how can I be liking this $550 new axe more than all my others?

[MetalMike_II]

<gushing>

after going back and forth with all my other guitars for hours at a time I am liking it more and more




No camera - pics here all on one page
http://www.musicplayers.com/reviews/guitars/2006/0806_IbanezRGT42DX.php


culprit: Ibanez RGT42dxfm-tlf
alias: cheap knock-off of the Prestige RGT

construction: neck-thru
5-piece maple/walnut centerpiece w/ beautiful rosewood board
mahogany body wings
flame maple laminate top

finish: satin, matte finish
color: bluish-grayish-lavender ("Transparent Lavender Flat")

hardware color: I don't know, gray, burnished nickel-looking, like a modern plumbing fixture
("Powder Cosmo (Satin Black Chrome)")

guts: only aftermarket items are pickups. Everything else is stock

- PAF Joe in the neck, white
- Mo' Joe in the bridge, white

Volume, Tone, 5-way knife

- bridge
- bridge and neck, inner coils only
- bridge and neck
- neck in parallel
- neck in series

Edge 2 floating tremolo and locking nut

cosmetics:
matching peg head
white logo
white binding around the gorgeous 2-tone rosewood board
(lots of light and dark browns in the rosewood)
subtle sawtooth inlays, probably fake, but subdued abalone-ish looking

bonus:
eye-popping bluish-gray guitar with white trim and white pickups
versatile pickup combinations
vocal-sounding super strat
low action, greasy, fast player
soft sounds
crispy punchy sounds
sweet stratty sounds
fat Gibson sounds
smooth ranges in the electronics

nice volume and tone action and range, very different...
...but somehow high-quality feeling and sounding,
...very smooth volume and tone controls

setup needed:
shim under the nut to line up the geometries a bit better for ultra-low action
action, light truss, intonation, 3 pickup set swaps, trem springs in a V

guitars compared:
- hardtail Wolfgangs with rosewood and ebony (basswood, maple bolt-on)
- Ernie Ball Musicman EVH sig (basswood, maple bolt-on with Floyd)
- Warmoth Soloist (alder/maple bolt-on with OFR)


results:

I am as suprised as anyone. A year and $2000 into a frustrating Warmoth project and I pluck a $550 axe off the wall and 3 weeks later after the relatively easy setup and pickup decisions I have something I love 10 times as much.

Ordinarily with my guitars my guitar volume sits at 9, just enough to cut that little bit of timbre and sibilance I don't need. But, with the Ibanez's volume at 6 or 7 and the tone at 7 or 8, I have the strangest, smoothest, sweetest tone with vocal chord quality, and punchy, soft yet clear single note lines. Very mid-ranged, but softly so, well balanced, but loose. Choke up on the pick and bring the crispy. Fast arpeggios snap and pop.

Bring up the guitar volume and tone from there and it just gets smoothly and gradually more metal and reminds me of some ESP neck-thrus I have tried. There are no timbre-jumps when you go from 7.6 to 7.9, no sudden increases in volume. These electronics just have the smoothest range in them. Turning them up you get more than just Timbre or Edge or actual Volume - that you get by going from 0 to 6, after that and it's more like the last 40% is reserved for Intensity.

Fast playing Wizard profile and wide playing surface up high. Super easy access to every string on the 24th fret thanks to the huge cutaway afforded by the neck-thru construction.

WIZARD II Neck Dimensions
Scale Length: 648mm/25.5"
Width At Nut: 43mm (1.69")
Width At Last Fret: 56mm (2.20")
Thickness At 1st Fret: 19mm
Thickness At 12th Fret: 21mm
Radius: 400


It is not the RGT featured on Ibanez's site: http://www.ibanez.com/eg/guitar.aspx?m=RGT42DXFM
which is a different color and a different trem

It is this one (very, very cool pic although you can't quite make out the maple and walnut strips going all the way up--in person with the shifting light you can see the neck-thru construction clearly and it looks magnificent):
http://www.musicplayers.com/reviews/guitars/2006/images/rgt42dxBack-big.jpg


</gushing>

 

[Breaking the law]

Re: how can I be liking this $550 new axe more than all my others?

I've got an older one, colored black. With these, it's about finding the right one out of the stock, at least to my experience. I have an even cheaper Ibby, the white cheap one (RG 350 or someting?) and sometimes I like it more than any other guitar I lay my hands on. I've concluded that you can get pretty darn lucky with Ibanez.

A nice review-ish post, anyways.

 

[BluesGuyJ]

Re: how can I be liking this $550 new axe more than all my others?

