MusicRadar

Taylor's mid-series SolidBody Standard

1 of 2 » View in gallery

• Review

Despite the title of Taylor's SolidBody series, their first ever line of electric guitars, the Standard and Custom models both have substantial body cavities, imparting them with a certain 'hollow' tone. It's the Standard we're looking at here, the middle-priced model in the line.

Design and construction
The Standard's body contouring is complex, like the other guitars in the series. The body is three-piece sapele, topped with a flame-maple veneered laminate. The back is curved subtly in both planes and there's a rib-cage contour. The edges have a slight chamfer all the way around, being most pronounced at the pointed (Florentine style) cutaway, which, to our eyes at least, would look better if it was rounded (as on the SolidBody Custom). The top is also slightly curved in both planes, though it is far from having a traditional arched top.

In playing position the guitar looks much thinner than it is. Maximum depth is approximately 46mm in the body centre, although the rim on the bass side is nearer 30mm. But it's also tapered from bottom to top: 45mm by the bass strap button, around 35mm by the neck joint.

The neck is sapele again, with an unbound ebony-faced headstock. Dimensions are quite mainstream (42.8mm at the nut, 53mm at the 12th; in depth we have 20.7mm at the first fret, 22.3mm at the 12th), and the neck- to-body joint, Taylor's T-Lock, is not only tight-fitting but very stable and all achieved with just a single Allen key bolt.

The fingerboard is rosewood adorned with small, mother-of-pearl dot inlays, and the edges are bound. Fretting is immaculate from a medium wire. The radius, for an electric, is quite flat at Taylor's standard 15inches (381mm); more classic brands use a smaller radius like Fender's 7.25 or 9.5inches, PRS's 10inches and Gibson's 12inches. More contemporary brands do use a flatter radius, so it certainly gives the guitar a more modern, less vintage feel. Speaking of feel, the scale length is 632mm (24.9inch), the same as the T5, close to PRS's 635mm (25inch) and a little longer than Gibson's nominal 628mm (24.75inch). The neck profile is again typically mainstream and very Taylor: a medium 'C' profile.

The back-angled headstock also sticks with safe Taylor territory. Only the standard, and rather generic-looking, big button tuners let it down. They feel a little spongy in use although we rarely used them; this is one very stable guitar.

Hardware and electrics

At the other end of the string is a fantastic new Taylor bridge design, machined from acoustically resonant aluminium and all curved and contoured, giving a very sleek feel. The strings 'top mount' into the back of the individual 'shuttles' and emerge over a precise looking lip-like break point. Individual intonation can be set via a small Allen key bolt just by the string anchor point, and the important thing is that the whole saddle moves, ensuring the same distance from anchor to break point wherever it's set. There is no individual height adjustment and the curve of the saddles is set at 12inches - the same geometry as on all Taylor guitars.