Music Man Silhouette

The Musicman Silhouette is a classic design now. It was first introduced in the 80s when Musicman was getting back into making guitars. They were already well known for their basses but they wanted to get into the guitar market. This guitar is bassically a modified strat with many improved features. The guitar has an alder body with many choices of finishes. The guitar has a bolt on neck which uses 5 bolts instead of the 4 that Fender use for an improved fit. The maple neck has 24 jumbo frets on it with dot inlays and comes with your choice of maple or rosewood for the fretboard. The pickups in this guitar are custom spec Dimarzios in an HSH configuration. The controls are pretty basic with a master tone and volume knob with a 5 way switch. The bridge is Musicmans proprietary hardtail bridge which is a very beefy design and reminds me a lot of the Leo Quan Badass bridges people use to put on their basses back in the 70s. Up top is Musicmans traditional 4+2 headstock with Schaller locking tuners.

UTILIZATION

These guitars have always had great playability. Musicman guitars are known for their small necks. They are small in every way they are pretty narrow so it may take some getting use to for some people use to wide modern necks. The neck has a pretty vintage 10 inch radius so it is not very flat either. The large frets help make up for this by letting you dig in without fretting out. The locking tuners on a hardtail guitar are something I love. I wish every guitar came with locking tuners even if they dont have a tremolo. The neck joint is nice and sculpted and feels good when playing on the high frets. With the hardtail you do not have to worry about going out of tune and changing strings is easy. This guitar is nice and light so it will be easy on your back and neck. It is only around 6 pounds.

SOUNDS

With the HSH configuration you can get a ton of different tones with this guitar. The Dimarzio humbuckers are smooth and with the single coil in the middle you can add a little top end bite to every position to get some top end clarity. The bridge position is nice and beefy and has nice bottom. When you mix in the middle single coil with this pickup it just adds a bit of spank and sparkle on the top end and your chords and really shine out accentuating every note in the chord. With the neck position you get the super smooth tones of the neck position that you would expect. The tone here is super warm and fat. With some middle pickup mixed in with the neck you can get some extra clarity and add a crisp top to the smooth bottom.

OVERALL OPINION

This is a classic Musicman design now. This guitar has been made for about 20 years but it still is not a very popular model. Musicman has a ton of great artists playing them but normal every day players seem to ignore their guitars. Their basses are well known to be some of the best basses money can buy and their guitars are good too they just dont have the reputation of the basses. If you are looking for a superstrat guitar that leans more towards the strat end of the spectrum the Musicman Silhouette is a great option that wont break the bank.

USA Made EBMM Silhouette, specs:

Alder body
Maple neck/fretboard
24 fret
Dimarzio custom single coil pickup with PAF buckers
H/S/H config
musicman trem
schaller locking tuners
25.5" scale neck
10" neck radius
5 bolt neck attachment
1 volume, 1 tone, 5 way switch



UTILIZATION

This is a SWEET guitar! Completely ergonomic in every possible way! Body contours, forearm contour, the 5 bolt neck joint is made well so you the upper frets are easily accessible. It's an overall, VERY VERY comfortable guitar. Especially the neck, the 10" radius neck is unique in the sense where it's not too big or not too small. Feels great for rhythm or lead work and very very comfortable.

The musicman tremolo systems are top notch! It's smooth! All their guitars have locking tuners to help keep the guitar in tune when using the trem. All the parts are top notch!



SOUNDS

Plugged this in through a few amps, blackstar ht-5, egnater renegate combo, koch studiotone, fryette pitbull...All the custom dimarzio pickups used for this pickup aims for complete versatility.

