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A modern semi that looks backwards for inspiration

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• Review

Construction-wise it follows a similar path to the T5 but is more 'electric' still. The two-piece centre-joined sapele back is hollowed out, leaving not so much a centre block as two quite thick ribs running top to bottom that not only hold back and front in a rigid fashion but also support the pickup ring mounting screws and the bridge/tailpiece studs.

The top – quilt maple-faced laminate of poplar and compressed fibre, approx 3.8mm thick – is therefore unbraced and very smartly edge-bound with a white plastic and inner black/ white purfling. The finish on both our vibrato and non-vibrato samples is absolutely superb and the attention to detail faultless.

"It's another bold move for a brand that has its eye on the electric market and is a guitar we'd suggest you audition as soon as you can."

Yet the T3 is a surprisingly complex construction. Both body and back are curved across vertical and horizontal planes. This means that, although the rim thickness is approximately 52mm at the base and thins some 10mm at the tip of the neck heel, the curved construction yields a central depth – Les Paul-like – of just a shade under 60mm.

The 21-fret neck joins the body at the 14th fret and is again in keeping with Taylor's acoustics, if a little restricting for an electric. It's actually a bolt-on neck (with two steel reinforcement rods either side of the truss rod) and uses Taylor's T-Lock joint – like the T5 and the SolidBody guitars. There's a single allen-keyed bolt holding the two parts firmly and precisely together.

Certainly if you're a Taylor player the neck will feel like home. Like all of Taylor's guitars there's a good width, slim but not overly thin in depth, with a flattish radius and a very mainstream 'C'-style profile.

The bound edges lend a slightly square feel to things and, coming from more characterful electrics, you might find it a little bland. But again, you can't fault the craft. Finely polished frets (like on the SolidBody guitars, a slightly bigger size than Taylor's standard) on the ebony 'board, slick playability – it's all here.

As Hosler says, the roller bridge is key to the T3/B's design. It's a Korean-made roller bridge that's rather neat. It sits on two standard (4mm) tune-o-matic thumb-wheel posts and can be locked in place by two grub screws per post, front and back – it's therefore very rigid and won't fall off when you remove all the strings.

The design, by Trevor Wilkinson, actually pre-dates the popular Tone Pros' locking hardware but that's another story. Each saddle has a roller at the break point and each can be manually moved for intonation then firmly locked to the bridge base.

"One thing we did discover," says Hosler, "is that the rollers do tend to vibrate so we found this dampening grease that we shoved in them. It's the same dampening grease that gets used on a telephoto-style camera lens and it changed everything – the rollers are smoother and don't vibrate."