Music Bound

I took my guitar to this shop in March for a standard setup. I also asked them to clean a crackly volume pot and apply a bit of glue to a small cosmetic crack on the headstock. They charged me £110 in total (£50 for the setup, £10 for strings, £25 for the glue, and £25 to clean the pot). I didn’t question the price at the time — even though it seemed steep — because I trusted they’d do a good job. Unfortunately, that trust was completely misplaced.

They originally told me the guitar would be ready in three days. It ended up taking three weeks. I was told the delay was because "glue takes ages to settle," which seemed odd. During that time, I had to go to the shop in person multiple times because they don’t answer the phone, and every visit came with a new excuse.

When I finally got the guitar back, the strings were buzzing badly. I returned it immediately. They made a quick adjustment and said it was because "the new strings need time to settle" — something I’ve never heard from any other tech. The problem persisted, so I brought it back again. This time, they said the bridge was bent and needed to be replaced.

I ordered a new bridge myself and brought the guitar back for them to install it. They offered to do the swap free of charge — fair enough — but it took another month to get my guitar back. Again, I had to chase them repeatedly, with little to no communication from their side. I only got through once by phone and expressed how frustrated I was. They promised to sort it properly.

When I eventually got the guitar back, I was told it was fixed — but the same issues were still there. At that point, they told me the guitar actually needed a full refret. Funny enough, when I first brought it in, they said nothing like that was necessary.

To top it off, when I came to collect the guitar for the final time, no one even acknowledged me. One of the brothers just handed it over without a word or apology — genuinely unfriendly and unprofessional.

This is the worst setup job I’ve ever had — and this guitar has had plenty of work done over the years without problems. I’m now taking it to a proper luthier to fix the mess they left behind. I would strongly advise avoiding this shop if you care about your instrument and your time.

I took my guitar to this shop in March for a standard setup. I also asked them to clean a crackly volume pot and apply a bit of glue to a small cosmetic crack on the headstock. They charged me £110 in total (£50 for the setup, £10 for strings, £25 for the glue, and £25... Show full »