Review quickie: PRS SE Silver Sky

Intro

This is the SE version of John Mayer's Silver Sky model, made in Indonesia at a lower list price. It's not a direct duplicate of the USA version, differences being:

• bigger truss rod cover
• plastic tuners
• 8.5" fretboard radius
• SE version pickups
• non-American electronics
• covered rear cavity
• poplar body

This guitar was officially released in 2022, given quite a fanfare by John Mayer himself, despite being an SE. Currently, only the rosewood fretboard version is available & it comes with an SE bag.

 Likes

• overall build quality - near flawless, darn!
• tone - as versatile as the USA model, very usable tone in all pickup positions
• playability - despite a difference in fretboard radius, from the core model, it's comfortable as heck!
• well cut nut slots

Dislikes

• dry fretboard
• tuners - inconsistent performance

Conclusion

Despite being an SE, this version of the Silver Sky holds its own in terms of tone & playability. This might be the reason the PRS camp went all out to launch it, they know it stands for quality more than anything else, SE or otherwise. If you remove the pickguard & take a look at the pickups, it has a bar magnet at the rear, typical of budget, in-house units which are more likely to be high output & semi-useless clean. Not for this guitar, though. Whatever inner variation it sports, these pickups are above expectations in my books. Bonus for distortion freaks like me - they sound equally awesome in high gain / drive mode.

That 1" difference in fretboard radius is negligible especially so for dweebs like me who seldom chord. The tuners are budget grade & its performance exposed only after being put to action. In fact, 2 of them are stiff. I wouldn't worry about the dry spots on the fretboard (only at the 3rd & 5th fret area), might be due to temperature fluctuations & of course, at this price point, it might be of a lower grade but definitely not a dud feature. All in all, the Silver Sky SE is not a second fiddle to the USA version. Despite the lower price point,  this is a quality guitar worth checking out if you are a single coil fan regardless of your John Mayer inclinations. 

Overall rating: 90%

Availability: Davis GMC / Swee Lee. Please refer the respective distributor's website for prices.

Pic: Sweetwater