Neck pickup (clean):
Very nice, medium output that can shred depending on the amp you use. This pickup can get VERY clean, not strat-like chimey but still very very good.

neck pickup (dirty):
Thick but not too thick and dynamic enough to clean up with the volume rolled down. Under high can still retains its character.

neck pickup w/single coil:
the infamous strat sound! It totally nails it with the custom single coil pickup! Very nice!

middle pickup:
a good strat-like sound. Not completely noiseless however, but still quite good. Not as bright as a strat would be but close.

bridge pickup w/single coil:
The OTHER infamous strat sound! Again, great sound, plenty bright though not over quacky.

bridge pickup:
great pickup! Thick, not too bassy and not too bright either. Very dynamic, also cleans up well with the volume rolled down. Can get really shreddy if necessary!

Overall the sounds are great and versatile. You should be able to achieve nearly any sound with this pickup config! I gave it a 9 just simpley cause the middle pickup isn't completely usable since it's not noiseless. Yes i'm spoiled! Iit's a near perfect guitar!

OVERALL OPINION

Overall opinion. A perfected strat is what I would say this guitar is. It's also one of the most versatile. I believe that was the aim of producing something like this. Not only is the entire guitar ergonomically comfortable with the neck being one of the smoothest playing necks I've ever played, but the setup is great out of the box too! I've noticed ALL music-man guitars are of great quality! From the finish, to the action, to the sound, to the fretwork! It's almost a shame they're not as well known to the main stream like fender and gibson. An absolute shame!

If you're looking for a guitar to be the end of all guitars in a strat-like shape, the silhouette is definitely a worthy candidate.

Like all Music Man, the Silhouette is manufactured in the workshops of San Louis Obispo, California. The MODEL that I is not rcent Submitted: my guitar t complete the 28/03/1991. Unlike the one you can see a picture of my MODEL only has two humbuckers and a bridge halfway between the typical standard vibrato, and the Floyd Rose. Also she has a nut block string, which is at the head, not the nut (so there is also a standard nut on my guitar). To see some photos, take a look in my gallery on my profile. Otherwise, you can also visit this page, where you will find more things on other subjects on guitar: www.myspace.com / ultimategear ( http://www.myspace.com/ultimategear ) .

Keep in mind that I note down voluntarily, but 8 is a note in my trs. Simply, I compare this guitar with what I know also with other guitars, including my luthier tools, which are all fawn better (but more expensive too). So you have Whereas I would not put beyond the 8 for a guitar made with industrial techniques.

In short, this guitar is made up of a massive body in two parts of alder, and a 24-Bolt Saddle boxes blow with a key area in Rabl. The pickups are Seymour Duncan SH1 and SH4 (I do not know if the pickups are original). There is a Tone volume and a 3 position switch (size 5). I have not been asked a push-pull for each microphone to the split, but that will come in the future. In addition to the nut block-chord, there is a plastic nut (very hard, not a stew, but it is not the bone or the Tusk), and is acastillage chrom.

Submitted this guitar well and, although it is a classic shape while it is lgante, especially with his white plate perlod.

UTILIZATION

At daily use, is one of the guitar that I prfre among those I have. It is trslgre (my pice INTERESTED alder is because it is a low density which is very well for such a timber), Obviously, small and trs handy. Vritable is a toy. It is placed trs well if only one high door (which is my case), and his balance is good. The right arm is placed trs well, sr, well, the left hand is immediately ease.
The handle of a tuning fork standard, is closely and end with a C-section homogne. It is most enjoyable (but for my part, I can easily adapt some trs prs any type of handle (even if I admit that some handle Les Paul put me in CHEC). I find at least trs simple play. CHAC to treble is more than enough. I know better (the handle of my al Adamante for example!), but reached 24 my box without any difficulty.
Vibrato is a pice Designed intelligently. This is not a vibrato on a knife, as we see all the time, but it is a blade that comes in a notch s'inserrer. The contact point is the width of the rpart vibrato, which makes the pice indestructible. To have any dernirement disassemble, I found that after 16 years (ending for 17), there is no point of wear on the blade or or in the slot. His return to point zero is trs good, what I saw first exprience, and what the Checker State of the pivot has confirmed. The action level is vibrato RULES on bridges, not on the base of vibrato, which it is fixed. Thus, we obtain an optimum for each string rglage very easy. And unlike what one might think, its use is not restricted to only a few LGERS vibrato effects. On the contrary, we can REALLY shake in all directions (a large semi-tone up (so, even when less than a floyd rose), and not specially limit down) . Back in the agreement is good insofar as the notches on the plastic nut sizes large enough. Music Man is a little ****** for that! This is my troisime MM, and three have to do an internship at my luthier to resize the nut with string passages are never large enough! If you ever have any problem on your agreement MM, consider this. The vibrato is good, but much less the nut!

