[Brent Hutto]

What an oddly named and unusual little guitar. I was in my usual guitar shop today and walked into the acoustic-guitar room for the first time lately. I was sort of window shopping small-bodied guitars thinking at some point I'd like to have an inexpensive and small guitar to take with me on long weekends to the beach.

I noticed a couple of Fender acoustics--who even knew they made them? Other than Guilds of course. Anyway, there was a Korean-made one maybe a bit larger than what I'd call "Parlor" size but way smaller than "Auditorium" like my Taylor. Has a Strat-style headstock with honest-to-goodness slotted vintage tuners with the hole in top. What the heck?

Sounds pretty good. Short scale and narrow neck makes it easy to get around on. Not surprisingly it sounds better than the "Little Martin" on the next shelf, the Fender is wood instead of HPL and bigger to boot. It might be tempting if it weren't $400-odd plus tax. Yikes! Very fun little player, decent action, balanced tone (except for no real bass-bass).

Then again they had a Hohner laminated-wood beginner's guitar that was $99 and actually sounded just as good, although the action was high and stiff so it wasn't as fun to play. I think for a toss-around guitar I'd have to go with the Hohner at 1/4 the price and see if I could fiddle with the strings and nut and bridge to get the action better. I can treat a hundred-dollar guitar as disposable after a couple years, not sure a $450 one is really in the take-everywhere, no-worries category.