After reading and watching so many good reviews about these guitars, I decided to add one to my collection before they're all gone. I'm now regretting that decision.
I have no idea what Guild quality is like normally, as this is my first one, but this one is horrible. Finish defects everywhere. I've never seen a finish this bad, and I've had a lot of cheap guitars.
Starting with the neck, there is what seems to be a combination of glue, filler, and spots where the finish was sanded through all over the fretboard. There is a huge white streak across the fretboard between the nut and the first fret, and more of this substance down both sides of the fretboard. At first I thought maybe this is just some leftover polishing compound, but it doesn't wipe off, and it's a satin neck so it wouldn't make sense to be there. Whatever it is, it's either under the finish or bonded to the finish. Then there are multiple spots on the side of the fretboard, the headstock, and the back of the neck where the finish has clearly been sanded through. Also, whatever filler compound they used to fill the fret ends is crumbling and falling out of several of them, leaving the sharp corners of the fret slot exposed.
Moving on to the body, the gloss clear coat is nice and smooth to the touch, but the colour coat underneath was clearly rushed and not done well. There are what I can only assume are brush marks going in multiple directions all over the body, especially along the sides and the contours. Again these are not in the clear coat, as the clear coat feels smooth in all these areas. There are also several visible cracks, dust, and debris in the colour coat. It almost looks like someone ran a brush or an old sock across the entire body while the colour coat was drying, decided to ignore how terrible it looks, and sent it out anyway.
If I wanted a guitar that looks like it's been abused for a while, I would have bought one of the many relic models available. Instead I bought this Surfliner, which I expected to look like a brand new guitar, and it doesn't. I don't know if this is the low quality that this brand regularly puts out, but for sure this will be my first and last Guild guitar.
