Blood page

If you think you know the last guitar you put away because you had enough of it, the best thing to renew your faith in it is to return with fresh ears. No, fresh ears would be impossible- more like fresh perspective. When I last played my John Page Ashburn you see here, I thought the Bloodline single coils were too trebly & twangy for my brand of music. However, a different EQ tweak (both at the pedal & amp ends) did renew some faith in this guitar. I was listening to Malmsteen's Blackstar prior to plugging this in so that helped somewhat. 

Many of us are too quick to give up on an impulsive investment. We think we made a grave mistake by doing so & getting rid of that guitar would end the nightmare. However, we might overlook the fact that some instruments fulfil different applications, just like tools. Screw drivers are not claw hammers despite getting the job done in a crude way; they're just not meant for that job scope. More often than not, it's the user who failed to assess the situation & bring out the right tool for the job. If you think you've given up on that piece of gear that sounded so wrong when you last used it, give it a rest. Come back to it when that awful tone stopped ringing in your head. You'd be surprised what some downtime could do for you. 

Ibanez: SA560MB

I managed to give this Ibanez SA560 a go at Swee Lee recently. I have a soft spot for 22-fret Ibanez instruments, knowing Ibanez have some models still made as such is a little assuring.

As mentioned not too long ago, this SA560 looks promising in terms of looks & specs. In person, even the default weight is awesome & the non-angled headstock did very little (if any at all) to affect tuning responsiveness/ stability. The DiMarzio Black Velvets in all positions are deserving pickups in this instrument. They did well to complement this satin finish which has a midrange inclination. OK so I like the single coils here more than the humbucker in this respect. 

However, one major let down here - no excuses, Ibanez, this SA560 is the highest in its tier & should speak something in terms of QC since it costs more than the lower order units- the frets were poorly finished. 😠 The treble side of the neck was laden with sharp fret ends for almost the entire length. Damn! There's no such oversight at the bass side so clearly, it's one that escaped production scrutiny. I do not wish to imply the Chinese end of Ibanez as problematic since the acoustic & semis originated from the same country of manufacture & are some of the best in terms of construction.

Worthy FG

Happening now at Sound Alchemy. I've played this model before but it's at the Yamaha PS outlet. Awesome projection & playability. Now that it's going at this price, I'd recommend it to players looking for a reliable instrument on a budget with no compromise in QC. 👍

Ibanez: RG521 (3)

I seldom get positive encounters when it comes to Ibanez's in-house pickups. The branded, third party ones fared better in terms of my expectations. These are namely Seymour Duncan & DiMarzio models. The ones you see here in my RG521 are the V7 (N)/ V8 (B) humbuckers, the former being a ceramic unit & the latter, alnico.

I have no idea what the intention was by putting a ceramic core model in the neck position but the Ibanez people have let me down in this aspect yet again. If there's a hope of getting people to utilize the neck pickup for distortion inclined tones per se, then it might appeal to the solo purists. Many of us rely on the neck for smoother tones & immaculate cleans, generally, us solo geeks included. We like our bridge pickup to handle a more aggressive take for riffs instead. It would be a splendid idea to swap the magnet cores in time to come; have a ceramic-based pickup in the bridge, an alnico in the neck. I'm not writing off the V8 here entirely but it fell short on most occasions when a stinging, aggressive distortion is dialled up. No issues with the neck pickup in this aspect, even the cleans sound very appealing for a strong magnet type. 

Good offset tones

Was at Swee Lee today & managed to re-try the Fender Offset Tele with a different amp. Nothing boutique, just the BOSS Katana amp 😁

This guitar is equipped with a pair of American Custom pickups. Whatever these were meant to be, they sounded impressive with high gain. I managed to bump the midrange & the bridge single coil was just menacing- totally unexpected. The guitar was also set up to be low profile so shred was no issue here, just too bad the default strings were rusty. These pickups are also the rare breed that do well on clean mode. Of course, mind the Tele honk but it doesn't get in the way. I don't mind the Tele details at the body but I can't come to terms with the Tele headstock being fused into an offset body. Just me.

35-versary

In conjunction with their store anniversary, every $299 (& above) purchase at 35 Guitar Avenue, entitles you to a lucky draw chance. Prizes are depicted here. So this marks the start of a good March 😁