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Comments
I played the 3-pickup Hampton variation, first impressions were good, it felt well finished, and well put together, the matt finish on the back of the neck was a nice touch but it ended at a diagonal line at the top and bottom of the neck, which struck me as a little odd.
The Hampton is a weighty guitar, not a back killer, but certainly got some substance to it, I felt like a lot of the weight was in the neck. Speaking of the neck, it was a nice palm-full (I've got smallish hands) with a good fretboard radius, nothing felt difficult to play.
I particularly liked the pickups, three mini-humbucker sized gold foils sound great, each position offers a slightly different tone, chosen by a five way selector, my favourites were:
- Neck with the tone rolled off, lovely an bassy with no mud at all
- Middle only - very responsive to the tone control, you could really get a lot of variation out of this
- Bridge with neck - With tone about 3/4 on this would be my go to sound, bit of bite if you dig in but with plenty of body.
I was particularly impressed by the tone control, it seemed to have a large range and consistent travel, and allowed you to get everything from scoopy quack to teeth shattering treble.If I was nitpicking, I'd say the 5-way selector felt a little flimsy and volume only had travel for 70% of the knob, and the odd finishing on the back of the neck mentioned above.
In summary, it felt like a well made truly versatile guitar, is it worth the price tag? I'd say yes, particularly if you want a guitar that does a bit of everything well.
Any other questions ask away, I can always nip down again and have another go.
I think it's a bit odd that the Island series are made in Indonesia and the Americana ones are made in China - seems a lot of money all of a sudden for guitars of those origins, this money should buy a South Korean built instrument.