NGD Rex Aragon

Choivert · March 2022

From my research Rex seem to be the Kalamazoo of Gretsch. Although it looks like they were made by Kay or Harmony. To my surprise this one has mahogany back and sides not birch like I was expecting. The variation in top thickness also suggests it might be a carved top. I can't tell what wood the neck is, there is a bit of finish rub off on treble side of the nut but it's not clear if it's mahogany or something else. The binding marquetry is really something. The Waverly tune rite tuners seem to date it to late 30s I think. I've found the Rex Archtop models in a '36 catalogue (although they use Harmony pictures - for example the model below the Aragon (the monteray) is shown as a Cremona picture.

If anyone knows any extra info about this guitar or has a copy of the '39 Gretsch catalog that would be ace. Overall, I'm really pleased. It came with a set of argentine gypsy jazz 11's which sounded good. I've put on 12-54 80/20 and surprisingly it sounds better to me tuned to D standard. Tuning up to E seems to choke the tone a little, which goes against my intuition on archtops wanting heavy high tension to drive top.