My Teton tenor arrived Monday morning. I believe Mim uses a time machine, because I'm sure I'd only ordered it an hour earlier.
I’ve had to be away from home for much of the past few days, so I’ve only just had the chance to put down all my thoughts. And time spent writing is time spent not playing my Teton, which cannot be tolerated much longer.
This is one fine-looking instrument. Fit and finish are lovely. I’ve never seen another solid-body uke to compare it to, but it’s extremely well crafted. From the photos Mim graciously provided, I chose one with an assortment of contrasty laminates. I didn’t want anything subtle (although that choice is certainly available), and this fit the bill with its bold, wide stripes of different wood colors to complement the standard center stripes.
I have three quibbles with the construction:
1. Equina spotted the erroneous position marker at the 9th fret instead of the 10th, which will apparently be fixed in the next production run. I’m not skilled enough to spend much time that high on the neck, so it isn’t an issue for me yet, although I know it eventually will be. I’m wondering if a good luthier could somehow reposition it and plug the resulting hole, without the fix looking nasty.
2. The hole drilled in the wood body for the headphone output is the teensiest bit too narrow and deep. I had to try three sets of headphones before finding one (my crappiest pair, unfortunately) that would fit. The straight plastic housing (I don’t know the technical term; it’s the part you hold to push in the ⅛” stereo metal part) on the plug end of my JVC headphones was just wide enough that it wouldn’t fit in the wooden hole, and my Bose headphones’ right-angle housing fit, but the end section of the right-angle was too short to go all the way in. The good news is that, if you have something that fits, it’s snug and protected and you needn’t worry about it pulling out accidentally or snapping off.
3. As I had written in an early post in this thread, I loved the first sample photos that showed how the offset “soundhole” revealed a cross-section of the center wood sections. However, on mine, the darker middle one isn’t fully exposed, so instead of its being a uniform stripe of dark wood with light wood stripes on either side, it’s shaped more like a candle flame, with a pointed top and a bulbous base. In addition, there’s a little dark spot in the grain on another part of the inner edge of the soundhole that goes from front to back and is exposed as three dashes.
HOWEVER, considering the great price on these ukes, how delighted I am overall, and how I quickly I became attached to this particular one, I soon began to see these blemishes as beauty marks. I’m sure I have the only Teton with the Signature Flame and Morse Code “O” Soundhole!
But how does it sound, you ask? Well, like I said in an earlier post, I’ve only played ukulele for a few weeks, and my acoustic Kala is my first-ever stringed instrument. So I’m definitely not the best judge of the solid-body electric ukulele sound, nor can my very limited skills show what the Teton is capable of (I am counting on apps effects and pixie dust for that).
But I really like the way it sounds, for what that’s worth — played “clean,” it sounds like a high-end acoustic ukulele (and you can pot the brightness up and down with the on-board tone control), and with effects it sounds like the electric guitar I’ll never own . . . and now don’t need to! Oh, and like Mim says, there’s equal string volume, which I have read is an issue with many electrics. And she put on a Low G for free, which was icing on the cake of her impeccable setup.
Speaking of effects, I now FINALLY know for sure that the iRig HD works beautifully with the Teton. I walled myself up in a back room of the closest Guitar Center yesterday, and gave it a long and thorough test. In preparation, I had downloaded a few guitar amp-and-pedal emulation/modulation apps to my iPad, but spent most of my time with GarageBand. I really didn’t know what I was doing, but I sounded better than my wildest guitar dreams. And because life is short, I asked the salesman to add a Crybaby wah pedal to the signal chain (it attaches between the Teton and the iRig HD). I had never heard of a Crybaby until the night before (thanks, YouTube!) and was only vaguely aware of wah pedals, although I’d always loved the sound they made. Wow. I couldn’t leave without buying it.
I will now be eating crackers for the rest of the month, but who has time to eat anyway, when there’s a Teton to be rocked/jazzed/bluesed/R&B’d out on?
If you’ve been on the fence about buying one of these, you may now dismount. And don’t bother going anywhere but to Mim’s Ukes. This was my first time dealing with Mim, but after reading so many glowing reports from UU members, I had no hesitation. Hers is the caliber of service you always hope to get from a vendor (of any product) but seldom do. There may be others who are as good as Mim, but I can’t imagine anyone better.
‘Nuff said. Flaming MorseO Teton, here I come!