Look to the Strokes’ Nick Valensi for evidence of its stateside power.)

However, they give licks and rhythms a very pleasing midfrequency spread and a dynamic, hard-to-peg character, making the USA Casino a wicked electric blues guitar, full of character and punch, but with great detail and grit as well. Likewise, the two Gibson USA Dogear P-90 pickups here may not be some bluesmen’s first choice, though they’ve been a key go-to for T-Bone Walker, Freddie King and, lately, Gary Clark, Jr. Keep in mind, this is essentially a Gibson 330-style guitar with high-output single-coil P-90 pickups, so while it’s naturally a little more wily and open sounding than, say, a 335, when played through a cranked tube amp, in most other contexts the Casino can ably handle a lot of the same basic territory, with a wild edge of its own. That is especially true of a Casino as premium as this model, which is a huge improvement over more recent Asian-made Casinos. Well, it would be a mistake to continue to pigeonhole the Casino as strictly a guitar for British-inspired power pop, no matter how ably and powerfully it works in that context.

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