Some people have issues with basswood; for me, it's anything that works because it's what ultimately comes out of the amp (speaker) that matters. I've been getting good results with basswood, especially with my RG7620 (disct'd) here.
Touted as a soft, ding-prone & cheap, basswood is often deemed as a second class resident in guitars; many would cite mahogany/ ash as superior tonewood. It's inevitable that basswood's economical nature would entice the manufacturer to make it a favourable working material in terms of production costs, as such, basswood is used in mid-priced guitars which often manifest production inconsistencies. However, select basswood are also used in upper-end guitars as documented in Suhr's catalogues & we have the Ibanez Universe to prove the critics wrong.
I own many basswood guitars across brand names, but many in my collection are Ibanez models. Throughout the years, what I hear from my basswood guitars are great pickup tones; it seems that this tonewood permits the manifestation of the pickups' voicing rather than being a blanket to the sonic delivery. My RG7620 here fortifies the default DiMarzio's lower end frequency focus. I often hear an excessively polished top end from the aforementioned pickup brand, at high gain/ drive settings, but not from this guitar. This is the reason why I choose to keep them in-tact & not swap them for Seymour Duncan units, which I favour.
Rather than being more appreciative of the overall tone on offer, many of the fledgling players today choose to compartmentalize tonewoods into the respectful/ hateful category.
