NEW/USED Guitar: Glarry GTL Telecaster with upgrades by previous owner

[toomanycats]

Yesterday I paid $48 for this Glarry GTL Tele at a pawn shop. A quick search reveled that they could be purchased brand new for around $90 with free shipping. But this used example was in excellent condition, had been upgraded with Kaish locking tuners, hot rail type pickups (brand unknown), a Wilkinson bridge, and a black control plate and knobs. Plus it was green! I’ve had good luck with cheap green guitars recently, like the IVY ILS-300 I brought home a few months ago.

Though this is technically my first Glarry, some of you might remember my recent purchase of a Ktazon HH Strat, which are supposedly made by Glarry.

From the slack manner in which all the upgraded parts were installed, I got the impression that the previous owner looked at it as something like an aesthetic exercise. Most everything was switched out from the stock chrome to black. They first and foremost wanted a green and black guitar, and functionality was a secondary consideration. The nuts and screws on the tuners were not fully seated, which caused them to rattle (to say nothing of the tuning issues associated with loose hardware). The tone control knob was loose, as was the nut on the output jack. That these are easy fixes, though they hadn't been addressed, reinforced my perception that the former owner wasn't really a guitar geek.

Surprisingly, the pickups were soldered in correctly, and they sounded very good. I looked under the hood and they are ceramic magnets. The bridge position sounds like a Tele on steroids . . . muscular, throaty, and spanky. The neck is full, warm, and can produce glassy cleans. While these are not vintage Tele tones, they are still good and usable tones.

With the action set moderately low there was some buzzing on a few frets, though a tap with the butt end of a screwdriver seated them and the offensive noise ceased. The neck feels modern, like a rounded C with a flat board and 22 large frets.

The wood inside the hole for the truss rod looks “wooly,” by which I mean it’s not sanded. This is not atypical on cheap guitars that are cranked off an assembly line in China as fast as they sell White Claw at a Taylor Swift concert. It’s a small thing that bothers me, though it will only take a few minutes to tidy up.

I feel like I got $42 worth of guitar.

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Honestly, Fay was very excited to participate in today's shoot. The reason she's not outwardly showing her enthusiasm with the tail up is because she can't. As a kitten we found Fay in the parking lot of a Food Lion just after she'd been run over by a car. We scooped her up and drove her to the animal emergency hospital. A week in the hospital and a few grand later we still weren't sure if she'd ever be able to walk. As it turns out she had a broken nose, torn soft tissue around her mouth and jaw, and the vertebra near the base of her tail had been crushed, severing the spinal cord and paralyzing the appendage. She used up several of her lives that terrible morning. The doctor suggested amputating her tail, but we decided to keep it. Once in a while she drags it through the food bowl, but other than that there's been no issues. Trust me, in her heart Fay is flying that tail up high like a flag in a happy cat greeting.

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The worst day of Fay's life. It's been all milk and honey since then.

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[Tonray's Ghost]

Love Fay, hate the McLaren or whatever it's called. I sense she is less than impressed with those tuners

[BatUtilityBelt]

Green is good! There's something to be said for blackout and green. It's a fun aggression.

[andrewsrea]

"Yesterday I paid $48 for this Glarry GTL Tele ..." "I feel like I got $42 worth of guitar."

Priceless!

HNGD

[toomanycats]

"Yesterday I paid $48 for this Glarry GTL Tele ..." "I feel like I got $42 worth of guitar."

Priceless!

HNGD

Either that was a typo, or my subconscious is a more clever comedian than I am.

I want my $6 back!

[Rollin Hand]

Nice. The mods were probably worth $42 on their own.

IIRC Phil Collen said he recorded some of his Hysteria parts with a Tele that had a Tele-sized Super Distortion in the bridge. It just had something that he was looking for at the time.

[andrewsrea]

"Yesterday I paid $48 for this Glarry GTL Tele ..." "I feel like I got $42 worth of guitar."

Priceless!

HNGD

Either that was a typo, or my subconscious is a more clever comedian than I am.

I want my $6 back!

I honestly took it as the "clever comedian," as I've seen your dry wit before here at AGF.