Hello and welcome to my Takamine GN77KCE review.
This review will look at Takamine’s GN77KCE in terms of:
- The Tone;
- The Playability;
- The Materials the GN77KCE is made from;
- Who the GN77KCE is best suited to;
- The GN77KCE’s value-for-money
The Tone
This guitar has a nice balance between being bassy enough but with some clarity and thickness to the highs and enough mid-range presence.
Warm or Bright?
I would say that it’s on the brighter side but not overly bright. I’d say about a 6/10, if 1 was the warmest and 10 was the brightest.
If it was solid Koa, I would say that this would get warmer with age but I’m not sure if the same is true with a laminate construction.
Bassy or Trebly?
The GN77KCE has some decent bass coming through but it’s not overly dominant – there’s still a mid-range in there and the highs come through too. It was a nice balance. Not the kind of tone that blows you away but nice and balanced.
Strumming or Finger-Picking?
This is a good all-rounder. The tone suits either and the body shape suits either as well. And it sounded good with flat-picking too.
It’s got a narrow nut-width which is perhaps more suited to strumming and flat-picking than finger-style but that’s more of a playability thing.
The Shape
The GN77KCE has Takamine’s NEX body. This is like a scaled down jumbo – close in size to a grand auditorium.
The NEX bodies that I’ve played have produced a really nice balanced tone. It’s a shape that I like.
The Materials
Top: Hawaiian Koa Laminate
Back & Sides: Hawaiian Koa Laminate
Bracing: Quartersawn X Bracing
Bridge: Rosewood
Saddle: Synthetic Bone
Nut: Synthetic Bone
Electronics
The GN77KCE comes with Takamine’s own TP-4TD preamp and has a built-in tuner and 3 band EQ settings.
Playability
I liked the feel of this guitar. Somehow it didn’t feel quite as nice to me as the Takamine P1NC that I also played in the same session but I’m not exactly sure why. But still, it was overall a very easy and smooth feeling guitar.
Action
The action is a little bit on the high side – but not hugely and compared to most off the shelf it was set up pretty well. It’s a good idea to do your own set up anyway to customize it to how you like it to feel.
Nut Width & Neck Profile
The neck has Takamine’s asymmetrical feel to it – which I really like. This basically means that the neck is a bit thinner on the bass side. This is supposed to be a more natural fit for a hand. Whatever it is, it felt nice to play to me.
The nut width is 1.673″ (42.5mm) which is just a little narrower than the average width. This is great for chord constructions, especially for those with smaller hands but it was still nice enough to play finger-style on.
Fretboard (fingerboard)
The fretboard is made from Rosewood and that’s no surprise – as it seems that 90% of guitars out there have rosewood fretboards! But that’s just fine as Rosewood typically makes for a good fretboard.
Of course not all pieces of wood are the same – but this felt fine. It was nice and smooth feeling.
Scale Length
The GN77KCE has a scale length of 25.4” (645mm). This is a pretty standard size for a “full” scale length.
Who this Guitar is Most Suited to
This guitar is great for anyone who wants a guitar that is better quality than a budget guitar but still at a reasonable price and for anyone who wants a guitar with a good balanced tone and a nice feel.
Value-for-Money
In the same session, I played the Takamine P1NC from their pro series 1. I loved that guitar.
The GN77KCE wasn’t in the same league as the P1NC, in my opinion – I liked the GN77KCE but I didn’t love it, like I did with the P1NC.
But I wasn’t expecting to like it as much either. In some cases I actually prefer a guitar that’s cheaper – sometimes they can just sound nicer but in this case the difference in price faithfully represents the difference in quality (for my tastes anyway).
But the GN77KCE is a good $700 less in terms of it’s MSRP and $500 less in terms of it’s street price. So you do pay significantly less for it – and it certainly is a decent sounding guitar and still nice to play – so for the money I would say it’s still a good buy.
But just the way that the P1NC was to play, I would pay the extra, personally. Not that this is a like-for-like comparison, of course, as both guitars feature different tone-woods.
More Info and Where to Buy
Disclosure: Links below are affiliate links, meaning I get a commission if you make a purchase through my links, at no extra cost to you.
If you’re interested in the GN77KCE, are ready to buy or want to check out prices and availability, check out the links below.
>> Takamine GN77KCE at Amazon.com
If you want to check out some more under $1000 options check out the link below.
>> My Top 5 Acoustic Guitars Under 1,000
Dee says
The top is not laminate. Its solid. Check out the Takamine website