Best Guitar stores in Nashville?

  • Thread starter Thread starter the rossness
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the rossness

the rossness

Well-known member
I’m going to be traveling through Nashville. What are the best guitar stores to check out?
Thanks ✌️
 
I was there a few months ago. Carter’s was my hands down favorite, followed by the Gibson showroom. Wasn’t that impressed with Gruhn’s. Rumble Seat was tiny and the best stuff was in a side room not for sale.
 
OUTLAW1969 said:
Carter's Vintage Guitars is always a guaranteed stop for me.

Gruhn and Rumble Seat are good choices, too.
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This exact post, go to the gibson gear garage because it is 5 minutes from carters, also I hear the guitar center is very good lots of high end stuff, but if I had to pick 2 would be gruhn and carters
 
Watch out...
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Believe it or not the Nashville Guitar Center's platinum room is great. Bogner, Suhr, Fender Custom Shop, PRS, Tom Anderson, Gibson Custom Shop, Mesa Boogie, etc.

Eastside Music Supply has a ton of pedals.

Carter Vintage Guitars and Gruhn's Guitars have a bunch of cool vintage guitars.
 
When I lived there I liked Nashville Used Music out on Nolensville rd quite a bit for the used guitar and gear selection. I think the Nashville zoo is close by. They had decent prices and quite a bit of inventory at the time. Probably wouldn't call it the "best" store in the area but I like used gear a lot.
 
itsme said:
I was there a few months ago. Carter’s was my hands down favorite, followed by the Gibson showroom. Wasn’t that impressed with Gruhn’s. Rumble Seat was tiny and the best stuff was in a side room not for sale.
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Yep as a local I don't bother with Rumble Seat anymore.

Carters, Guitar Center (have a great platinum room), Gibson, Gruhns and Corner Music are the places. Would have said Sam Ash, especially considering they hired a couple guys to run their guitar/amp area that know their shit but they're closing. If you want pedals out the wazoo check out Guitars/Effects/Pedals or Eastside Music Supply. Both small stores but they have amps and guitars as well but primarily pedals...best selection around and both will deal with you on trades.

Sadly, again as a local the really great places are long gone or not what they used to be. For example Nashville Used Music was fantastic, used gear out the wazoo and cheap but now, it's a shell of itself. Other places like Guitar Heaven or Tusculum that just had gear stacked to the ceiling and where Paul C (Timmy Pedals) was the guitar tech all long gone. 15 years ago you could spend an entire day shopping guitar stores in Nashville and that's not even including a few choice pawn shops.
 
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I went there a year ago and hit all those places in one day, as well as a watch store. It was a cool trip, but I got the feeling I was never going to stumble upon some great deal, where the store had bought something, didn't really know what they had and were selling it too cheap. I find those deals at GCs all the time. Everyone in Nashville knows what they're doing and isn't going to mistake an EBMM EVH for an Axis, as I have seen at my local GC.
 
Rick Lee said:
I went there a year ago and hit all those places in one day, as well as a watch store. It was a cool trip, but I got the feeling I was never going to stumble upon some great deal, where the store had bought something, didn't really know what they had and were selling it too cheap. I find those deals at GCs all the time. Everyone in Nashville knows what they're doing and isn't going to mistake an EBMM EVH for an Axis, as I have seen at my local GC.
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Yep, great thing back in the day was there was so much used gear from the locals you could find deals all the time. Even a few pawns shops were regular stops because they had so many guitars, they were priced to move regardless of what they were. I mean I remember hitting places and seeing used Marshall 4x12's for dirt cheap or say a perfect condition Peavey Ultra Plus 120 for $250 bucks. Just racks of used rack gear of Rocktron, Lexicon for example for dirt cheap. It was awesome.

Now everythings overpriced on Reverb.
 
I had a fucking blast in both Carter’s and Gruhn’s. Carter’s is great because they have so many guitars in there and you never know what you’ll find on the racks on the main floor. When I went there was an Ibanez JS10 just chillin’ there, anyone could play it.

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And at Gruhn’s you can pick up any vintage guitar and no one will say a fuckin’ word to ya-
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That shit’s the exact reason my eyes roll when seeing $1500 guitars behind the counters at fucking Guitar Center.
 
Carters, gruhns and the gibson garage was all great spots for guitars. I liked all of them for different reasons.
 
jabps said:
For example Nashville Used Music was fantastic, used gear out the wazoo and cheap but now, it's a shell of itself.
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That sucks to hear. I used to like going in there because you never knew what they might have and the prices weren't nuts and I didn't have to go into thick downtown traffic to get there. They had all the banjo picks I like to use.
 
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