Entry Level Archtops: opinions please?

[warddix]

Please take this as one guy's experience, but I've played several Godin 5th ave's, wanting to like them, but just couldn't make it happen. To me, they never felt or sounded right. I did, however, find a used LH300 'The Loar,' that sounds and feels good to me. There was plenty of work to do to it, new nut and saddle, find the right strings, etc., but it's a nice guitar for messing around with now. Maybe if I did all that to a Godin, I'd end up at the same place. Play them all if you can, get a good return policy if you can't. Good luck-

[concretecowboy7]

Not all molded tops are laminate.

Old Harmony arch tops are solid wood and molded. They sometimes call them pressed tops also.

The higher end Harmony guitars made in the 30-40's are around for a pretty decent price.

There are even carved top Harmony guitars around from that period.

[Bluemonk]

Originally Posted by mr. beaumont

Yeah...basically, with carved archtops you have two kinds...parallel braced like the Loar, which is a classic, swing rhythm sound...loud, strident, quick attack and decay, strong mids.

then you have more modern x braced sounds like, at a budget level, Eastman does. These are a bit quiter and "sweeter" sounding...

Jeff, have you ever played a Campellone? They are all, as far as I know, parallel braced, and they sure are pretty sounding. Changed my perception of what a parallel braced archtop sounds like.

You did say there are always exceptions.