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tjon901 « The new Anthrax Soloist »
Published on 12/19/11 at 10:08Scott Ian is one of the guitar players in the popular thrash metal band Anthrax. Before his guitars were super simple rhythm based guitars. Now with this new Soloist 2h model it is a more versatile model where you can more easily play leads on it as well. This guitar has the traditional soloist shape. The body is made out of mahogany with a thick maple top. The guitar has neck through construction with a maple neck. The back of the neck has an oil finish so it is smooth. The fretboard has the Jackson compound radius design with 24 frets and an ebony fretboard. This is the 2h version so it has a double locking tremolo and two pickups. The tremolo on this guitar is an Original Floyd Rose and its flush mounted so it can dive only. The pickups in this guitar are a set of Seymour Duncans. The bridge pickup is the is a Scott Ian signature humbucker while the neck pickup is a 59. The controls are simple but a bit awkward. There is a single volume control placed a bit farther back then normal and the pickup selector is up on the upper horn like its trying to be a Les Paul.
UTILIZATION
The playability on this guitar is good like most every Soloist. The guitar has a super simple and kind of old school soloist design. The tremolo is setup to dive only which is what you use to get when Floyd Rose units first came out on the market. The pickup selector placement is just dumb. You have to be playing with the guitar hanging at your knees for this kind of selector placement to be useful. It just gets in the way more often. The back of the neck being oiled is a cool Jackson feature that is showing up on more guitars. It gives you the smooth feel of a bolt on neck. The compound radius fretboard means its comfortable on both ends of the neck. Near the headstock its rounder for playing chords and near the body its flatter for lead playing.
SOUNDS
The Scott Ian signature pickup is super hot. It has a blade magnet design like a Dimebucker or an X2N. It also sounds a lot like those pickups. It has a lot of top end grind to the sound. This mixed with the super high output means you get a ton of high end clarity and crunch. The 59 in the neck is a classic Seymour Duncan neck pickup. It is like an old PAf in design. It is made mostly for lead playing and blues. It has medium output but it is really smooth. This makes it great for leads where the bridge pickup would come out sounding way too harsh.
OVERALL OPINION
Its good to see Scott Ian and Jackson coming out with a more traditional Jackson style guitar for his signature model now. The old ones were kind of strange when compared to the rest of the Jackson line. I think these new T-1000s will do well compared to the old ones. On top of everything it comes with a cool Silverburst finish which is becoming super popular nowadays. This guitar is mostly for Scott Ian fans but its more familiar design makes it accessable to other Jackson fans as well. If you are looking for a super simple Soloist and dont care about pickup selector placement this guitar is a good new unit.
UTILIZATION
The playability on this guitar is good like most every Soloist. The guitar has a super simple and kind of old school soloist design. The tremolo is setup to dive only which is what you use to get when Floyd Rose units first came out on the market. The pickup selector placement is just dumb. You have to be playing with the guitar hanging at your knees for this kind of selector placement to be useful. It just gets in the way more often. The back of the neck being oiled is a cool Jackson feature that is showing up on more guitars. It gives you the smooth feel of a bolt on neck. The compound radius fretboard means its comfortable on both ends of the neck. Near the headstock its rounder for playing chords and near the body its flatter for lead playing.
SOUNDS
The Scott Ian signature pickup is super hot. It has a blade magnet design like a Dimebucker or an X2N. It also sounds a lot like those pickups. It has a lot of top end grind to the sound. This mixed with the super high output means you get a ton of high end clarity and crunch. The 59 in the neck is a classic Seymour Duncan neck pickup. It is like an old PAf in design. It is made mostly for lead playing and blues. It has medium output but it is really smooth. This makes it great for leads where the bridge pickup would come out sounding way too harsh.
OVERALL OPINION
Its good to see Scott Ian and Jackson coming out with a more traditional Jackson style guitar for his signature model now. The old ones were kind of strange when compared to the rest of the Jackson line. I think these new T-1000s will do well compared to the old ones. On top of everything it comes with a cool Silverburst finish which is becoming super popular nowadays. This guitar is mostly for Scott Ian fans but its more familiar design makes it accessable to other Jackson fans as well. If you are looking for a super simple Soloist and dont care about pickup selector placement this guitar is a good new unit.