Other than that, everything works well on this guitar trs. Mcaniquement speaking, the guitar is in place. The handle is trs stable and remains in place despite changes frquents places. It is an instrument whose use is intensive sr.

SOUNDS

This guitar is meant to be a superstrate. A very dense alder body, a handle and a button in Saddle: was the basis of a typical Stratocaster (except that a sleeve of Start is basically blow slab, not neighborhood). It is supposed to find her young when a search of its type. Unplug the A COST: stockings little mdiums Submitted, senior mdiums Defines round and well, especially the brilliant and incisive acute trs. We find all this in the Silhouette.
To have had a Fender Stratocaster just before I prfre largely Music Man, for various reasons: the quality of manufacturing is much better and quechoix woods, I prfre largely on the type of microphones Mount the MM, the vibrato, the 24 cases ... In the end, I sound my ears even more enjoyable and much DIFFERENT than my old Fender.
I play with a ENGL Savage SE 2 bodies (ENGL 4x12 cab with V30) and a rack of effects (Wah Wah Dunlop DCR1SR Rack, TC-Electronic G-Force). However, when I talk about the sound of the guitar, you must Whereas I send it directly into the amp without the rack.

The highlight is the brightness of the sound above 1.5 kHz. It makes the game enjoyable trs on this guitar for the game arpges (clear as saturated), and the solos. Ct of low-frequency signal (360 Hz about 750 Hz), the sound is round and low mdiums are identified by the efficiency of Seymour Duncan SH4 in the area of ​​the spectrum. Thus, it was an incisive and well Dfine grain, although it does not get a sound such as a round mahogany gives it to us. It is logically trs in line with a superstrate (I think the sound of a Vigier, with much more grain). The high-mdiums are rich and trs INTERESTED: trs clear round and so far, they make perfect guitar to play rock to big rock (I personally played with the prog mtal and trs it works well!), passing by in his arpges clear.
There is a guitar whose sound qualities are indniables! It has a lot of grain, as with the SH4 SH1, dynamic sound in high mdiums and treble, and well below mdiums rough. It apprciable trs! This makes this guitar usable for many styles of music (like a good Start!), And as much in the clear, or that crunch that saturated. In two words: versatility and characters!

OVERALL OPINION

I play this guitar for the past few months, almost daily, what with the greatest pleasure. Superstrate with a real sound convincing and a good violin. This guitar has all the same over 16 years, is in an excellent state of preservation for its age, which accounts for its quality workmanship. Manageable, enjoyable play, we can apply many nuances of the game, she transcribed. Furthermore, it is not really a question of saying we are limited in a musical register. Probably Is not made to play the Trash (quoique. ..), but for blues, jazz, to rock and mtal, it will find its place without problem.

There is no doubt that it is not absolutely perfect: there is room for improvement in the choice of wood. A body in one pice of Aule, and a handle (and not screwed in al Saddle sch naturally hit on slabs would be better for such a guitar or a rosewood fingerboard ... But then one would speak more than a Music Man Silhouette ... but an instrument maker of made to order.

For the price at which one can have, ie 1300 euros (at least, I would sell my guitar this price, because of its state of conservation ... but I am not aware of the latest mod argus of the Silhouette, which are DIFFERENT from mine), this guitar will charm his acqureur. Robustness and sound quality are an instrument of choice in this price opportunity! 8 / 10 for the Overall rating => A note by trs consquent!