Hard working stage guitars have traditionally been Takamine’s great strength. Does the GN75 CE live up to its ancestry? Ben Morgan-Brown finds out.
We were very impressed with the Takamine’s ‘budget’ G20 which we reviewed recently, so our hopes were high when we opened the next box Takamine sent us, one containing the cutaway GN75 CE. First impressions are that it’s a very different instrument – clearly designed with an eye to Country players. The body style is a scaled down Jumbo with a cutaway and the guitar’s dark stained Sitka spruce top with a handsome quilted maple back and sides mean you’ll either like this or you won’t – it is very distinctive.
Pricewise, the Takamine keeps some very competitive company. Priced at a recommended £569 it is up against very tough competition indeed. Currently, the big name guitar makers are in a fight for this market sector, bringing top-end features like solid woods, higher build quality, classy fittings and better quality pickups and electronics down from the top end of their ranges to the middle, so as to offer something that really stands out against their rivals. The GN75 CE certainly stands out visually and and has quite a sophisticated pre-amp to go with its proprietary Takamine undersaddle piezo pickup. But is it enough?
Takamine’s market has traditionally been the player needing an affordable, hard working stage guitar that you can rely on for hard gigging. Does the GN 75 continue that proud tradition, or has the competition caught up, maybe even surpassed, the brand that more or less invented this market?
Watch the video to see how Ben Morgan-Brown got on with this guitar.
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Specifications
Takamine GN75 CE
UK price £569
Top: Solid Spruce
Back: Quilted Maple
Sides: Quilted Maple
Neck: Maple
Finger Board: Rosewood
Nut Width: 42.5mm
Electronics: TP-4TD
Finish: Transparent Black
