All user reviews of 4/5 for the Ibanez JEM7V Prestige

Pd $1470. Although I very much appreceiate Steve Vai's contribution and talent I was looking for specific things on my next guitar. Strat alder body, 24 fret ebony neck, hot but not steril pups, good floating bridge, and believe it or not I wanted it painted white. It's all the truth. I'm glad it wasn't named a vai guitar or anything similar because I just couldn't buy it then. Truth be told the only thing I have a problem with is the "monkey grip". That just takes away from the wood for no good reason IMO.

I already explained this however this guitar can with a proper setup can have awesome action (no matter how silly you want to go in either direction), tone, and playability. A lot of this guitar is in the neck (and trem if you're a wanker ;]).

Again, monkey grip.

This is your high end guitar. There's only so many words that can explain it if you've never experienced one.

From what I've heard don't expect great customer service from Ibanez although I must say I've never had to find out myself. I've always delt with my local shop for wiring and major stuff.

This review was originally published on http://www.musicgearreview.com

The Ibanez Signature Series Steve Vai JEM7V is well worht the money spent. You wont be disappointed with this beauty. for sound you can do almost everything for the big sound of Metallica has the emg are preferable in any case large output level I find these pickups are pretty bold with lots of harmonics and the presence we can not say that it was via but the sound was a little something. this guitar is really superb choice I would do this without a doubt but I prefer the old models compare before buying seems reasonable.

UTILIZATION

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.

SOUNDS

The neck is really very good or excellent.
After several hours playing with this stick, I put it at Washburn N4 those who are also fantastic. The ergonomics are excellent, the weight too is a light guitar and well balanced.
The access is easy to acute. This gives a great sound, or rather sounds excellent with a wide range, namely that the 5 positions offer as many sounds. I will not detail everything that would be too long! Because this guitar is extremely versatile and offers such versatility that can play everything. Let me be very clear, it is indeed a signature guitar, but most do not focus on it, this guitar sounds very tender round and warm with these double, middle sounds very typical Fender Start.

OVERALL OPINION


Overall, I think the Ibanez Steve Fai series is a down right solid piece of equipment, they are pretty hard to find now adays though. I found some online a few months back but the price was too high for my liking. I am thinking about purchasing another one of these just to keep around the studio for anyone who wants to start jamming.

The 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.

(Originally written by Endrix/translated from Audiofanzine FR)
Guitar made in Japan by the J Craft team. My model has a scalloped rosewood fingerboard and was made this year.

The guitar has an Ibanez Pro Edge tremolo under Floyd Rose license and Di Marzio Evolution pickups (two humbuckers and one single coil).

Tone and volume controls.

Typical Ibanez neck: very flat and slim, similar to the RG models.

I also owned one of the first models with ebony fingerboard and I can't notice any difference compared to the current versions with rosewood fingerboard.

UTILIZATION

For me the neck is the most important part of the guitar and that's the reason I decided to play a Jem (among other things). I find this neck is great. It's fast and comfortable, but it's not the best neck I know (I also play a Charvel).

Access to the upper frets is easy thanks to the great neck/body junction.

The guitar is light and I love that.

The sound is even better because the guitar is extremely versatile in spite of its heavy metal look.

The neck humbucker allows you to play everything from pop to rock and ballads or even jazz licks.

The middle position provides typical Strat sounds.

And of course the bridge humbucker produces a killer sound for heavy metal.

This guitar is extremely versatile. I don't know any other modern Strat that provides such a wide sound palette.

SOUNDS

I already wrote above about the sound. I only want to repeat it's an ultra versatile instrument. I play it with all my amps and I always get very good results.

The clean sound is good with both tube and solid-state amps. The guitar always sounds good.

On the contrary, the bridge pickup gives much better results with tube amps... but that's always the case with every guitar!

To keep it short, this Jem offers every possible sound! I also own a Gibson Les Paul but I don't take it out of its case anymore because the Jem offers me a typical Gibson sound with my Mesa Mark IV amp and I like its neck a lot more. It's the same thing regarding clean sound: the middle pickup sounds very good and once again it's more comfortable to play the Jem than a Strat. Its typical Ibanez neck makes it easy to play any music style with any technique.

I only moderate my opinion because I have a new purchase, a Charvel SoCal and in spite of its great value, the Ibanez doesn't have the magic of the Charvel.

OVERALL OPINION

I've been playing a Jem for 14 years (counting my first Jem)!

I like almost everything about this guitar!!

The only thing I don't like that much is the Pro Edge tremolo. Considering the technical aspect, it's a fantastic tremolo that gives you more possibilities than an original Floyd Rose but I find the Vigier tremolo with ball bearing has a longer life. So I put this guitar on the same level as another wonderful instrument, the Vigier Excalibur Custom.

I like this guitar a lot because it's the only one that gives me the sounds I love. If you want to play Vai stuff you have to own this guitar.

The value for money is average because even though a Jem is less expensive than a Vigier, and many other lesser guitars, it's still quite expensive because it's a signature model.

I would choose it again but there are new instruments hitting the market and I sold my Washburn N4 (awful look and average sound) to buy a real Charvel US, which is an amazing guitar! The advantage of the Charvel is that you buy a guitar and nothing else (no signature, no deluxe case, no nothing just the guitar). But the Jem still has its own sound.