Musicians Discount Warehouse
This place is yet another place to find off brand guitars for dirt cheap, they sell much more than just guitars. They also sell drums, bass, and many other instruments and have some amps that might be interesting considering their amperage and price but I will just stick to what I know best and that is guitars.
Davison
This is the inhouse brand of the company, I do not know much and there is very little information out there about this specific brand of guitar, but the specs look good and personally I love the headstock shape on the explorer style guitars. Soon I do hope to buy one or two davison guitars so I can at least write some reviews so that their will be at least a little more detailed information about what can be expected from Davison's quality.
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Kona
Luckily I actually have experience with this brand and have played several models from Kona and honestly this was a brand that really surprised me. At first glance they do not look like much but the necks on them are actually very comfortable, they are not too thick or wide allowing people with smaller hands to comfortably play them, but the necks are not so thin that those with large hands will feel cramped trying to play one. The fretwork is pretty decent on these as well, I have played at least six or seven from the Dakota series and the overall quality seems rather consistant. The frets are leveled with no sharp ends so you can get a pretty low action with minimal fret buzz. I have not been able to test the electronics on them how ever due to the pawn shop never having a working amp sitting out that I can plug into but I am betting it is safe to say that the pickups and controls work fine but are probably lacking. But eitherway Kona guitars are easily worth every penny, especially the set neck PRS copy with the EMG passives.
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Main Street
Another brand I have experience with, the necks are often of decent quality but the consistancy can vary with the quality. Most of the bodies of these guitars are made of Alder, only a couple of the strat models are made of plywood. With this brand its actually a good idea to buy the pretty or cool looking ones with the graphics or pretty paintjobs as those are the ones with the alder bodies. The strats with the dull yellow color are made of plywood and stay far away from the SG copies, they are fragile and made of plywood.
But again if the guitar is semi hollow or has some sort of graphic on it such as a flag or checkerboard design then its safe to say that the body is made of Alder or Swamp Ash. Overall, not a bad buy as long as you avoid any with a plywood body which again are the SG copies and the strats that cost under $130 |