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tjon901 « Well priced shredder with EMG's »
Published on 07/09/11 at 07:30I dont care what alphabet soup ESP calls this guitar this guitar is the LTD version of the Horizon with active pickups. The Horizon is the arch top version of ESP's classic shredder the M-II. And this is the LTD version so it is not made in Japan but the quality is very nice. This guitar is about 1000 dollars less than the ESP version would be and the only real difference is the fretboard. This guitar has a set neck construction instead of neck through but the heel is so nice you would think it was neck through. It has a maple neck set neck with a rosewood fretboard. The fretboard has 24 jumbo frets on it with offset inlays. It has the Earvana compensated nut to help with the intonation across the whole neck. The body is mahogany with a quilted maple top. The body has really cool natural binding. The binding itself is just the natural wood from the maple top. It has standard Grover tuners and a tune-o-matic string through bridge. The pickups in this guitar are a set up active EMG's. It has EMG 81s front and back like an M-II would have. The controls are your standard master tone and master volume with a 3 way blade switch.
UTILIZATION
The playability on this guitar is great and exactly what you would expect from this type of ESP guitar. The neck is nice and thin and the fretboard is nice and flat. The flat fretboard and the jumbo frets let you get a super low action on the guitar. The hardtail setup means it is super easy to tune the guitar or change strings. You wont have to break out your toolbox to do a string change on this guitar. The active pickups means that you will have to put in a 9v battery in the guitar if you want it to work. ESP has built in a battery compartment for that so you dont have to take off the whole control cavity plate to replace the battery.
SOUNDS
This guitar might sound better than the ESP version. With the set neck construction you get a different tone from the guitar. Neck through guitars have a slightly brighter tone since everything is on the same piece of wood. With a set neck guitar the connection of the neck and the body with the glue kind of softens the tone. With EMG pickups this is important because these pickups are naturally bright. EMG pickups on some neck through guitars sound too bright. The EMG pickups in this guitar work well for pretty much any kind of music. The bridge tones on this guitar are super clear. The 81 is a pretty bright pickup from stock so in a neck through guitar with an alder body this guitar is cutting through anything. The 81 in the neck is not a good choice in my opinion. With a guitar this bright you would want to darken up the neck position tones. I would have preferred an 85 in the neck. The 85 would have been good in the bridge also to thicken up the naturally bright tones of the guitar. With the EMG quick connect system this makes it easy for you to swap pickups so you can try other EMG models and see what you like best. And if you dont like EMG's you can always get the version with Seymour Duncans. ESP is good like that.
OVERALL OPINION
This guitar is great if you want a good solid metal guitar with EMG pickups. No tremolo means the upkeep is super easy and you can tune it to whatever you want without having to adjust springs and whatever. The EMG pickups mean the guitar is dead quiet even with rediculous rigs and studio equipment. If you want a good solid shred guitar check this out.
UTILIZATION
The playability on this guitar is great and exactly what you would expect from this type of ESP guitar. The neck is nice and thin and the fretboard is nice and flat. The flat fretboard and the jumbo frets let you get a super low action on the guitar. The hardtail setup means it is super easy to tune the guitar or change strings. You wont have to break out your toolbox to do a string change on this guitar. The active pickups means that you will have to put in a 9v battery in the guitar if you want it to work. ESP has built in a battery compartment for that so you dont have to take off the whole control cavity plate to replace the battery.
SOUNDS
This guitar might sound better than the ESP version. With the set neck construction you get a different tone from the guitar. Neck through guitars have a slightly brighter tone since everything is on the same piece of wood. With a set neck guitar the connection of the neck and the body with the glue kind of softens the tone. With EMG pickups this is important because these pickups are naturally bright. EMG pickups on some neck through guitars sound too bright. The EMG pickups in this guitar work well for pretty much any kind of music. The bridge tones on this guitar are super clear. The 81 is a pretty bright pickup from stock so in a neck through guitar with an alder body this guitar is cutting through anything. The 81 in the neck is not a good choice in my opinion. With a guitar this bright you would want to darken up the neck position tones. I would have preferred an 85 in the neck. The 85 would have been good in the bridge also to thicken up the naturally bright tones of the guitar. With the EMG quick connect system this makes it easy for you to swap pickups so you can try other EMG models and see what you like best. And if you dont like EMG's you can always get the version with Seymour Duncans. ESP is good like that.
OVERALL OPINION
This guitar is great if you want a good solid metal guitar with EMG pickups. No tremolo means the upkeep is super easy and you can tune it to whatever you want without having to adjust springs and whatever. The EMG pickups mean the guitar is dead quiet even with rediculous rigs and studio equipment. If you want a good solid shred guitar check this out.