How do you like the Mojo in the bridge? It is a candidate for my RG project...

It is very likely you found yourself a good guitar for cheap man. I have decided to turn away from the typical high end guitars and work really hard to get the best bang for the buck now. Instead of a Gibson LP, I am looking for a cheaper Heritage or Carvin SC or PRS SC. Instead of an Ibanez JEM, I'm looking at the cheaper RG prestige series or just plan on constructing my own custom RG.

 

[MetalMike_II]

Re: how can I be liking this $550 new axe more than all my others?

How do you like the Mojo in the bridge? It is a candidate for my RG project...

I originally put a non-F-spaced Mojo in the neck, and I liked it so much there that I decided to swap with DiMarzio for an F-spaced one for the bridge. I went with the PAF Joe on a whim for the neck. They match up with "sinky," spongy neck-thru vibrations of the whole instrument but tighten up with knobs getting turned up. There are abundant little Satrianis to be found with ease; I've also located some SRVs and the occasional lurking Santanaties.

They are both vowelly - A E I O U y - but the consonants are there when you dig in, and they are sweet as teats.

The instrument was the subject and point of this Christmas carol:
https://forum.seymourduncan.com/showthread.php?t=127773


:fest6:

 

[uOpt]

Re: how can I be liking this $550 new axe more than all my others?

Can you give more details on the Warmoth you got?

It's pretty common that one guitar just turns out to be "the one" on a very individual basis, but I still think that there are lessons to learn here about Warmoth projects. Both about when not to start them, and about how to do it if you do.

 

[MetalMike_II]

Re: how can I be liking this $550 new axe more than all my others?

Can you give more details on the Warmoth you got?

there are lessons to learn here about Warmoth projects.

a lesson I may have from the Warmoth is that I might not be an alder guy

it's an alder Soloist body, rear routed with original Floyd, H-H config

birds-eye maple neck, compound radius, Wolfgang contour, Kramer banana peg head (a great neck that looks great)

I think I would like it better if it had been a swamp ash or basswood body

A lot of other people would probably like it better than I do

 

[BluesGuyJ]

Re: how can I be liking this $550 new axe more than all my others?

You live and learn. I'd really like to start ordering completely custom guitars so I am coming to learn the basics of doing so now. I figured, I'll startout by putting together a guitar from parts that are already availbile (RG1570 body and RG Prestige Wizard II neck with silver shark tooth inlays). I am sending off he body to be repainted. I need to learn what measurements my current necks have so I can really learn what I like about each neck and what I dont and how they literally measure up.

 

[tone?]

Re: how can I be liking this $550 new axe more than all my others?

a lesson I may have from the Warmoth is that I might not be an alder guy

See this to me is a common mistake made by people including myself that put together parts guitars.
I dont think that you do not like alder, you just do not like the specific guitar you put together. An electric guitar is waaay more than just the wood used. I spend way too much money on parts guitars only to see that they dont play nearly the way you want em and sound to the left or right of what you want to hear.

how did the Wolfies and the EVH compare to the Ibby??

 

[MetalMike_II]

Re: how can I be liking this $550 new axe more than all my others?

how did the Wolfies and the EVH compare to the Ibby??

Love my Van Halen guitars. Those Wolfgang hardtails are still the best guitars in the whole wide world for the guitar stylings of Metal Mike. I've not found another guitar that comes close, for me and my thang.

The Ibanez is waaaay different. But it sure is growing on me fast. I'm not even entirely sure why I like it yet, I just know that I do, more and more.

 

[JB_From_Hell]

Re: how can I be liking this $550 new axe more than all my others?

Ibanez makes solid guitars for low $.

Either believe that, or keep listening to the "Ibeenhad" crowd, and remain puzzled as to how you could like the RGT.

 

[MetalMike_II]

Re: how can I be liking this $550 new axe more than all my others?

Ibanez makes solid guitars for low $.

Either believe that, or keep listening to the "Ibeenhad" crowd, and remain puzzled as to how you could like the RGT.

yep for real
had an Ibanez Saber, too, once upon a time
and the Roadstars were great
always liked em

wonder if their amp is any good

 

[mediumpimpin]

Re: how can I be liking this $550 new axe more than all my others?

I really need to play an Ibanez again, I never dug the super thin necks before, which makes sense as I love LP's. My carvin has a 15inch radius and thin neck, so I might like an ibanez. I'm just not a fan of floyds and the looks of most Ibanez's.

 

[tnvol]

Re: how can I be liking this $550 new axe more than all my others?

I like the old RG 550s a lot. I have a PGM 30 that has a killer neck on it as well.

