1. Round-neck Tricone
“The round-neck Tricone, tri-plate, whatever you want to call it, didn’t get played very much by slide players, but since the 60s, it’s become the ultimate bottleneck guitar. It sings and does things that no other guitar will do: it’s closer to an electric guitar with a sustain pedal on than an acoustic.”
2.
Square-neck Tricone
“That was the instrument that launched the sound: it was the invention. The neck is partly hollow, and in a way it is better than the round-neck Tricone. The only problem is you have to play it on your lap.”
3. Dobro Model 27
“This is a wood-bodied, spider-bridged, classic, basic Dobro. It launched the sound of what we know as the Dobro in country music. It was never made for country music, it just suited it. Top country bands like, say, Roy Acuff’s band were the pop stars of the era. To have Brother Oswald in there playing Hawaiian guitar was as cool as f**k, basically.”
4.
Stel-bodied National Duolian
“That has to be the most iconic resonator. It’s the one that everybody perceives as the sound of the Delta blues. It has a Duco painted finish. Very cheaply assembled, they often had what they called an ‘ebonised’ fretboard: basically, compressed paper. They produced them very cheaply and very quickly, and they have a tone that is incredible for blues guitar. It’s very tin can-ish – and loud as hell.”
5.
6. AIRLINE Resoglas 1965
SUPRO Dual to ne 1957
"Moving on from the resonator era, it's also worth checking out Supro [a brand of Valco, a business founded by Louis Dopyera, Victor Smith and Al Frost] and Dual Tones: Ry Cooder had the white one. Ry Cooder is more associated with the Strat, as that’s more often been his slide guitar of choice – but the Dual Tone is still a pretty iconic slide guitar." "In electrics, you've also got Supro Airlines. J B Hutto, the Chicago blues player, played one. Guitars such as the Resoglas don't really represent the first electric guitars used for bottleneck, but certainly Jack White made this model very popular in recent years."