Gretsch G2622 Streamliner Center Block: The $350 Guitar a Real Touring Guitarist Actually Chose

Search for the Gretsch G2622 Streamliner and you’ll run into the same recycled roll call that follows every Gretsch semi-hollow around the internet: Chuck Berry, Larry Carlton, Eric Clapton, Dave Grohl, Noel Gallagher. It’s the brand’s default player list, copy-pasted across product pages regardless of which specific guitar is actually being sold. None of these five has any documented connection to this particular model — Carlton and Clapton built their careers on a Gibson ES-335, Berry’s signature sound predates this guitar’s 2016 launch by six decades, and Grohl’s and Gallagher’s Gretsch chapters belong to full-size, much pricier hollowbodies from entirely different tiers of the catalog.

But here’s what makes the G2622 different from most budget Gretsch models: there actually is a real, verifiable, on-the-record touring guitarist who chose this exact guitar, unprompted, and has stuck with it for years. His name won’t mean much to a casual reader. That’s precisely what makes the story worth telling.

The Guitarist the Spreadsheet Missed: Keeley Davis

Keeley Davis joined post-hardcore veterans At the Drive-In in 2016, stepping into a lineup that also includes his longtime Sparta bandmate, drummer Tony Hajjar. Before that, Davis had already built a two-decade underground résumé as the frontman of Engine Down, a guitarist in Sparta, and a member of the ambient side-project Glös with his sister Maura. He is, by any honest measure, a career musician rather than a household name — which is exactly the profile of guitarist who actually plays a guitar in this price range as a main instrument rather than a marketing photo op.

Davis explained his reasoning directly in a Gretsch-produced interview: working on At the Drive-In’s 2017 comeback album in•ter a•li•a, he was chasing the humbucker-driven, in-your-face tone of the band’s earlier records without having played on them himself. He noticed the newly released Streamliner, and was drawn to its shallower body and fixed bridge compared to his existing Electromatic — practical, ergonomic reasons rather than brand loyalty or an endorsement check. He specifically cited disliking the “floppiness” of a strap sitting on a Bigsby-equipped neck, since he plays the guitar low, and found the Streamliner’s fixed V-Stoptail bridge solved that immediately.

That wasn’t a one-off. Davis kept using Streamliners into subsequent writing sessions, eventually picking up a second one in black finish and experimenting with single-coil-loaded versions for a brighter, “angrier” tone on newer material, describing the single-coil model as something that “rips your skin a little” in the best way. Equipboard’s crowdsourced verification confirms the specific instrument as a Torino Green G2622 without the Bigsby vibrato — the fixed-bridge configuration this article covers. He’s since name-checked wanting a 12-string Streamliner as his next gear acquisition in interviews, suggesting the relationship with the platform has outlasted a single album cycle.

The reaction from Gretsch’s own player community is worth noting too. A Gretsch-Talk forum thread titled, simply, “Who plays a G2622?” opened with a member expressing genuine surprise that Davis appeared to be the only notable player they could find using the model. The ensuing discussion landed on a blunt but accurate read of the situation: Streamliners are priced as gateway instruments into the pricier Gretsch tiers, and the brand’s profit margins on a sub-$500 guitar make it far more sensible to court big-name endorsements for the flagship-priced models instead. Davis isn’t a paid face for the brand’s marketing machine. He’s a working guitarist who tried one, liked what it did for his sound, and kept using it — arguably a more honest form of product validation than a signature model ever provides.

What the Streamliner Was Built to Prove

The G2622 launched in 2016 as part of Gretsch’s Streamliner Collection, a range built around a specific mission: deliver the semi-hollow Gretsch experience at a genuinely accessible price without gutting the design DNA that makes a Gretsch feel and sound like one. One long-running review of the launch lineup put it plainly, floating the idea that the G2622 might be the long-awaited affordable ES-335 alternative players had been asking for. That comparison has stuck ever since — you’ll see the G2622 described as a “bargain 335” or “budget Gibson ES-335 alternative” across nearly every retailer and review site that covers it.

Built in Indonesia — a manufacturing base widely regarded in the guitar trade as a step up in consistency from budget Chinese production lines of the same era — the Streamliner range sits at the true entry point of Gretsch’s current lineup, below even the China-built Electromatic tier that includes the smaller-bodied G5655TG Center Block Jr. Where that Electromatic sibling launched three years later in 2019 at a higher price point with gold hardware and a laurel board, the G2622 arrived first, at roughly half the cost, aimed squarely at players who wanted the silhouette and construction concept without the premium finish appointments.

The Streamliner Collection wasn’t a single guitar but a coordinated three-body-style launch: the full-size 16-inch G2420 hollowbody, the same-width double-cutaway G2622 with its center block, and a downsized 13.375-inch Junior variant, the G2655, aimed at players who wanted an even smaller-handling instrument. Each body style shipped in both fixed-bridge and Bigsby-equipped configurations. That range structure meant Gretsch could offer a genuine hollowbody, a genuine semi-hollow, and a compact semi-hollow at three price-adjacent points, all sharing the same pickups and control layout — a deliberate strategy to make the brand’s core tonal identity available at whatever body size and budget a given player could commit to.

