz, Rockabilly, Country.

This review was originally published on http://www.musicgearreview.com

Japan manufacturing, mine is from 2002 and is part of the very first series after the Fender takeover.

This is the version with 2 volumes, one tone, and a master volume knob.

UTILIZATION

The handle is nickel for who likes to have something in hand (shredder go your way).

Contrary to what one might think, it is quite heavy for a hollow guitar.

SOUNDS

I do not know what pickups are mounted on mine (at the relevant time was the transition between the ceramic filter tron ​​and Hi Sensitive).

Against by the sound possesses superb definition and its typical gretschien. It qoit in clean or saturated (but not too much), it's always perfect.

OVERALL OPINION

Excellent instrument