![]() ![]() The top is a maple laminate that measures about 1/8″ thick, which is likely one of the reasons that this guitar doesn’t ring out like an acoustic when played unplugged (though it’s no slouch, either). Certainly the Tele-purists would likely bemoan such additions to the iconic guitar, but then I’d imagine that a Tele-purist would think this guitar to be some sort of crime against nature to begin with, so I wouldn’t worry much about that. This is a Telecaster-shaped guitar that has none of the “comfort contours” such as a belly cut or forearm bevel on the body that you might find on a modern Telecaster. When I asked Hans Moust about this, he posited that with the then recent availability of actually useful and protective gig-bags, people simply opted for a more useful solution that likely came in at a lower price. The fact that the case was not included in the original price may account for the fact that many of the Crossroads CR01s I see for sale do not include the original case. ![]() The case for this guitar, at least according to the price guide, is the same case that Guild Songbirds came in, which is listed as the C42P Deluxe shaped case that was an additional $175. If there’s one thing Guild has always been good at, it’s muddying the waters with confusing model names, a tradition that remains to this day, though thankfully there are no Chinese-made Newark St. That means that there is an entire line of Acoustics from the ’80s called Crossroads, the telecaster-shaped guitar in this review called Crossroads (CR01) from 1994, and the Slash-designed double-neck guitar called Crossroads from 1997-2000. Hell, I even reviewed one which is the same guitar pictured here leaning up against the wall with the CR01. If you do a Google search for Guild Crossroads, you may find a different guitar to all of those listed so far, that being the Guild Crossroads Double-Neck designed by Slash which, according to the catalogs, does in fact have the name Crossroads. Clearly it’s also more versatile, but man do I ever think that the Guild looks better. That’s actually true of the Acoustasonic as well, and I think the Acoustasonic beats the Guild in the fact that it has a bridge electric guitar pickup where the Guild CR01 has a neck electric guitar pickup. It’s really an electric guitar and it’s really an acoustic guitar and you can mix the two together. The Guild CR01 doesn’t have any digital manipulation going on. Regardless of whatever digital trickery is involved, the fact remains that the Acoustasonic guitars are a modern tech marvel, but from a luthier standpoint I still think that Guild did it first in 1994. Then again, I have to think that due to the DSP involved that those five voices are models of other guitars, and while that’s really cool, the nerd part of my brain goes, “hmmm…” because that’s kind of the same as plugging any acoustic into a DSP to make it sound like a different guitar. ![]() The Guild Crossroads CR01 doesn’t have quite so many voices, but it was made in 1994 some 25 years ago before low-cost Digital Signal Processors (DSPs) were as commonly available as they are today. And it’s hollow! Not only is it hollow, but it’s braced like an acoustic, though it has a flamed maple top. But it has an EMG pickup! But it also has a piezo pickup. ![]() The neck is a bolt-on, but it’s not like a Strat or Tele because it has a relatively flat 16″ radius not to mention the fact that it has a 6×6 headstock.Ĭlearly, the guitar is shaped like a Telecaster, but it has a very acoustic-guitar type bridge with bridge pins to hold the strings. The neck is very much like an electric guitar – a Strat or a Tele to be specific, in that it has a 25 1/2″ scale length with an unbound rosewood fretboard with 22 frets. As a result of my doubts I was interested to try out this relatively rare instrument for myself, especially given its rather strange construction. This is an interesting guitar because it’s kind of built like an acoustic and kind of built like an electric, ostensibly in order to get the benefits of both, though in my experience compromises like that tend to accentuate the limitations of both instead. ![]()
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