Danelectro 57

review
DANELECTRO ’57 GUITAR & ’59 DIVINE
96
GUITARIST OCTOBER 2020
2. Back in the day
Danelectro used a varying
number of screws to hold
the neck to the body.
The modern reissues
invariably use five screws
on the single-cut designs
like this ’57 Guitar
1. These aged Gotoh tuners
might ape the budget
style of yesteryear but
they’re a welcome high-
quality addition here
1
2
In a guitar like a Strat, you have the pickup
in a cavity so it largely just picks up the
sound from the strings. But in Danelectro
guitars with the hardboard, there are
many sound reflections inside the mostly
hollow body: sound is bouncing off the
back and front inner surfaces of the guitar
body, and the pickup is receiving all of that
reflected sound.”
The frame here is a soft, creamy coloured
wood that could be one of a number of
timbers and is different from the plywood
of earlier reissues. It’s pretty hollow,
although the sides are kept quite thick and
there’s still a large wood block underneath
the bridge.
“We switched from the plywood frame
to a spruce frame in the middle of last
year,” continues Steve. “There are two
benefits to this solid-wood spruce frame.
Firstly, better tone. Spruce is, of course,
a tonewood and the glue in the plywood
layers tends to impede sound vibration.
Secondly, there’s less chance of the frame
chipping in spots where the wood is thin
– namely, the neck pocket.”
Today’s Dano necks are much more
conventional than the original design:
maple with a two-way adjustable truss rod
and a pau ferro fingerboard. Back in the day,
Danelectro used Brazilian rosewood for the
fingerboard – imagine that!
But it’s not a slavish reissue. The famous
aluminium nut, for example, is replaced
here with nicely cut bone. That original
‘four-way adjustable’ bridge (up, down,
forward and back) with its Brazilian
rosewood saddle is updated with the more
contemporary Danelectro design that has
adjustable metal saddles. It still mounts
in the same fashion as the originals: it sits
above the face of the guitar resting on two
height-adjustable screws at the front and
is held in place by the single screw that
mounts through the back of bridge into the
body. The saddles look like solid versions
of Fender’s pressed steel Strat types with
a central locking bolt and two screws for
individual height adjustment. Rather oddly,
the very nice Gotoh Deluxe three-on-a strip
tuners and their cream buttons are aged
while everything else looks brand-new.
THE RIVALS
Silvertone’s 1303/U2 (£199) is a very
affordable take on the Danelectro U-2,
though it’s spec’d with a mahogany body
and maple top. The quality of the 1423
(£279) we took on Longtermers test back
in 2018 really wasn’t bad.
Godin’s Radiator (£799) is far from
a Dano in looks but thanks to its full-
face scratchplate in mother-of-toilet-
seat pearloid, it certainly evokes the
50s. Powered by dual Godin Custom
humbuckers, it features a wrapover bridge.
Eastwood’s range of retro-inspired
electrics is a treasure trove of retro
designs inspired by the likes of Airline,
Mosrite and Wandre. There are even
versions of old Yamaha and Ibanez
classics. Alongside the Dennis Fano-
designed Rivolta models (from £834) is
a repro of Charvel’s Surfcaster (£772) with
a pair of Dano-style lipstick pickups.
GIT464.rev_dano.indd 96 03/09/2020 17:09