Since its debut at the Summer NAMM show, the Taylor GS Mini™ has been widely heralded with descriptions like “small but mighty” and “full of sound.” The scaled-down guitar, which boasts a bold voice and amplifying accessories, has made its way into the hands of well-known rockers, actors and professional athletes, and in a new web feature on the Taylor Guitars website, videos from the studio and the road testify to the Mini’s appeal.
One artist who was immediately taken with the GS Mini is longtime Taylor player Tommy Shaw (610ce, 614ce, 615ce, 854ce, GS8, T5-C2) of Styx and Damn Yankees fame. “It’s fantastic,” he raves in his video. “It’s small enough to go with me wherever I go in hotels, cars, busses, planes, and it’s a real guitar. It intonates great all the way up and down the neck and has a nice tone. I would play this on stage. I would record with this guitar.”
The Bacon Brothers, the rockin’ duo of Michael and Kevin Bacon (614ce, 914ce, 815ce, K65ce), also demoed GS Minis in a self-directed video sketch. “We love these little guys,” Michael shares. “When you play this guitar, you don’t feel like you’re playing a small guitar. It’s really loud and the neck feels natural. It’s a really versatile guitar.” Fellow actor and musician Bruce Greenwood had similar praise to share in a video from his recording studio. “[The GS Mini] instantly became my favorite guitar,” he says. “It has a big, fat deep tone, and it’s really small. I just love this little guitar. And like every Taylor, the intonation is perfect. It’s led me to a couple new tunes, and you can’t really ask for more than that.”
Jonah Matranga (GC8e, GC5e, SolidBody Classic), an LA-based singer/songwriter and lead vocalist of the band Far, offers up an acoustic performance of his song “Every Mistake” using the GS Mini. At the conclusion, he shares, “I love this thing. It’s got incredible tone and stays in tune… it sounds gorgeous! With its strap peg and pickup, I’ll take this thing on the road anytime.”
The GS Mini web feature also includes video from pro surfer Rob Machado, who strums on the porch of a weathered beach hut; Tony St. Tone, who travels and performs with his Mini in the tropics of Costa Rica; and fingerstylist Doyle Dykes, who samples the Mini at the Summer NAMM show. Other Taylor artists are featured, along with Taylor co-founder Bob Taylor.
The GS Mini features a solid Sitka spruce top, a back and sides of sapele laminate, an ebony fretboard and bridge, and a tortoise shell pickguard. Each Mini comes pre-fitted for the ES-Go™, a proprietary magnetic soundhole pickup inspired by Taylor’s award-winning Expression System®.
Part of the ES-Go’s design simplicity is that it can easily be added to the guitar by anyone as an after-market accessory, thanks to a snap-in bracket located inside the guitar. Another accessory that makes it easy to plug in and play on the go is the Taylor V-Cable™, a quarter-inch cable with a built-in master volume control. Because the Mini was designed without tone or volume knobs, The V-Cable gives players a volume control where it plugs into the guitar, putting volume control at every player’s fingertips any time they plug in.
Each GS Mini comes ready to go anywhere in a specially engineered Taylor GS Mini Hardbag and will be available at domestic Taylor dealers in late summer at a suggested U.S. MSRP of $678. The ES-Go and V-Cable will also be available in late summer through Taylor’s online store, TaylorWare. Players can also purchase the Taylor V-Cable through RapcoHorizon, the manufacturer of the V-Cable.
