Gretsch refrained from jumping into the doubleneck arena with Gibson in the 1960s or with Rickenbacker in the 1970s, but if Gretsch had made a doubleneck electric back then, it might have looked like the Nashville G6120-6/12.

Introduced in 1997, the six-string and 12-string model took it’s inspiration – like most of the guitars in the modern Gretsch line – from a tried-and-true model dating back to Gretsch’s glory years of the late 1950s and early 1960s.

The horseshoe on the pegheads, the orange-stain finish, and the Gretsch/Bigsby vibrola were all lifted directly from the Chet Atkins Hollow Body, aka Model 6120. The attempt to incorporate the single-cutaway body shape from the early 6120s, however, left the doubleneck with an awkward bulge on the upper bass bout.

Chet Atkin’s endorsement was not available at the time the 6120-6/12 was introduced, so the doubleneck, like other 6120-styled models in the new Gretsch line, was named Nashville – which has been Gretsch’s namefor the 6120 from 1964 to current times.