Tanglewood electro mandolins

[wizard]

Hello,

A friend of mine is interested in a Tanglewood electro acoustic mandolin. There are two:

The Cove Creek TMAS E - solid mahogany front /gold hardware

The Union TME AV - spruce top / chrome hardwear

Does anyone own either of these? There is quite a price difference. Is the Cove Creek worth the extra?

I know in the end it is down to trying them out and judging for yourself. However, any help/advice would be gratefully recieved.

Thanks

Wizard

[Ben Milne]

play it. make sure you are happy with it before forking over cash for it. a local auction house had a few tanglewoods going cheap (not the electro versions tho). for the price i thought one might do as a beater, but the couple i picked up were the pits. Granted, I believe a music wholesaler had offloaded them as B stock to the auction house, (and I have heard some really nice sounding Tanglewood guitars which was why i first gave them a thought) but even if the ones I looked at were given a decent setup the tone of them was really quite horrid.

I'm not saying this would be the case for all of them, and I would hope at a higher pricepoint the ones you are looking at would be better instruments, but i will reiterate....

Play it.

make sure you are happy with it.

play it.


then if you still like it, then buy it.

[mrmando]

If I expected good acoustic tone, I would hesitate to buy a mandolin with a mahogany top.

[wizard]

Thanks for the advice re a mahogany top.Would it make a great deal of difference with it being an electro acoustic? :mandosmiley:

Wizard

[Coffeecup]

I didn't know that Tanglewood are now making mandolins, but I have one of their guitars and am very happy with it, as are a couple of other people I know with their Tanglewoods. I chose it in preference to a similarly priced Martin on the basis of tone.

[wizard]

As you can see we are looking for a 'just above' budget mandolin. How about Crafter and Ozark?

Wizard