Center Block Construction: Twin Rails, Not a Single Block

Like its pricier Electromatic relatives, the G2622’s defining engineering feature is its center block — a design meant to solve the classic hollowbody problem of feedback at stage volume. Despite the marketing language, the actual internal structure isn’t a single solid block running through the guitar’s middle. One detailed teardown found the true construction to be two strips of spruce running down the center of the body, connecting top to back and anchoring the pickups, bridge, and tailpiece, while leaving a genuine air gap in between from just past the neck pickup down to the base of the guitar. That’s a meaningfully different, more hollow-leaning design than a true center-block guitar like a Gibson ES-335, and it’s part of why reviewers consistently describe the G2622’s voice as airier and less punchy than its Electromatic cousins — a “softer, squashier” tonality, as one reviewer put it, that trades some midrange punch for extra resonance.

The bridge and tailpiece setup is also a deliberate departure from vintage Gretsch design. Rather than borrowing a traditional Bigsby-and-trapeze layout wholesale, the fixed-bridge G2622 uses a purpose-built V-Stoptail anchored through metal ferrules — a shape Gretsch’s own product team has described as intentionally “Gretsch-y” in spirit (echoing the brand’s classic Cadillac tailpiece and Bigsby cutout) while avoiding being a direct copy of any vintage part. It’s also the exact feature that drew Keeley Davis to the guitar in the first place: no floating trapeze tailpiece, no Bigsby arm digging into a low-slung playing position, just a stable, low-maintenance anchor point.

Full Specifications

Broad’Tron BT-2S vs. BT-3S: What Changed

Early G2622 production ran Broad’Tron BT-2S pickups; more recent units use the updated BT-3S design, which mixes Alnico 5 and Alnico 2 magnets to push stronger mids, tighter-but-full lows, and smooth, musical highs. The BT-3S also introduced a push/pull coil-split function on the master volume pot, opening up thinner, single-coil-adjacent tones that the original BT-2S spec didn’t offer. If you’re shopping used, checking which pickup generation is installed is worth doing — it’s a genuine functional difference, not just a cosmetic revision.

Tone Recipes

Alt-rock/post-hardcore crunch (the Keeley Davis approach): Bridge humbucker, moderate-to-high gain, minimal reverb. The center block’s feedback resistance means you can push a tube amp hard on stage without the guitar howling back at you.

Warm jazz-adjacent clean: Neck pickup, amp clean headroom, tone rolled back slightly. Not a true archtop voicing, but a genuinely usable alternative when you want more air than a solidbody offers.

Blues-rock lead: Bridge pickup into a mid-boosting overdrive pedal, coil-split engaged on BT-3S-equipped units for a thinner, more vocal lead tone with extra pick attack.

Indie jangle: Both pickups together, clean-to-edge-of-breakup amp setting, light slapback delay. The airier resonance compared to a true center-block Gretsch actually works in this style’s favor.

How It Compares

Against the pricier Electromatic-tier G5655TG Center Block Jr., the G2622 trades gold hardware, a maple neck, and a genuinely solid center block for a lower price, a nato neck, and that airier twin-rail construction — a real hollowbody character at a real discount, if you don’t need the premium finish. Against the standard-depth G5420T, the G2622 gives up some of that model’s fully hollow resonance but gains genuine feedback resistance for higher-gain playing. And against the actual Gibson ES-335 it’s so often compared to, the honest verdict from most reviewers is that the G2622 doesn’t fully replicate that guitar’s punch or refinement — but at roughly a fifth of the price, it gets close enough that the comparison is taken seriously rather than dismissed outright.

Buying Guide

• Check pickup generation. BT-3S units (with coil-split) offer more tonal range than earlier BT-2S models — worth confirming on used listings.
• Fixed bridge vs. Bigsby: The G2622 (V-Stoptail) and G2622T (Bigsby) share the same body and electronics but handle and balance differently — try both if you can, since the added Bigsby hardware noticeably shifts the instrument’s weight distribution.
• Watch for country-of-origin confusion. Some overseas markets have reported Streamliners badged as Chinese-made rather than Indonesian; while Gretsch’s official position is that all modern Streamliners are built in Indonesia, it’s worth verifying with a reputable dealer if buying outside major markets.
• Used market value: These depreciate quickly given the low new price, making clean secondhand examples an excellent value entry point into semi-hollow tone.

Ownership Notes

Owner discussion consistently flags a few practical points: the reduced weight of newer production runs (some owners report figures near 6.5 lbs, notably lighter than older units) makes for comfortable long sets, though a few players note mild neck dive that a wider strap easily corrects. High-fret access is a recurring, honestly-reported limitation shared with other Gretsch double-cutaway designs — the neck joint and body shape don’t offer quite the same upper-fret reach as a Gibson ES-335’s more sculpted cutaway. New string sets and a nut check are worth doing on arrival, as with most guitars in this price bracket, to get tuning stability dialed in from day one.

Frequently Asked Questions