 

[Blueswaite]

Re: how can I be liking this $550 new axe more than all my others?

Over the years I have played many diifferent guitars and what ever price range I am amazed at the quality Ibanez puts out even in there low end models. I have an AXR300CRS with a SD 59 in the bridge and a RG270 which I play alot. I have played expensive guitars that just don't play and feel as good as the RG270. After a certain point what can you add to a guitar to make it so more expensive. I have played on some squires that felt better than American made ones. I think you just can run across one even inexpensive that you just go wow.

 

[MetalMike_II]

Re: how can I be liking this $550 new axe more than all my others?

I had an Ibanez 540 Pro S a long time ago...late 80s, early 90s that I played most and from which I learned a whole lot about playing.

it was S-S-H with mini-toggles for each pickup and a push/pull bridge splitter on the tone knob. Rusty, dark burnt orange colored with gold and black metal flake paint on a highly contoured and thin but weighty saber body style. Big chunky chrome floating trem with scooped out area to pull up on the bar really set off the look of this odd beauty

wish I had it now to throw some pickups at it - it would be an oddballish but classy looker today

 

[Mephis]

Re: how can I be liking this $550 new axe more than all my others?

I've got an RGT42BP, and love it to death.

I just wish I could get a hard tail conversion done on it and have it refretted.

 

[MetalMike_II]

Re: how can I be liking this $550 new axe more than all my others?

I've got an RGT42BP, and love it to death.

that is really cool-lookin
what's the "BP" in the model #? Did you paint it? what pickups?

how does one describe the tone of an RGT? I am having trouble. This is a whole new thing for me. My other guitars don't have a certain "depth" my RGT has, and the RGT is not as in-yer-face, and these things aren't good or bad, just different. I'm seriously trippin. My lead playing has changed and improved in 2 weeks -- this guitar is so fast!!! Maybe just having something so different but fully realized in its own way is getting me out of some ruts I didn't know I was in or something like that. Rhythm playing is a different world to me on this axe and I'm still adjusting and exploring.

I still can't get over that last 30-40% of the volume knob, which just increases the "intensity."

3 words that come to mind when I think of this guitar compared to my others:

Fluid
Deep
Mean

Stays in tune very well, even with spastic whammies and gurgled bar-flutters.

</more random gushing>



I've got a set of '59s laying around. Hmmm...I wonder....

anybody ever try Duncans in an Ibanez? isn't there a rule about that? I tried a basswood RG the other day that had a Full Shred. It was rich and phatass. The Satch pups in it now are working, but mad science is beckoning....

 

[The Golden Boy]

Re: how can I be liking this $550 new axe more than all my others?

I think I've got around $400 into my Telecaster. It's my #2 go-to guitar.

 

[MetalMike_II]

Re: how can I be liking this $550 new axe more than all my others?

wow!

been playin this RGT exclusively for a while and it looks like the honeymoon was a precursor of even better things to come, just had to start gettin to know her. mostly into a Cube 60 for practice and composing and fun. It seems to have developed a special relationship with the Moog Phaser it drives.

I'm right back to this one every time I try a different guitar for a minute, this is the one I keep playing for 3 hours. I'm astonished with the different vibe that seems to be because of the neck-thru, and I don't think I'm imagining things when it feels (from a sound affecting your playing so the frets feel softer) and sounds like an ESP (or a nice LTD for that matter) neck-thru. To me it has the same focused chunky biznez end as the few high-end ESP neck-thrus I've tried.

the fact that I'm into it for low $ is icing

I'm a happy camper

</rejoicing>



its just so fast and deep and I can get all soulful easy...I dunno
satin finish feels good

its reeeeeeally fast...............................................

</ps>

 

[BloodRose]

Re: how can I be liking this $550 new axe more than all my others?

2 things.. 1) vibe . Lately, I have been really loving, playing , enjoying some of my les expensive axes. Honestly, both of my Epi Les pauls (pickups changed) sound and play better than my Gibson (also with changed pickups) . I paid $375 each for them and More than twice that for the Gibson..

I used to have a good feeling when I played expensive guitars. Made me feel like a more worthy player.. Now, I feel better when I make good music on a cheaper guitar.. makes me feel Im a better player. Plus, the money Ive saved
is good..

2) lots of people bash Ibanez's.. Dunno why.. they make good guitars. There has been lots of great music made on them. My RG570 sounds huge. Not thin at all like many say they sound. My 550 sounded great too.. If it sounds good, it is good!!
If it moves you and encourages you to play... GO for it..