Recording King Lap Steel Guitar, Natural

At the price, I didn't expect much. I was, however, pleasantly surprised with what I got. Steel guitar is not my primary instrument, but I play well enough to lay down some country backing tracks when called upon to do so. This little rascal will get that done for under two hundred bucks. The instrument is solid, and the strings-thru-body design assures stability. The bridge and nut are unimpressive, but they both do their job well enough. I can see upgrading the nut in the near future. The tuning pins are of reasonable quality, and they bring the strings to pitch and keep them there. What more did anyone want them to do? The pickup won't wow anyone, but neither will the price of the instrument. The fact is that the P-90 delivers well enough to satisfy me, and I've been making music in Nashville for more than a quarter century. You're going to need an appropriate amp, reverb and a ton of fat compression to get the sustain and tone most of us associate with the steel in country music, but with an appropriate rig this Recording King will put a smile on your face. Finally, if looks are important to you, in spite of its inexpensive materials, the RG-31 is fairly handsome. The matte finish mahogany body is simple and classy, and the plexiglass white pearloid fingerboard is, IMO, appropriate to the overall clean design of the guitar. It's all a matter of taste, but to me the look of this guitar offers a nice break from all the totems, hearts, diamonds and thunderbirds that seem to have proliferated like cheap tattoos in the steel guitar world. To sum it up, I have experienced none of the unfortunate problems with this Recording King lap steel that others have reported. I took it out of the box, installed new strings (this will be needed if you play with C6 tuning), ran it through a tube preamp, then directly into Logic Pro where I used a vintage amp model with plenty of reverb and applied some heavy compression using a standard Logic Pro plugin. The sonic results were indistinguishable from what would have been expected from a greatly more expensive instrument. The only thing that would have improved the track would have been a better steel guitarist!

I have been a musician for over 25 years and decided to pick up playing lap steel. I didn't want to spend a lot of money if it ended up being something I didn't enjoy and at this price there wasn't much risk. Unlike the other reviewers mine showed up in perfect working order. No scratches or dings. I don't get what they were complaining about the neck being reflective...it's pearloid-esque. Not overly reflective just pretty. Maybe if you shined 1000 watt lights at it you might be blinded but I can see where I am on the neck just fine. The design is simple...solid wood with six strings, a small P90 like p/u, volume and tone controls. It plays as it should and seems very solid. I played with the factory installed strings and it sounded great. The only downside was the pickup didn't seem overly responsive and somewhat uneven. Part of that could be my lack of skill. Either way it's not unplayable but in the future a pickup and electrical swap may make a difference. If you're just starting don't over look this one.

Did a lot of research before I decided to go with this lap steel. Despite some bad reviews I knew that I could actually fix any electrical problem it might had. I wanted the mahogany body and the P-90 and got the natural finished one. This thing is really great! I simply love it. The pickup is noisy like hell, but... it's a P-90. I'll probably change the pickup, pots, wires and everything for high quality stuff, but it's something that I've been doing with all my guitars. Right now I just make the humming disappear with a good noise gate. The pickup also has a decent output. I've notice that one or two strings are slightly lower than the others, but since I play hard, it doesn't bother me. Again, it's just a matter of adjustments on the nut. It's really well made, nice finished and apparently there are no cheap parts. The tuners are good enough to hold it in tune and I've been messing with the strings that came with it a lot on the past weeks. Went from standard to open E, than to open G and back to open E and had no problems with the tuning at all. I really love this thing and plan to buy one or two more to use with different tunings. So far I'm very happy with it and would recommend this to my very best friend.

This was a huge disappointment. Read the ad and looked at the manufacturer's website and it looked like a great deal. After arrival I unpacked the guitar and plugged it into my amp. Surprise! No sound. So I tried a different cable and still had no sound. Next, I took the back cover plate off to look at the wiring and discovered I had sound with the plate off. Put the cover plate back and had no sound. After rearranging the wires I eventually got the pickup to work with the back plate on but the sound was thin and scratchy and downright horrible. The tuners were poorly made and the guitar would not stay in tune. The fingerboard was white and highly reflective and difficult to use for positioning (a must on a lap style instrument). I did a cost benefit analysis of what it take to turn this into a player. I determined I would need new pots, new pickup, new tuners, and a new fingerboard. I decided that for me it wasn't worth keeping. So I opened an RMA on Amazon.com and shipped it back. I have to say Amazon.com was extremely gracious and professional and they issued a full refund within 24 hours. I give Amazon.com five stars but this guitar one star.

In what seems to be a common problem with this guitar, it arrived, but didn't make a sound when I plugged it in. Turns out it needed new volume and tone pots, as well as new wiring. Pretty shoddy for a brand new guitar, but apparently there is zero quality control. Paid 35 bucks to get it rewired with new volume/tone pots, now it sounds and plays fantastic. Fair warning, though, that you'll probably have to put some more money into this guitarif you buy it. Still a pretty good deal. Lame part is that Recording King won't take any responsibility for its faulty wiring. That's why I'm giving this only 2 stars, despite the fact that the guitar actually does play and sound pretty cool (after fixing it, of course.) Call me old-fashioned, but I expect something to work at least the first time I try it!

Sent back. Defect.

Nice sounding and nice looking lap steel guitar. No problems with this one.

I wanted a lap steel and had thought for a long time about building one. Even with the parts I have on hand, I would spend almost as much on additional materials as the cost of this Recording King. Despite the inconsistent reviews both here and other places, I got this based on my ownership of another Recording King guitar, the ROS-6. As with that instrument, this one seems to offer a lot in terms of value. The workmanship is good and it has good tone both clean and overdriven. Intonation seems just about perfect, which is amazing for a bridge with no compensation. The guitar arrived in tune (standard guitar tuning). No doubt you could improve this with some better tuners and pickup/electronics but not exponentially. This is my first lap steel though I've been playing guitar for over 40 years. Perhaps there are better beginner instruments out there. I just couldn't find one in this price range. The only reason I don't give this 5 stars is it doesn't have a case or gig bag -- even as an additional cost option.

The recording king rg-31 lap guitar is quite well made and finished especially considering its low price. The only problems on my sample are a badly cut bridge and poor quality pot's (volume & Tone controls), the bridge problem I can fix and the pot's I will replace in due course.