B.C. Rich Assassin Exotic Classic Deluxe ASM

This guitar is part of B.C. Rich's Exotic Classic line. This is a cool series of guitar that use cool woods in their construction. These guitars are a throwback to the 70s B.C. Rich's. This guitar is in their Assassin shape which is their superstrat shapes. This guitar has neck through construction and a mostly mahogany body. The neck is mahogany. The top of the body is spalted maple and it has two ebony stripes down the body where the neck and the body join. The fretboard is ebony and has no binding so it has a clean look. Up top it has Grover tuners and a the bridge is a tune-o-matic with a string through setup. The pickups are a set of Mafia Rockfields which is a sorta aftermarket company that B.C. Rich has been using in their guitars. This guitar also has coil tap capabilities.

UTILIZATION

The playability on the Exotic Classic B.C. Riches is pretty good. This guitar plays quite well. With a neck through guitar like this you need good construction because there is no way to make major adjustments on the neck like a bolt on where you can shim the neck if the action is really bad. The neck through construction means that there is no big heel to get in the way of the upper frets. The ebony fretboard and jumbo frets let you get a nice smooth action on the strings. Being a hardtail instead of a tremolo guitar like most other super strats means it is super easy to change tunings and change strings. The string through body bridge also gives you more tone and resonance.

SOUNDS

This guitar has a pretty bright sound due to its construction. Neck through guitars tend to have the brightest sound and the maple neck and string through bright just means you get more of the bright maple tone than you would have gotten with another guitar. The Mafia pickups are pretty good for what they are. They are pretty hot. They know these guitars are going to be playing metal music so they give you some pickups that are voiced accordingly. The bridge pickup has nice edge and bite. It is pretty tight in the low end. It has a bit of a scooped sound which is kind of what you want for a metal pickup. Too much mids and it sounds like you always have a wah on. The neck pickup is hot but a bit smoother. It is pretty good for high gain leads in the neck position. It can get a bit muddy though if you are laying it on thick.

OVERALL OPINION

This is a great guitar if you are looking for something different. Everyone has an ESP or an Ibanez shred guitar but you could have a BC Rich shred guitar. It has great features not found on most shred guitar of the same price also. Having neck through construction and an ebony fretboard with a spalted maple top. This guitar looks like some boutqiue Alembic or something. It is a nice change from the normal black super strat with a rosewood fretboard and a Floyd Rose. If you want a shred guitar that isnt the same thing this Exotic Classic Assassin is a good choice.