The Delta Snake Review: Musical Gear Review and Music Article Archive: Review: 2006 Silvertone SSL3

Review: Silvertone 2006 SSL3

When I saw this guitar listed here without a review, I couldn't resist jumping in with my favorite cheap guitar story. You see, in my area, there's this cool guitar shop that isn't an authorized Gibson or Fender dealer, so they carry everyone else's stuff. You name it; Ibanez, Dean, BC Rich, Jackson, Danelectro, Hamer, Schecter, Samick, Turser, and the list goes on.

Also, they will buy ANYTHING if you are willing to go low enough. They even sell used Esteban guitars, although they've given up on that lately. Want a dreadnought with the Mexican Flag painted on it? It's there, for 50 bucks.

So, it's no surprise that a Silvertone SSL3 is there, although that's not why I played it. I played it and prayed it was like its early ancestor, the coolest of Les Paul copies. Sure, you hear all the time about the “lawsuit” guitars, and the great Japanese Les Paul copies of the 80's.

None were as cool as the Silvertone Les Paul copy. It was some sort of Ebony, with a mirrored pickguard, some oddball 90-degree cutaway, and neat mini-humbucker-style pickups. Like the SSL3, it had a clean tone that was akin to a banjo, and a nice distorted, if simply loud tone. The problem was that the store wanted 300.00 for it, more than a new one.

However, every time I went to that store, it was still there, and my attempts to get the price down were rebuffed. One day, their website noted that the price had dropped to 200.00. I headed there, and according to the clerk, lost the race by around one hour. I won't say that my heart was broken, but if any guitar is like a Moby Dick to me, it's that old Silvertone.

Les Paul copies are a dime a dozen, and many, like the Agile, have great reputations. The trouble is, the attraction of a particular guitar is really about extremes.

A 4000.000 Gibson has an aura about it. A super cheap copy like that odd duck Silvertone has an aura. A medium-priced copy, like an Epiphone, doesn't. It's like Silvertone knows that their gig is to make guitars that you can just go to an ATM machine and get the cash to buy, and have spent decades (via various owners who seem to share the same philosophy) honing that skill.

Sort of like, they can't match a top-of-the-line Gibson version, so they make a cool plank of wood that only superficially resembles one. And that 90-degree cutaway isn't as weird an idea as you might think. If you look at the profile of a Gibson Nighthawk (not Blueshawk) and the old Silvertone LP copy, there's an amazing resemblance.

That resemblance ends, of course, when you play each of the instruments. The modern Silvertone is more in the mold of the Epiphone in that it sports humbuckers now, a tune-o-matic stop bridge, and a quilted top. What wood they use to make that quilted top is conveniently left out of any ads, but I'm sure it's around the quality of a low-level Squire.

The humbuckers are not bad. The clean tone, the key to any Les Paul is not very good, but for the Alternative style rocker, it will serve quite well. Most hard rockers play at volumes where the type of guitar isn't as important anyway. Like I once said in another review, the best SG sound I ever heard at concert volume was from a Jay Turser with a single P-90. Play this guitar loud, and you get a harsh, but very cool wall of sound.

The only disappointment I experienced was that the company decided to go with a quilted top, yet keep the cool old profile. Those old Silvertones are now going for a few hundred now on eBay and other places, if you can find one.

Also, those mini-humbucker-style cover pickups were perfect with a mirror pickguard. Silvertone needs to go back to its roots. So, if you have a couple of hundred bucks, or less (if a used one comes around), it's not a bad deal. But it's not a very exciting guitar in its modern version.

If there comes a day the company decides to reissue the old model, then wild horses couldn't keep me away from the ATM machine.

- Al Handa

2007

Note: This review first appeared on the ePinions.com site in 2007. This and other reviews were short takes that accompanied the link to a business that sold the guitar. As a rule, the guitar had to be at least examined and played by the reviewer (and ideally owned). In my case, a severe case of GAS made it possible to have at least owned the reviewed instrument for a short while. I'm reprinting these as having another source on a guitar never hurts, even if the reviews aren't definitive. Other than minor corrections, these short takes are unchanged from the original text. I figure that it might be helpful to keep the older perspective.

The Quitturz by Al Handa