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King Loudness « A vintage take on the Ibanez superstrat... »
Published on 04/18/11 at 10:52This guitar, from what I gather, is a bit of a rare bird. It's one of the USA made models from the mid nineties. It was designed to take the shred-tastic RG platform and make it a bit more vintage to suit the changing tastes of the time. These changes included the following:
*A thicker, more rounded "RT" neck profile.
*A 2 point, non-locking tremolo system
*Typical 4 bolt Strat style neck heel.
I believe they also had lower output pickups as stock as well. I can't confirm this since mine had all replacement pickups when I purchased it. I found it to be fairly cool for what I was doing because of the more vintage features. I find most of the recent Ibanez shredders to be hard on my hands/wrists because the necks are so thin, so this RT profile was a welcome change.
UTILIZATION
This guitar, like most Ibanez superstrats, is fairly ergonomic. It was definitely on the lighter side and the heel, though it was Strat style, was contoured, so it was easy to get up to the 24th fret without issue. Normally I have an issue with guitars that use a 4 bolt plate system and have 24 frets, but in the case of this (and many other Ibbys that I've tried), I've never had a problem with upper fret access.
As far as dialing in tones, it was fairly simple. When I got the guitar, the pickups and wiring weren't as stock (it only had two humbuckers as opposed to an HSH pickup configuration) so I was really working with the core sounds of the humbuckers. The only other thing of note is that the bridge humbucker had a coil tap, so I was able to retain some of the Stratty character that I like the tone of so much.
SOUNDS
When I had this guitar I was primarily using a Mesa Boogie Mark III head and a Basson Sound 2x12 speaker cabinet with Emience Legend 1258 speakers. The pickups that were in it at the time of purchase were an unlabeled Gotoh in the neck position and a DiMarzio Dual Sound in the bridge (basically a Super Distortion with 4 conductor wiring for a coil split). The middle single coil had been removed, so it was functioning as a dual humbucker guitar with a coil tap for the DiMarzio.
The tones were very cool considering how hacked the guitar was electronically. The neck pickup had a nice smooth tone (think Steve Vai or John Petrucci) for leads and jazzier settings. I didn't care for the middle position as it sounded rather nasally, so I won't go into detail about that. The DiMarzio Dual sound was a really cool sounding, high output pickup. It was great for hard rock rhythms or that classic LA eighties lead tone. Engaging the coil tap gave it a nice quasi Strat tone on both clean and distorted settings.
OVERALL OPINION
Overall I felt that this guitar was a killer find. It was extremely beat up (the flamed top veneer had been removed and there was a blue finish put over the top of the guitar. As I said before, the pickups had been changed as well. All this resulted in me getting the guitar for a screamin' deal. I used it for a few months in various rock/hard rock projects until I needed to make room for other guitars, so I parted with it. Last I heard, it was refinished in bright pink and was floating around my hometown... maybe I'll buy it back one of these days. They go for very reasonable prices used and they have some killer craftsmanship as well. I wouldn't mind trying to find a stock RT650 to mess around with at some point, but even though the one I had was hacked up, there is no doubt in my mind that it was a well put together ax by the folks over at Ibanez!
*A thicker, more rounded "RT" neck profile.
*A 2 point, non-locking tremolo system
*Typical 4 bolt Strat style neck heel.
I believe they also had lower output pickups as stock as well. I can't confirm this since mine had all replacement pickups when I purchased it. I found it to be fairly cool for what I was doing because of the more vintage features. I find most of the recent Ibanez shredders to be hard on my hands/wrists because the necks are so thin, so this RT profile was a welcome change.
UTILIZATION
This guitar, like most Ibanez superstrats, is fairly ergonomic. It was definitely on the lighter side and the heel, though it was Strat style, was contoured, so it was easy to get up to the 24th fret without issue. Normally I have an issue with guitars that use a 4 bolt plate system and have 24 frets, but in the case of this (and many other Ibbys that I've tried), I've never had a problem with upper fret access.
As far as dialing in tones, it was fairly simple. When I got the guitar, the pickups and wiring weren't as stock (it only had two humbuckers as opposed to an HSH pickup configuration) so I was really working with the core sounds of the humbuckers. The only other thing of note is that the bridge humbucker had a coil tap, so I was able to retain some of the Stratty character that I like the tone of so much.
SOUNDS
When I had this guitar I was primarily using a Mesa Boogie Mark III head and a Basson Sound 2x12 speaker cabinet with Emience Legend 1258 speakers. The pickups that were in it at the time of purchase were an unlabeled Gotoh in the neck position and a DiMarzio Dual Sound in the bridge (basically a Super Distortion with 4 conductor wiring for a coil split). The middle single coil had been removed, so it was functioning as a dual humbucker guitar with a coil tap for the DiMarzio.
The tones were very cool considering how hacked the guitar was electronically. The neck pickup had a nice smooth tone (think Steve Vai or John Petrucci) for leads and jazzier settings. I didn't care for the middle position as it sounded rather nasally, so I won't go into detail about that. The DiMarzio Dual sound was a really cool sounding, high output pickup. It was great for hard rock rhythms or that classic LA eighties lead tone. Engaging the coil tap gave it a nice quasi Strat tone on both clean and distorted settings.
OVERALL OPINION
Overall I felt that this guitar was a killer find. It was extremely beat up (the flamed top veneer had been removed and there was a blue finish put over the top of the guitar. As I said before, the pickups had been changed as well. All this resulted in me getting the guitar for a screamin' deal. I used it for a few months in various rock/hard rock projects until I needed to make room for other guitars, so I parted with it. Last I heard, it was refinished in bright pink and was floating around my hometown... maybe I'll buy it back one of these days. They go for very reasonable prices used and they have some killer craftsmanship as well. I wouldn't mind trying to find a stock RT650 to mess around with at some point, but even though the one I had was hacked up, there is no doubt in my mind that it was a well put together ax by the folks over at Ibanez!
