Hi all,
Yesterday I managed to fulfil a dream of mine and become the owner of a guitar built by Nathan Sheppard. The story is that soon after I started playing, I had lessons with Ben Bartlett, at the time a journo for the Future publishing mags, and pretty early on he received an electro nylon string made by Nathan, a local up and coming luthier. I was blown away by the workmanship and the amazing woods used, and I remember thinking that when I had the money (I was just a 15-year old with no job back then), I would have one of Nathan's guitars. Since then I've only heard the name Nathan Sheppard crop up once or twice, in a glowing review in Guitarist, and very rarely on the odd forum, and I found out not long ago that he'd gone out of business.
Fast forward to a couple of days ago, Pete and I decided to take a trip to Exeter to visit an old buddy and have a look around Mansons and some other music shops around there. Right near the end of our time in Mansons I caught sight of a pre-owned Nathan Sheppard hanging up on the wall, and had to check it out. Time was short and I didn't play it, but the price was very reasonable, and it stuck in my head all the way home. Yesterday I decided that it's an opportunity I couldn't miss out on, since they're extremely rare, and with Nathan out of business, it may literally be a once in a lifetime chance. With the offer of an advance on the money from my awesome mum, I rang up Mansons, and got them to hold it while I drove back to Exeter.
Upon playing it, I was actually a little bit underwhelmed by the set up, but the guy I was dealing with was extremely helpful, and gave the guitar a full set up, including cutting the nut slots right down as I like them, as well as slapping some new D'addario 9-46s on, setting the neck as straight as possible (again, my preference), and intonating it. After he'd done that, the guitar felt brand new, and I had no excuse not to buy it.
As another aside, it turns out the guitar was being sold on behalf of an employee of a certain Bare Knuckle pickups, which I think it pretty neat.
Anyway, some (many) pics:
So from what I can tell, the wood selection is the tried and tested mahogany with a maple cap, set maple neck with a rosewood fretboard. The flame on the top is absolutely stunning, it's very deep, and I love the orangey-red stain. The mahogany body is one-piece, and the neck features heavy birdseye on the sides, with deep flame in the center portion. The looks won't be to everyone's taste, but I think it's amazingly beautiful. The frets are vintage-style, which is not my usual preference, but with such a low and slinky action it plays incredibly, likewise the neck is a like that of a good Tele, with a deep C profile, yet it's still very shreddable.
This guitar features some extremely special Bare Knuckles - the Knuckleduster set, made pretty much exclusively for Nathan's guitars. From what I can tell they're essentially a set of Tele pickups made into humbuckers, and can be split individually by pulling up each of the volume knobs. In split mode they're nothing like conventional humbucker split tones, they actually sound exactly like the woody and sparkly tele I've always wished I've had, yet when in humbucking mode, they're incredibly creamy and smooth - pure Andy Timmons.
The natural sustain of this thing is ridiculous, it just keeps ringing on and on, with such a musical clear fundamental behind every note. I'm in love.
Anyway, sorry for the essay and masses of pics, hope people find this interesting.
Nolly
