The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #77787 Message #1391625
Posted By: Bee-dubya-ell
28-Jan-05 - 04:08 PM
Thread Name: Is This the Future of the Guitar Neck?
Subject: RE: Is This the Future of the Guitar Neck?
I can see how it may be advantageous in a small handful of situations:
For a player who plays in a lot of different tunings, it might be nice to be able to quickly tweak the neck angle to eliminate fret buzzes from increased excursion on slack strings.
A player who plays conventional styles and slide on the same guitar could quickly raise the action for cleaner slide playing.
A touring musician who might play in, say, Denver, CO one night and New Orleans, LA the next could accomodate for neck changes due to changes in altitute, temperature and humidity.
And just about every guitar is eventually going to need a neck reset. With the TransAction system you can just do it yourself any old time.
But the first two situations presume that someone is going to use a single guitar when, in fact, just about everyone who plays in tunings or does slide work uses more than one guitar. And weather/altitude changes can usually be dealt with by truss-rod adjustments. And, if you're the original owner of a quality guitar with a lifetime warranty that eventual neck reset is a freebee.
I think it's an interesting idea, but not one I'd be willing to pay extra for. In fact, I wouldn't buy a high-end guitar with anything quite that gimmicky on it. If Martin is serious about trying to get the system widely accepted, they need to push it as a low-cost option on some of their cheaper boxes like the 15 series. Then they might find a market for high-end axes equipped with the thing from people who are trading up.