The Johnny Cash Model Martin D 35 Acoustic Guitar All In Black.

Whether you are a picker, or just a grinner - if you are a strummer, or a serious player in the realm of country music, folk, Bluegrass, or even Celtic picking, then you want that serious guitar that you'll never, ever need to replace. You want that timeless sound that only a high end company like C.F. Martin & Co can, and always does deliver.

But maybe you are none of those, maybe you just always admired the message that Johnny Cash always had to deliver. Maybe you are even a bit of a "goth person," and the all black with the white contrasts of this guitar really grabs you - but you're also a serious player, and demand a flashy guitar of the highest possible quality. The Martin D 35 Johnny Cash model might just be the guitar for you.

So you can't afford a Martin D 45, very few people can afford one of those - but the D 45 is basically just a fancier D 28; but you don't want a Martin D 28 either because damn near everybody that is anybody has one of those guitars. Well, the D 35 is the next step up from the D 28, and the Johnny Cash Model Martin D 35 is a D 35 with more personality than "just" a super guitar like a standard D 35. This is the guitar for you, there's no doubt about it.

Like I say, a D 35 is basically a D 28, but with a fancier three piece solid wood back with the very attractive binding that comes along with it. A D 35, like the D 28 is a "herringbone" guitar with the herringbone trim. But those things are peripheral, they are on the outside, and though those things make a guitar attractive - my interests is always on the INSIDE of the guitar. The top of a standard D 35 will be solid Sitka Spruce, but with the Johnny Cash mode Martin D 35 you get an upgrad of Engleman Spruce as the solid spruce soundboard - be sure that you know that you'll be paying for that, it's a standard feature on this guitar, but otherwise it's a thousand dollar upgrade. It's a high end guitar that never will need to be replaced so long as you take care of it. I'm positive that the value of these guitars will increase in time - they always do. If they don't, then they can and do get the price paid back for them should you be dumb enough to re sale one, but it's less with scratches, more with upgrades like bone nuts and saddles, bridge pins, etc. The three piece back and sides are of solid East Indian Rosewood, which deliveres the darker tone, and long sustain that rosewood guitars are treasured for.

The "high X" is a martin bracing design that most great manufacturers have copied. There are other bracing patterns that produce great tone in solid wood construction steel string guitars - but why mess with something that is perfect? You don't. Also, the braces are scalloped, just like they should be. What is important to know here is that not all Martin guitars ever made, or even all of them made now are "high X" guitars - but the high X guitars are the legendary guitars, the guitars that are used for recording in the studio. It could be that you might want a cheaper guitar to take with you on the road for tours, or to the festival to play with your drinking buddies - but not Johnny Cash, and most great performers want their fine guitars with them, but of course most great performers can afford another one if the unthinkable happens, and a guitar is stolen, or damaged.

I've priced this beautiful guitar from the legendary American acoustic guitar company, C.F.Martin & Co. for $ 4, 499, 00., and I promise you that that is a gread deal for this instrument. What you are paying for here is the three piece back, and the upgrade to an Engleman Spruce top - other than that, the black paint, the Johnny Cash signature as inlay on the twentieth fret, and the signature of his son on the label - if those things aren't your thing, then buy a D 28, but regardless of if you are a Cash fan or not - you'll pay another thousand dollars for a D 28 with an Engleman Spruce top.

Some day, I'll have one of these - Johnny Cash, and every last thing he stood for make him a lifetime hero of mine, and an example of the ideals that are lacking in our society today.