Telephant
Active member
This review is for the Edwards LP CTM (black beauty style). Lets start with cosmetics:
Its not often you recieve a guitar in the mail thats pretty much giggable right out of the box. This guitar certainly was. The actual cosmetics are very nice. Everything looks solid and when you look at the guitar, it doesnt look cheap. In fact its so nice, Im really suprised this guitar was only $750 (minus shipping of course). From the pictures on the ebay auction, it almost made the inlays on the guitar look white, as if they werent abalone. But they are. Even the logo is. And it looks classy IMO. Even the pickups are at the right height. I may raise the neck pickup slightly but its fine as it is.
Im also really impressed with the neck shape and size. C shape necks are what I learned on, so that naturally feels more confortable to me than a D shape, but the actual size is not gigantic like a lot of LP's. In fact, its damn near perfect. Some might say its on the small side... The action is hammered to the board... And the ebony board... Man its smooth. It looks like they actually finished it. And again, the pics on the auction made the fingerboard look bright like the color of rosewood but its actually straight black.
The "cap" on the pickup selector has been comming unscrewed, typical I guess. Thats really my only complaint. I need to super glue it down so it wont unwind itself from lots of abuse.
Its also really weird laying my hand across a tune - o -matic. It just feels so much different than a strat style bridge. But I like it. It almost FEELS more percussive, if that makes sense?
Im very impressed with quality of the guitar. No, EXTREMELY impressed. I honestly prepared myself for it to be kind of cheesy, and its not at all. I would gladly buy another one before I spent $3500 on a LP standard.
It feels like a solid axe. And to me, the feel is the most important part, next to the sound.
Sound:
Let me just start by saying Im a strat gut through and through, but this guitar into my Superbass is THE sound of rock 'n roll. Its got a JB in the bridge, and a '59 in the neck. The neck seems really balanced but maybe a just a hair dark. While the JB just snarls out of control.
Its way more output than Im used to dealing with. The cool thing is, I dont really have to change my settings on the Superbass when I switch from the Strat to the LP. I mean normally with an LP, Id plug straight into the high input, but even when I use a Y cable to the top two inputs it sounds mean AND very thick. Im actually reall impressed by the clarity of these pickups. String/note seperation on full open chords is amazing. And again, it sounds really thick. Which is actually really helpful in my situation because we're a three piece.
The last two nights of band practice Ive used the LP exclusively. I havent eeven touched the strats. This is because I wanted to get used actually playing the guitar. And not just the way the neck or fretboard feels, but trying to get used to the switch placement and the knob placement. As I was syaing yesterday, I use my pick up selectors and volume knobs a lot, even in one song. If there is a break in a song, normally Im rolling my volume all the way off for a split second, so you dont hear hum, and then bringing it right back up again.... With the LP, its dead queit, unless the tubescreamer on and then it may want to feedback a bit. But we're also practicing in a tiny room and my stack is literally two feet behind me. So a little feedback with an overdrive on is definitely to be expected.
Also, the output is so high, I dont find myself using my 808 at all unless for solo's. With the strat, the OD808 is not only used for leads, but for all the heavy rhythm parts. With the LP, it overdrives the Marshall so hard, its like having that Mastodon tone right at my fingertips. With the 808 on, its an insane amount of gain.
Ive also realized I dont really dig the sound of humbuckers clean. For exmaple, through my Champ clone clean, it was too much of a flat, jazzy tone. But add just a little grit by turning the champ up to 7 or 8, and its all about the Zeppelin.
Now, strumming the guitar acoustically, I can see what some of you were saying about the laquer being thick and the guitar not resonating as much as you like. I can definitely hear and feel that. I mean, normally you can feel an electric resonate against your stomach, you know, that feeling when you play a really nice electric and you think to yourself, "Wow this guitar almost feels alive." This is the only lacking part of the guitar. Literally. The rest of the guitar is almost perfect. You know, its really hard to tell the quality of the wood since the finish is so thick. The guitar is straight black but its got the super mirror gloss going.
This guitar is staying. It kicks so much ass to finally be able to have this sound at my disposal. I love my Strats and Tele, but there is no substitute for the sound of an overdriven Les Paul. I might sand the finish down, and I might change the pickups for something with a little less output, but not anytime soon. Right now, Im just getting accustomed to bringing the rock fury.
