Pierre
Stratologist
Yeah it's honestly hard to find the words here. So let's start with a thousand of them, in picture form. Apologies for the potatoes. I hadn't wiped her down to not show smudges, and I live in a city where 'sun' is strictly a June -> September occurrence. Hence it's all flash or ISO1250.
So on the back of these 4 thousand words, here're a few more to wrap this up.
This is one of the most inspiring instruments I own.
It's on the heavy side compared to what I'm used to normally. But it's certainly manageable and given that I favor very light axes, it may be on the light side of things for some people out there.
It's resonant and sounds great acoustically, which is pretty much my #1 criteria for electric guitars (... yep). It enables me to play them anytime no matter who may be annoyed by it, and the likelihood of a guitar to sound good plugged-in is higher for guitars that sound good without electronics.
It sounds... maybe a liiiitle on the bright side but not unpleasantly so.
It sounds better than most Strats I ever played plugged-in, even with the basswoord/maple body wood and the humbuckers! The mixed positions + Split are fantastic, and typically what I'd judge an HH or HSH configuration on.
Unfortunately I don't like the bridge pickup on its own THAT much for heavy tones, though I've not yet 100% honed-in on why. To be explored...
The electronics are little more complicated than I like, and I've not sussed them 100% yet. The middle pickup is actually a humbucker so all individual pickups will produce no hum, and the toggle will Split any of them.
And then you can pull on the tone knob, and introduce the bridge pickup. This is GREAT for those in-between tones, or to add width to the neck pickup tone. It takes a little getting used to, and I dislike push-pulls now that I tasted the awesomeness of push-push, but well. As the French never say, c'est la vie.
It plays about as well as you'd hope for a guitar that price. The frets FELT a little smaller, but when comparing to another guitar with the Medium Jumbos I like, they look fairly similar. I guess I'm still getting used to the feel.
There's too much relief on the neck, but I'll adjust that once I'm more familiar with the guitar.
I screwed the bridge all the way to the body. There is no trem route, so it functions as a hardtail. Sweet.
The tuners are AWESOME. The nut is perfectly done and at exactly the right height.
I still need to fine-tune the bridge saddles' radius, and as mentioned maybe tighten the truss rod a little, but she's 98% there as it is.
Something interesting... The demarcation line between the body and top is PERFECT. There's even a tiny blacker finish line to accentuate the change. Top quality.
But the natural binding on the maple top has quite a lot of finish bleed. This was unexpected. I focus on details so I was a little bummed, but in the end it's actually... classy. There are no specific sections that stand out, and all of it is rather discreet. I guess it just looks hand-finished, rather than imperfectly-so. Given that the rest of the finish is perfect I was a little surprised, but ah well. Here's a close-up:
Alright, specs:
* Basswood body, maple cap
* Maple/maple neck
* Heavy frets (Stainless Steel)
* TA branded bridge and tuners
* Cajun Teal finish on quilt top
* Add bridge on push-pull, Split on 2-way toggle switch
It is not a custom guitar, but the plethora of options out there mean you won't fail to find what you want and what fits you.
Ah before I forget. This is quite a large guitar! I'm used to modern Superstrats being quite small (e.g. Suhr Moderns, MusicMan, Soloists/Dinkies etc...) but this one feels bigger. It's definitely bigger than my Suhr modern. I'll have to make do. The rest makes it worth it.
So on the back of these 4 thousand words, here're a few more to wrap this up.
This is one of the most inspiring instruments I own.
It's on the heavy side compared to what I'm used to normally. But it's certainly manageable and given that I favor very light axes, it may be on the light side of things for some people out there.
It's resonant and sounds great acoustically, which is pretty much my #1 criteria for electric guitars (... yep). It enables me to play them anytime no matter who may be annoyed by it, and the likelihood of a guitar to sound good plugged-in is higher for guitars that sound good without electronics.
It sounds... maybe a liiiitle on the bright side but not unpleasantly so.
It sounds better than most Strats I ever played plugged-in, even with the basswoord/maple body wood and the humbuckers! The mixed positions + Split are fantastic, and typically what I'd judge an HH or HSH configuration on.
Unfortunately I don't like the bridge pickup on its own THAT much for heavy tones, though I've not yet 100% honed-in on why. To be explored...
The electronics are little more complicated than I like, and I've not sussed them 100% yet. The middle pickup is actually a humbucker so all individual pickups will produce no hum, and the toggle will Split any of them.
And then you can pull on the tone knob, and introduce the bridge pickup. This is GREAT for those in-between tones, or to add width to the neck pickup tone. It takes a little getting used to, and I dislike push-pulls now that I tasted the awesomeness of push-push, but well. As the French never say, c'est la vie.
It plays about as well as you'd hope for a guitar that price. The frets FELT a little smaller, but when comparing to another guitar with the Medium Jumbos I like, they look fairly similar. I guess I'm still getting used to the feel.
There's too much relief on the neck, but I'll adjust that once I'm more familiar with the guitar.
I screwed the bridge all the way to the body. There is no trem route, so it functions as a hardtail. Sweet.
The tuners are AWESOME. The nut is perfectly done and at exactly the right height.
I still need to fine-tune the bridge saddles' radius, and as mentioned maybe tighten the truss rod a little, but she's 98% there as it is.
Something interesting... The demarcation line between the body and top is PERFECT. There's even a tiny blacker finish line to accentuate the change. Top quality.
But the natural binding on the maple top has quite a lot of finish bleed. This was unexpected. I focus on details so I was a little bummed, but in the end it's actually... classy. There are no specific sections that stand out, and all of it is rather discreet. I guess it just looks hand-finished, rather than imperfectly-so. Given that the rest of the finish is perfect I was a little surprised, but ah well. Here's a close-up:
Alright, specs:
* Basswood body, maple cap
* Maple/maple neck
* Heavy frets (Stainless Steel)
* TA branded bridge and tuners
* Cajun Teal finish on quilt top
* Add bridge on push-pull, Split on 2-way toggle switch
It is not a custom guitar, but the plethora of options out there mean you won't fail to find what you want and what fits you.
Ah before I forget. This is quite a large guitar! I'm used to modern Superstrats being quite small (e.g. Suhr Moderns, MusicMan, Soloists/Dinkies etc...) but this one feels bigger. It's definitely bigger than my Suhr modern. I'll have to make do. The rest makes it worth it.
).
