Chris Bryant’s Musical Instruments

I spent the best part of a Saturday afternoon traipsing round Denmark Street and Charing Cross Road helping a friend to buy an acoustic guitar…
There are few things more fun than guitar shopping with someone else’s money, especially when there’s so many guitars and guitar shops to choose from! Sometimes though, it’s a bit hard to know where to start. Needless to say we ended up in more than several guitar shops…
Whilst I’d never been in to Christ Bryant’s before (not quite sure why given that I’ve been everywhere on Denmark Street in the past) the selection of right-​handed acoustic guitars, service and attention we received in here was easily the best of the afternoon.
The assistant that helped us (Justin) spent a good half hour over the course of two visits explaining the different properties of the different woods and styles/​construction of the models we looked at and the effect that has on the sound. As someone who is no trained musician but who has played guitar for a few years I was pleasantly surprised to learn quite a few things too!
The main thing though was that they were attentive and extremely helpful without any of the snobbery or slightly intimidating atmosphere you sometimes find in guitar shops. In the end two happy customers left with one very nice sounding Crafter guitar.
p. s. Hank’s round the corner were also quite helpful but didn’t have the same selection of guitars in the price point we were looking at (£200 — £350). Maybe worth a look too though.
Left-​handers might want to try Macaris 5 minutes further down on Charing Cross Road road as they seem to have a wider selection of guitars for those of a southpaw disposition.

Chris Bryant’s is the first store that you come to on the epic strip of music shops on Denmark Street. It is technically on Charing Cross Road, but it corners Denmark Street. It is a pretty average shop all in all, and doesn’t really have anything that sets it apart from the rest.
The selection of electric guitars and amps is pretty decent. The selection of acoustic guitars however is pretty dismal. The shop is quite small, and often really crowded, probably because it is the first shop everyone sees. It doesn’t really have much in the way of instruments that aren’t guitars. The service is pretty average, and they don’t seem to keen to help you out.