Its not often you recieve a guitar in the mail thats pretty much giggable right out of the box. This guitar certainly was. The actual cosmetics are very nice. Everything looks solid and when you look at the guitar, it doesnt look cheap. In fact its so nice, Im really suprised this guitar was only $750 (minus shipping of course). From the pictures on the ebay auction, it almost made the inlays on the guitar look white, as if they werent abalone. But they are. Even the logo is. And it looks classy IMO. Even the pickups are at the right height. I may raise the neck pickup slightly but its fine as it is.
Im also really impressed with the neck shape and size. C shape necks are what I learned on, so that naturally feels more confortable to me than a D shape, but the actual size is not gigantic like a lot of LP's. In fact, its damn near perfect. Some might say its on the small side... The action is hammered to the board... And the ebony board... Man its smooth. It looks like they actually finished it. And again, the pics on the auction made the fingerboard look bright like the color of rosewood but its actually straight black.
The "cap" on the pickup selector has been comming unscrewed, typical I guess. Thats really my only complaint. I need to super glue it down so it wont unwind itself from lots of abuse.
Its also really weird laying my hand across a tune - o -matic. It just feels so much different than a strat style bridge. But I like it. It almost FEELS more percussive, if that makes sense?
Im very impressed with quality of the guitar. No, EXTREMELY impressed. I honestly prepared myself for it to be kind of cheesy, and its not at all. I would gladly buy another one before I spent $3500 on a LP standard.
It feels like a solid axe. And to me, the feel is the most important part, next to the sound.
Sound:
Let me just start by saying Im a strat gut through and through, but this guitar into my Superbass is THE sound of rock 'n roll. Its got a JB in the bridge, and a '59 in the neck. The neck seems really balanced but maybe a just a hair dark. While the JB just snarls out of control.
Its way more output than Im used to dealing with. The cool thing is, I dont really have to change my settings on the Superbass when I switch from the Strat to the LP. I mean normally with an LP, Id plug straight into the high input, but even when I use a Y cable to the top two inputs it sounds mean AND very thick. Im actually reall impressed by the clarity of these pickups. String/note seperation on full open chords is amazing. And again, it sounds really thick. Which is actually really helpful in my situation because we're a three piece.
The last two nights of band practice Ive used the LP exclusively. I havent eeven touched the strats. This is because I wanted to get used actually playing the guitar. And not just the way the neck or fretboard feels, but trying to get used to the switch placement and the knob placement. As I was syaing yesterday, I use my pick up selectors and volume knobs a lot, even in one song. If there is a break in a song, normally Im rolling my volume all the way off for a split second, so you dont hear hum, and then bringing it right back up again.... With the LP, its dead queit, unless the tubescreamer on and then it may want to feedback a bit. But we're also practicing in a tiny room and my stack is literally two feet behind me. So a little feedback with an overdrive on is definitely to be expected.
Also, the output is so high, I dont find myself using my 808 at all unless for solo's. With the strat, the OD808 is not only used for leads, but for all the heavy rhythm parts. With the LP, it overdrives the Marshall so hard, its like having that Mastodon tone right at my fingertips. With the 808 on, its an insane amount of gain.
Ive also realized I dont really dig the sound of humbuckers clean. For exmaple, through my Champ clone clean, it was too much of a flat, jazzy tone. But add just a little grit by turning the champ up to 7 or 8, and its all about the Zeppelin.
Now, strumming the guitar acoustically, I can see what some of you were saying about the laquer being thick and the guitar not resonating as much as you like. I can definitely hear and feel that. I mean, normally you can feel an electric resonate against your stomach, you know, that feeling when you play a really nice electric and you think to yourself, "Wow this guitar almost feels alive." This is the only lacking part of the guitar. Literally. The rest of the guitar is almost perfect. You know, its really hard to tell the quality of the wood since the finish is so thick. The guitar is straight black but its got the super mirror gloss going.
This guitar is staying. It kicks so much ass to finally be able to have this sound at my disposal. I love my Strats and Tele, but there is no substitute for the sound of an overdriven Les Paul. I might sand the finish down, and I might change the pickups for something with a little less output, but not anytime soon. Right now, Im just getting accustomed to bringing the rock fury.
