NAMM 2020: Cort has a blast with its new GX300 Etched guitar models

(Image credit: Cort)

NAMM 2020: Something is clearly afoot in the world of guitars when it comes to sand-blasted finishes – we've seen them from PRS  and Schecter has some ready for NAMM too with its new Silver Mountain range. Now Cort has joined the blasting party.

We have high hopes for Cort guitars – they put out one of the best value guitars of 2019  so we can expect the new GX300s to sound as good as they look. 

(Image credit: Cort)

There's no gloss in sight on these matte black beauties. Cort starts uses a 15 mm solid swamp ash top that’s then sand-blasted for an open-pore finish. Afterwards it's accented with red or gold paint that has been applied only to the wood grains for maximum contrast. 

(Image credit: Cort)

The main body is mahogany and the bolt-on GX300 features the newly designed high-mass hardtail bridge to improve sustain as well as resonance.

The GX300 also has a hard maple neck with a 24-fret pau-ferro fingerboard. Its radius is 15.75’’ (400 mm) with a 25.5’’ (648 mm) scale. 

(Image credit: Cort)

Pickups are a marriage of the iconic with the contemporary via EMG's RetroActive Super 77 dual humbuckers. EMG has built on the classic blueprint of the traditionally wound PAF-style humbucker and incorporated a preamp for enhanced response.

(Image credit: Cort)

According to Cort these high output pickups 'react unlike anything they’ve heard before'. Sounds promising! The pickups colour match for each of the two finishes is a nice touch too. 

For more info on Cort visit Cortguitars.com

Rob Laing
Guitars Editor, MusicRadar

I'm the Guitars Editor for MusicRadar, handling news, reviews, features, tuition, advice for the strings side of the site and everything in between. Before MusicRadar I worked on guitar magazines for 15 years, including Editor of Total Guitar in the UK. When I'm not rejigging pedalboards I'm usually thinking about rejigging pedalboards.