As you can see, it's gorgeous. But more than that, it has opened up a world of tonal possibilities that I could never have hoped to reach with my Takamine or my Strat. If you're a guitarist, you can see that this is a semi-hollow, dual-humbucker model guitar, and you may recognize the shape as very similar to the Gibson ES-335. I'm happy to report that I got this one for about one-seventh the cost of an ES-335, and it filled the hole in my guitarist heart just as well.
I've been wanting a semi-hollow with humbuckers for some time now, and I have played a ton of different models over the past couple of months: the Epiphone Dot and Sheraton II, the Ibanez AS-73, a Schecter, a Guild De Armond, and some others. This one plays and sounds better than all of them, perhaps due to the fact that it has a solid maple top and back instead of plywood laminate, and it cost less than most of them. Even though it's used, it's in near-mint condition. I am thrilled with it.
I bought the guitar from eBay, which was a leap of faith for me since I had a pretty disappointing experience the only other time I bought a guitar there. (Remind me to sing you the Ballad of the Twisted Chet Atkins someday.) My fears were assuaged in short order, however; the seller (check out his other listings!) handled the transaction in an extremely professional manner, even going so far as to pay to replace a faulty pickup switch that he hadn't noticed when he listed it.
Here's some more detail. Feel free to say hello to the new guitar in the comments!
