Left-Handed Guitars

Gordon-Smith Gypsy 2, 2002 (hand-crafted in Britain)

Status: Not currently for for sale

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If you're looking for a solid, reliable and unique guitar for gigging or recording a used Gypsy 2 could be for you. Compared to the manufacturer's off-the line price of £716 (basic) you'll make a considerable saving.

Those quotes out there about Gordon-Smith being to Britain what Gibson is to the USA are, in my opinion, perhaps a little over-generous. In fact, when I first started looking for one of these guitars I came across a major Hertfordshire dealer who told me they'd had to cease stocking Gordon-Smiths because of quality control issues.

Now, about this particular Gypsy 2.... It looks good, sounds great and stays in tune endlessly, but it did arrive with several problems of its own in the form of finish blemishes in various places and a bridge/string/neck alignment issue which the supplying dealer just about fixed by replacing the original adjustable brass nut with a graphite one (they couldn't get another brass nut to fit properly). In addition to this, after a few months the jack socket literally fell apart and sometime later the three-way pickup selector switch started to misbehave with selection of the bridge pickup being missed sometimes. These may be low-cost and easy items to repair but no other guitar I've owned has had a similar array of problems on or shortly after delivery.

Now that its teething problems have been sorted out this is a very nice guitar with an unrivaled range of sound textures and tones available through its tapable Gordon-Smith humbuckers. With its one-piece maple neck and orange gloss flamed-maple top it's also good to look at and it gets lots of positive comments at gigs.