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tjon901 « Very nice modern shredder »
Published on 11/08/11 at 17:34Chris Broderick is an all around cool guy. He has played guitar for Nevermore and is currently the lead player for Megadeth. He use to play Ibanez guitars. He is primariliy a 7 string player but with Megadeth he is back rocking the 6's. He has left Ibanez and is now supporting Jackson and Jackson has given him a signature model with all his individual preferred specs. The base specs are not too unusual for a Jackson. The guitar has neck through construction with a mahogany body with a quilted maple top and a maple neck with an ebony fretboard. The fretboard is free of any inlays and has 24 jumbo stainless steel frets. Up top on the 3x3 headstock you get a set of Planetwaves trimlock tuners that are locking and trim the string ends. You get a locking nut to go with the low profile Floyd Rose. The pickups are a set of custom Dimarzios specially voiced for this guitar. The controls are pretty creative. There is a 3 way toggle that is horizontal so it is kind of like a 3 way blade. The neck controls is a volume knob that was a push pull function for coil splitting. The next knob is a tone knob that has a push pull function to take it out of the circuit kind of like a no load tone knob. The next switch is just a kill switch. The Output jack is facing upwards so you can easily wrap your cable around your strap to keep it from coming out.
UTILIZATION
You can really tell that Broderick had a lot of input on this guitar. It has a lot of unique features that lots of people wish they have on their guitar. The stainless steel frets are nice and smooth. There are tall and narrow and give a great feeling. The trimlock tuners are very nice. Every guitar should have locking tuners and having some that cut the string ends off the string is a bonus. The low profile tremolo is pretty nice. I am not a big tremolo user but it feels like a high quality unit. The push pull tone knob is pretty cool. It is great that you can take it out of the circuit when you want a wide open sound but its still there if you need to dial off some tone for a clean or lead tone. The guitar balances perfectly. The body has a slightly offset design to it and the strap peg is raised from where it would normally be so the guitar naturally sits in a balanced classical position when you are standing up.
SOUNDS
These custom Dimarzios have a real high end bite to them. They sound almost like active pickups. They seem pretty close to the Dimarzio D-Activator pickups which are designed to sound like actives. Broderick use to use Bareknuckle pickups. I wish he had stuck with those in his Jackson. I guess Jackson wanted him to use a more mainstream pickup maker for his signature model. The Bridge pickup in this guitar is super tight and has a nice grind to it. Almost like a passive 81. It doesnt clean up that well but you can make it work with a bit of tone knob action. The neck pickup has a bit of grind as well, almost too much for me. Broderick is so smooth in his lead playing he can get away with having a lot of edge in his lead tone. Most people would need a smoother lead pickup to sound good. This neck pickup will force you to be smoother.
OVERALL OPINION
Its cool seeing someone come out with a signature model that isnt an just a normal model with a paintjob on it or something. This is a really unique and creative guitar with a unique design. There are no silly logos anywhere so you wont feel like a billboard. I hope Jackson makes this model for a long time and I hope they take some of the traits from this guitar and use the ideas in some of their other guitars. If you are looking for a shred guitar that has a super modern design and a modern feel the Chris Broderick soloist is a great find.
UTILIZATION
You can really tell that Broderick had a lot of input on this guitar. It has a lot of unique features that lots of people wish they have on their guitar. The stainless steel frets are nice and smooth. There are tall and narrow and give a great feeling. The trimlock tuners are very nice. Every guitar should have locking tuners and having some that cut the string ends off the string is a bonus. The low profile tremolo is pretty nice. I am not a big tremolo user but it feels like a high quality unit. The push pull tone knob is pretty cool. It is great that you can take it out of the circuit when you want a wide open sound but its still there if you need to dial off some tone for a clean or lead tone. The guitar balances perfectly. The body has a slightly offset design to it and the strap peg is raised from where it would normally be so the guitar naturally sits in a balanced classical position when you are standing up.
SOUNDS
These custom Dimarzios have a real high end bite to them. They sound almost like active pickups. They seem pretty close to the Dimarzio D-Activator pickups which are designed to sound like actives. Broderick use to use Bareknuckle pickups. I wish he had stuck with those in his Jackson. I guess Jackson wanted him to use a more mainstream pickup maker for his signature model. The Bridge pickup in this guitar is super tight and has a nice grind to it. Almost like a passive 81. It doesnt clean up that well but you can make it work with a bit of tone knob action. The neck pickup has a bit of grind as well, almost too much for me. Broderick is so smooth in his lead playing he can get away with having a lot of edge in his lead tone. Most people would need a smoother lead pickup to sound good. This neck pickup will force you to be smoother.
OVERALL OPINION
Its cool seeing someone come out with a signature model that isnt an just a normal model with a paintjob on it or something. This is a really unique and creative guitar with a unique design. There are no silly logos anywhere so you wont feel like a billboard. I hope Jackson makes this model for a long time and I hope they take some of the traits from this guitar and use the ideas in some of their other guitars. If you are looking for a shred guitar that has a super modern design and a modern feel the Chris Broderick soloist is a great find.