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Resonators...any recommendations?


Jinder

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I've just made a Blues album using a borrowed Regal RC51 Tricone...I used to play a great deal of slide in my love shows and had an Ozark reso which I had to sell a few years ago during a lean period.

 

I recently had to give the Regal back, but to take the blues album on the road I need to get my hands on a reso that will do the job.

 

I've tried quite a few, a Hound Dog (sounded like a banjo), a Dobro California Girl (better but still banjoesque) a National Estralita (beautiful for fingerstyle blues but a bit too warm for slide), a National Duolian reissue (fantastic but expensive) and a National German Silver Style N (by FAR the best reso I've ever heard or played, absolutely interstellar but at £3000 sadly WELL out of my price range).

 

Can anyone recommend anything else to try? Any gems I might be missing or bargains that punch above their weight? It seems to me that with resos you really do get what you pay for, and I think I'm suffering from having a champagne taste on a Diet Coke budget!

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Don't do anything until you at least try a couple of lower model National Tricone steel bodies instead of the expensive brass and German silver ones - I have the black finish one and a friend said it was the best acoustic guitar sound he had ever heard. It is a heavy beast and would survive the road or explosions or maybe children.

 

I am hustling off to get a photo for you...

 

 

Back with photo :

 

 

E7miT8x.jpg

 

 

BluesKing777.

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Lots of discussion here: My link

 

Perhaps unsurprisingly the Michael Messer forumites like the guitars he commissions, but it seems he has found a niche in the UK for inexpensive well-made resos. The same crowd seem to recommend Busker for tricones in the same vein, but Busker have recently shut down. ParlourMan had a Busker tricone at one point, which he said was very good. Not sure he kept it though - resos weren't really his thing, I think.

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I am satisfied with my Regal reissues (by Saga). I have a RD 45 square neck and an all metal round neck. They sound good and raunchy for blues playing and are reasonably priced. On both I swapped out their wooden saddles for bone to further increase their volume. They rock...

 

QM aka Jazzman Jeff

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I like the Nationals....I went through a small handful before I settled on the M1 Tricone. Some folks want a different sound than the mahogany tricone...and that's why they make different models. But in my mind National Resophonic sets the standard for resonators...

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BK that Tricone of yours is beautiful!! The Regal I used on my album was identical in looks, steel body and black finish. I love the overtones and complexity of the Tricones, the only other reso I've heard that tone in is the German Silver Style N I tried. I'll definitely look into the steel Tricone.

 

Thanks so much for the suggestions, all! I'll do some hunting and picking and chin scratching and see what suits me best. I'm a bit of a fussy one when it comes to getting the right tools for the job, I may well move on some of my herd to get the right reso. I want to get my hands on something that will be a keeper.

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BK that Tricone of yours is beautiful!! The Regal I used on my album was identical in looks, steel body and black finish. I love the overtones and complexity of the Tricones, the only other reso I've heard that tone in is the German Silver Style N I tried. I'll definitely look into the steel Tricone.

 

Thanks so much for the suggestions, all! I'll do some hunting and picking and chin scratching and see what suits me best. I'm a bit of a fussy one when it comes to getting the right tools for the job, I may well move on some of my herd to get the right reso. I want to get my hands on something that will be a keeper.

 

 

 

 

Appears the Tricone is what you would like, so don't forget to look for a similar used one.....they go for sale a bit because they sound great but are expensive and really heavy to lug around.

 

There use to be a reso specialist somewhere down the south coast, don't know if they still go.

 

I haven't played one, but the Messers might be worth a budget look.

 

Another fantastic tip from my luthier - Schatten Reso pickup, sounds great and sticks to the back of the bridge with removable double sided tape if you don't want to drill. They also make a model with a volume control or you can buy a plug in volume comtrol! I plug them through my Fishman Aura and it is stunning!

 

 

 

BluesKing777.

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I'll try to seek out a Goldtone Beard sig, they seem pretty uncommon in the U.K, Wunjo in London have one but it's a little way north of a thousand notes. I'd like a metal bodied reso ideally but I'll certainly lend my ear to a wooden bodied model. I loved the National Estralita I tried for fingerstyle blues but it didn't have the same kind of lush-but-stinging slide tone as the Regal I used on the album. The National Style N I played had that IN SPADES and sounded like a turbocharged version of the Regal on steroids, but so did the price tag...plenty of food for thought!

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Now another maybe hard to find option is a metal Dobro. I have better photos but Photobucket is too cruel lately to go any further in!

 

 

Now I posted this one's serial number years ago with Messer and co...and the story is this: mine is the good year 1976 and short few years after that they declined in quality. Doug Young (RIP) who later started the National Resophonics Guitar Co was shop foreman at the time and as the only Nationals around were vintage and wildly expensive, these were the modern 'thing'. Mine is glorious, bell brass body chromed, sounds superb.

 

These metal Dobros were very expensive at the time too, but as soon as the National Resos started up...boom, price drop aisle 7. The later ones were giving these good ones the bad rep, so.....

 

 

But have a look around - because of the price drop and the National competition, they can just sit in a shop forever.

 

 

 

edit - found the nice photo:

 

 

 

Dobro1a_zpsa100bffc.jpg

 

 

 

 

BluesKing777.

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