Wow, a great guitar at a great price. Heavier than I expected.
Need to be setup. Had a lot of fret buzz.

Great sound.

Less than 2oo$ delivered and a great entry into tele world. It's like getting a kit put together so you see and feel what it's like first. Now it's a evolving project,fun stuff. The ash body is heavy,ok for casual wouldn't want to stand for 4 sets. Neck needed fret work.

Well, this is not the first Monoprice Indio guitar I have bought. I am still quite amazed at how good they are. I received mine this morning and I did not have to do one single thing to it. Normally I do a full set up on them, but in this case it came perfectly intonated and playable right out of the bag/box. The action was just between medium and medium-low, so if anything I may drop it just a touch, but it is entirely playable as it is and the Wilkinson pickups sound great. Even the tuners (usually a bit rough) were really good as-is. I continue to recommend these guitars to my friends and family. I have no issues whatsoever with these guitars.

Let me begin by saying that I'm by no means an expert. I've been playing guitar for about three years and electric for only the last year or so. But in that time I've owned two Gibsons, two Epiphones and a Rickenbacker. I might actually like playing this guitar the most of all.

I bought this instrument as a beater guitar for when I travel. After ordering it, I freaked out about all the reviews saying how heavy it is, and I thought I might even just end up returning it unopened. I'm so glad I didn't do that.

First, the negatives - to get them out of the way. When the guitar arrived, the box was damaged. It was packaged in the gig bag (a nice bag overall) and then in a shipping box - that was it. Whatever damaged the box also dinged the guitar. (Monoprice made it right by giving me a small discount). The fret ends were very sharp. I took a standard round file, used tape to protect the fretboard and filed them down. No big deal. Last, the tuners are pretty poor. They are hard to get in tune and they don't hold tuning very well. I picked up a set of Musiclily locking tuners which dropped right in to where the old ones were. Huge improvement.

Now, the good - well, everything else. The guitar itself is beautiful - the grain on the Ash is lovely and the fretboard is a nice, thick piece of rosewood. It comes with D'addario strings. The bridge is high quality and the guitar came properly intonated. The pickups, which I thought I might need to replace, sound absolutely excellent through my Vox AC15C1X. Clean on the bridge setting is twangy and Spanky; get some dirt on it and it's growly in the best way. And - finally - my guitar weighs just a touch over 9 lbs. That's on the high end for a Tele-style guitar, but Squier Classic Vibe 50s Telecasters regularly weigh 8-9 lbs, so this is in that ballpark. It's certainly manageable and nowhere near some of the numbers mentioned elsewhere on the web (11 lbs?!).

Anyway, basically I highly recommend this guitar. I'm just absolutely shocked at how good it sounds, how nice it looks and feels and how much fun it is to play. It seriously makes me wonder why anyone (including me) ever spends what it takes to buy a Gibson or Fender (or even a good Epiphone or Squier for that matter).

I don't see how can you go better than this for around $200 if you want genuine Tele sounds. Good fretwork and once you set it up correctly it has incredible action and playability. Indio keeps improving year after year!

Very happy with this purchase. Guitar looks and feels great, was set up very nicely* and is very easy to play. Bought for my college-age daughter to practice with while she is home for the summer (she has access to more expensive instruments at school), and so far she is getting great sound out of it and rarely puts it down.

* Neither of us are guitar experts, but in this price range we have gotten used to seeing poor electronics, buzzing frets, etc. Took a flyer on this one and it has not disappointed -> have found no issues after 2 months, it punches way above it's weight!

The good: wonderful sound, at least as good as my MIM Fender Tele. Beautifully finished neck, smooth fret ends. Great pickups. Sounds better than the Retro Classic a friend talked me out of. Setup near perfect, but I'm going to try to get it lower.

The not so good.: Heavy, heavy, as others have noted. And the neck is quite a bit chunkier than my Fender Tele.

Bottom line: Despite the weight, a good deal on a quality guitar that I recommend to you.

Great well-built guitar like any guitar it will require a set up to get it to your preferences mine required Slight truss rod adjustment, fret polishing and tapping down a couple of frets On par with other reviews she is heavy 11+ pounds I like the sound of the pick ups they have the classic tele twang The fit and finish are PERFECT mine looks, sounds and plays GREAT !!!

If your able to do your own set up and working on guitars then I would recommend buying this guitar.. The body is 2 piece so that's good. Its pretty heavy. Nicely finished. The neck has a satin finish and while you can feel some imperfections its not an issue with me. The fret board was pretty dry but I used the fret board conditioner I use on my Taylors and it looks and feels better now. Heres the problem with this guitar. I think the materials especially for the money are good but where its lacking is assembly. They must of used an air powered screw driver to mount the neck and Im guessing they fully screwed the 2 upper screws in first and then the 2 closest to the body. Luckily it must of been torque limited because there was a visible air gap where the lower part of the neck met the pocket. I thought they had shimmed it but the angle was wrong so I loosened all 4 screws and hand tightened them in sequence as if I was putting a tire on my car. Fits like a glove now and the angle to body is good. The truss rod was over tightened and the lower strings buzzed. The frets were rough, I mean real rough you could see file marks where they leveled the frets. I spent alot of time with fret erasers getting them smooth and while they are better i think I might file them someday. When they installed the jack plate they didnt chamfer the hole and because the plate has a slight crown where the cord plugs in it didnt fit tightly. They put the screws in at an angle so I unsoldered it, filed the edges on the hole so it would fit and then repositioned the jack plate and redrilled the holes so the screws would go in straight. I had originally thought about upgrading the pick ups but TBH the pickups it came with sound great! If you think Im not happy with this guitar you would be wrong. It sounds as good as or better than the MIM Telecaster Player I was thinking of buying. It has the tele twang and pop but doesnt sound cheap at all. The upper strings have good tone articulation. I've never bought a MIC guitar so I don't have anything to compare it with. Would I buy another one if this one was stolen? Yes in a heart beat. Also the gig bag is nicer than expected and they got it to me in a day. Seems to stay in tune too. Ad says it was setup in the USA but maybe this one slipped by the luthier. All in all Im happy and may buy another guitar from Monoprice.