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King Loudness « A real JEM »
Published on 08/14/11 at 07:31The Ibanez JEM is a guitar designed by/for legendary guitar virtuoso Steve Vai back in 1987. This particular guitar came about in the mid nineties as a classier take on the florescent JEMs that ruled the scene during the eighties and early nineties. It features an alder body, a maple neck with either a rosewood or ebony fretboard (depending on the year, I believe post 2002 is rosewood for this model), 24 frets with the last four scalloped, a unique vine inlay, Ibanez tuners, an Edge Ibanez locking tremolo, and DiMarzio Evolution signature pickups made for Vai by Larry and co at DiMarzio. It's rounded off with a volume/tone control set and a 5 way selector.
UTILIZATION
The JEM is possibly one of the most ergonomic guitars I've seen. Steve likes to really have a guitar that moves with him and this is a prime example. The alder body is light, and even offers the famed "monkey grip" if you want to swing it around a bit. It has a fairly thin neck which is great for people who want something ideal for shredding. The upper fret access is as good as it gets on these guitars... Steve designed it to near perfection and it shows... getting to 24 and even above that is absolutely no issue with this guitar!
Getting a good tone out of this instrument is not an issue really. It was designed to be a bit more versatile than the typical Ibanez RG, which is known as a very high output shred machine. The Evolution pickups are high output but offer a good range of tones from clean to mean overall.
SOUNDS
This guitar is great for a multitude of things I find. Sure it's meant to excel at high gain lead applications, but for the price it costs I would hope it would do some other tones well. The clean sounds are pretty good. The EVO pickups are a little bit too hot for pristine vintage style cleans, but you can get a nice facsimile by using either position 2 or 4 on the selector switch which provides a nice out of phase quack. The humbuckers sound good clean, but are a little bit flat sounding for my tastes (a common complaint I have with Ibby cleans).
The drive tones are great. Harmonics and overtones just leap from the guitar and it has eons of sustain and a great lead voicing that lends itself well to whatever technique you throw at it, whether it's alternate picking, sweep arpeggios, tapping, etc, it'll do it and do it well. If you are still a burgeoning player it will help you to really want to improve with its great playability and awesome lead tones.
OVERALL OPINION
All in all I think the Ibanez JEM is a great guitar for anyone looking for a great lead guitar that is designed to be a no compromises sort of instrument, perfect for an aspiring Steve Vai. At $2,750 new, it's pretty expensive and not something I would ever buy (I bought a Suhr Custom Modern built to my specs for less than $200 more) but if you're a Vai fan and have the dosh, it's well worth considering. The feel is there and the tones are there, so now you just need the 10,000 hours of practice and you'll be the next Vai... maybe.
UTILIZATION
The JEM is possibly one of the most ergonomic guitars I've seen. Steve likes to really have a guitar that moves with him and this is a prime example. The alder body is light, and even offers the famed "monkey grip" if you want to swing it around a bit. It has a fairly thin neck which is great for people who want something ideal for shredding. The upper fret access is as good as it gets on these guitars... Steve designed it to near perfection and it shows... getting to 24 and even above that is absolutely no issue with this guitar!
Getting a good tone out of this instrument is not an issue really. It was designed to be a bit more versatile than the typical Ibanez RG, which is known as a very high output shred machine. The Evolution pickups are high output but offer a good range of tones from clean to mean overall.
SOUNDS
This guitar is great for a multitude of things I find. Sure it's meant to excel at high gain lead applications, but for the price it costs I would hope it would do some other tones well. The clean sounds are pretty good. The EVO pickups are a little bit too hot for pristine vintage style cleans, but you can get a nice facsimile by using either position 2 or 4 on the selector switch which provides a nice out of phase quack. The humbuckers sound good clean, but are a little bit flat sounding for my tastes (a common complaint I have with Ibby cleans).
The drive tones are great. Harmonics and overtones just leap from the guitar and it has eons of sustain and a great lead voicing that lends itself well to whatever technique you throw at it, whether it's alternate picking, sweep arpeggios, tapping, etc, it'll do it and do it well. If you are still a burgeoning player it will help you to really want to improve with its great playability and awesome lead tones.
OVERALL OPINION
All in all I think the Ibanez JEM is a great guitar for anyone looking for a great lead guitar that is designed to be a no compromises sort of instrument, perfect for an aspiring Steve Vai. At $2,750 new, it's pretty expensive and not something I would ever buy (I bought a Suhr Custom Modern built to my specs for less than $200 more) but if you're a Vai fan and have the dosh, it's well worth considering. The feel is there and the tones are there, so now you just need the 10,000 hours of practice and you'll be the next Vai... maybe.