View other reviews for this product:
Hatsubai « Ebony fretboarded model »
Published on 06/28/11 at 12:01For a small period of time, Gibson released Gothic version of their guitars. This one has a mahogany body (and I think a maple top?), a mahogany neck with an ebony fretboard, a unique 12th fret inlay, black hardware with a tune-o-matic bridge, two humbuckers, 22 frets, two volumes, two tones and a three way switch.
UTILIZATION
Just by looking at these, they're aimed at those who are more into the metal crowd. I noticed that these guitars tend to have some fretwork and nut issues. The frets can sometimes have level issues which will cause issues with you start to lower the action. If you notice some fretting out on certain frets, this is probably a good indicator that you need to get your frets leveled. The edges can sometimes be sharp, too. The nuts can also be problematic at times. If you ever tune your guitar and notice some odd sort of ping, then the guitar goes sharp, your nut is binding. You'll need to get your nut recut if that's the case.
SOUNDS
This guitar actually had EMGs installed in it, so I'll be going by those instead of the standard pickups. The guitar had an EMG 81 in the bridge and an EMG 85 in the neck. The 81 in the bridge sounded thick, but it had enough bite to cut through without a problem. It worked awesome for metal tones; in fact, it was crushing. I was really surprised how nice it sounded. The 85 in the neck was super thick and worked awesome for those legato and shred leads. The clean tones were pretty awful on these, but that's fairly typical with EMGs. However, since it's geared towards metal, the clean tone doesn't really matter that much.
OVERALL OPINION
The guitars are pretty hard to come by at times, but they can be really cool at times. The fretwork and nut issues are still here on these guitars, but they sound really good. A pickup swap is what I recommend, and the EMGs in this sounded great. Definitely worth picking up for a good price.
UTILIZATION
Just by looking at these, they're aimed at those who are more into the metal crowd. I noticed that these guitars tend to have some fretwork and nut issues. The frets can sometimes have level issues which will cause issues with you start to lower the action. If you notice some fretting out on certain frets, this is probably a good indicator that you need to get your frets leveled. The edges can sometimes be sharp, too. The nuts can also be problematic at times. If you ever tune your guitar and notice some odd sort of ping, then the guitar goes sharp, your nut is binding. You'll need to get your nut recut if that's the case.
SOUNDS
This guitar actually had EMGs installed in it, so I'll be going by those instead of the standard pickups. The guitar had an EMG 81 in the bridge and an EMG 85 in the neck. The 81 in the bridge sounded thick, but it had enough bite to cut through without a problem. It worked awesome for metal tones; in fact, it was crushing. I was really surprised how nice it sounded. The 85 in the neck was super thick and worked awesome for those legato and shred leads. The clean tones were pretty awful on these, but that's fairly typical with EMGs. However, since it's geared towards metal, the clean tone doesn't really matter that much.
OVERALL OPINION
The guitars are pretty hard to come by at times, but they can be really cool at times. The fretwork and nut issues are still here on these guitars, but they sound really good. A pickup swap is what I recommend, and the EMGs in this sounded great. Definitely worth picking up for a good price.