B.C. Rich

Lucked out and found this gem in a custom fitted hardshell case at a yard sale. Lady wasn't sure if it worked and wanted it gone since she was moving so I only paid 20$ for it. Has a couple chips in the paint, old D'Addario strap locks, and it must have been dropped at some point because it has a very fine crack in the finish running from the bottom of the body to the wrap-around bridge. The strings were so old they were brittle and had no tension left in them. I figured at the very least I'd have a decent fixer up to fiddle with in my free time. I re-strung it with Ernie Ball Power Slinkys, checked the inside electronics and plugged in to my amp to see if it would work. Sure enough it did. I read some reviews about the guitar and they were all negative but I've got to say this guitar sounds better than the ESP/LTD fm-100 I have. It's less tinny sounding, however it does get a little honky sounding above the 10th fret. I don't like the wrap-around bridge but it seems to do the job. The neck is wide but super thin which makes it a bit uncomfortable for my big hands. The action is low and fast. Fret ends have no sharp finger stabbing bits and the neck is very smooth. Gotta say I was pretty impressed with the fretboard, it's really well done. The tuners look super cheap, sooo cheap a better description eludes me, and I thought for sure I'd have to replace them but after the strings stretched out I've had no issues with it going out of tune while playing. I'm very impressed with the tone of this guitar below the 10th fret. Clean it's thick and meaty and with distortion it's very heavy with lots of crunch. Most inexpensive guitars I've tried sound really tinny and it drives me nuts trying to dial it out with effects. Very good for such a cheap Indonesian made starter guitar. I'd pay up to 150$ for one of these in great condition and think if I can find another with the string thru body I'd pick it up in a heartbeat. I've heard the better quality, higher priced, big brothers of this guitar with the heavier classic head-stock like to nosedive. This one with the pointy poke your eye out head-stock is well balanced. Overall this is a work horse guitar. Great for a hobbyist like me and probably would work well live as well. Strong build, nice looks, and decent tone. A friend of mine who has played in bands for 25+ years played it and said "If you ever wanna sell it let me know and I'll buy it off you. I've got a nice metal guitar but this one is a hell of a guitar"

Features Neck-through construction Mahogany body Beveled top 2-to-a-Side traditional-style headstock B.C. Rich ® die-cast tuners Mahogany neck 12" neck radius Ebony fretboard Diamond inlays 24 jumbo frets 34" scale Adjustable stop bridge B.C. Rich Bass Humbucker pickups Case sold separately I give it an 8 overall UTILIZATION The neck is a little wide for my taste can't reach the 24th fret of the E w/ my 4th finger (but my fingers are a little on the stubby side!)and like most BC Riches "Neck Dive" is a bit of an issue but it is very solidly built and has excellent action!! Due to the "neck Dive" and wider neck I'd give it a 7-8 SOUNDS I've only played it through a Genz Benz CTR500 115T and it sounds great! Sound wise it's a 9-10 OVERALL OPINION Great sound, Great quality for the price but I'd recommend playing one before buying it!!! Really good value but the "feel" of it is not for everybody! BC Rich fans should "love it"!! It was also nearly impossible to find an "after market" hardshell case that fits it I ended up spending another $160 on the "BC Rich" one

The B.C. Rich Bich is a classic design by them. The guitar is a staple in hard rock and not metal. A lot of Bich's made over the years have been 10 strings with the bottom 4 strings doubled like on a 12 string. With this setup you can get the chimey 12 string sounds on the high strings but still rock out on the low strings. This Bich has a quilted koa top although some come with spalted maple tops. I like the spalted tops better because you do not see them as often. The guitar has a fully bound neck and headstock bound with creme binding. The neck is a D shape that isnt too thick and it is a 5 piece maple neck with 2 strips of walnut dividing 3 pieces of maple. This makes the neck very strong stronger than a 1 piece mahogany neck would be. It has two rockfield mafia pickups which is the brand B.C. Rich uses. It has a custom B.C. Rich 10 string bridge. There are 4 extra tuners down by the bridge. It has two volume knobs and a tone knob with the bridge volume knob being the knob next to the bridge pickup. The body is made of two koa wings attached to the side of the 5 piece neck. UTILIZATION Even with 10 strings the neck is not any more wider than a normal 6 string. The biggest difference is that you will have to remeber to tune the 4 extra strings. With the body shape and neck through construction it is very easy to reach the top frets. The ebony fretboard is super smooth under your fingers and easy to play on. The jumbo frets make bending very easy. It is easy to get a low action out of this guitar. The body is wide. At the widest point it is as big as a Gibson 355. Because the guitar is Koa it is not very heavy even though the body is big. It will take some getting use to playing leads with the double strings. SOUNDS The pickups are high output and intended for heavy music. They clean up ok. The clean tones could be better because when played clean the guitar does sound kinda bright and thin. This guitar can do anything that comes with some gain from classic rock to heavy metal. You can get a lot of cool atmospheric sounds with the doubled high strings. This guitar may have a metal shape but it is really good at getting unique clean tones. The extra strings give it a built in chorus effect. OVERALL OPINION This is one of the very few 10 string guitars on the market. It gets most of the cool sounds of a 12 string but with more playability and rockoutability. This guitar has great features for the price. There are not many neck through ebony fretboard guitars in the same price range. B.C. Rich is showing people that the more popular guitar companies are holding back on people. If they can make an guitar with a neck through neck and ebony fretboard why cant Fender or Gibson. If you are looking for a 10 string guitar with a shape that will get peoples attention this may be the right choice for you. To be honest this is your only choice really.

I grew up playing B.C. Rich guitars and always wanted a 10-string. I loved the versatility of the guitar; the fact that you could get 12-string sounds, but still play power chords on the two lower strings, or if you want you can just leave the four extra strings off and have a standard six-string. My Perfect 10 Bich is a Korean-made neck-through and came with a B.C. Rich molded case, a nice added touch included in the purchase price. As a 10-string, this guitar has a specialized fixed bridge that accommodates the extra four strings. The action was set up from the factory extremely nice and low, just like I like it--I made no permanent adjustments. The Dragon's Blood finish is flawless and beautiful. The guitar is nice and thin and the neck is wonderfully playable. UTILIZATION Aesthetically, my guitar has all-black pickups instead of the zebra pickups depicted in most pictures of this guitar. The pickups are Rockfield Mafia pickups and work well in all of the pickup and electronics combinations. I have the Dragon's Blood finish which is a deep red with accents of black. A beautiful finish that I highly recommend. Don't get me wrong--the natural finish is beautiful, but I guess it depends on the type of music you play. The natural is more "folky" while the Dragon's Blood is more visually aggressive. The Rockfield Mafia pickups are higher-output pickups and are adjusted farther away from the strings than I would normally adjust them, but I have no complaints. I tried bringing the bridge pickup closer to the strings but didn't like the change in tone, so I put it back. It's not the easiest to master, with a plethora of controls at your fingertips, but it's well-worth the time investment. SOUNDS This is really a tone machine in just about every way. The neck-through construction provides awesome sustain and a wonderful feel playing higher on the neck. Clean tones are akin to what a 12-string guitar sounds like, but with a bit more clarity and less muddiness as a result of the bottom two strings not having octave strings. On overdriven and distorted patches chords take on a rich fullness and slightly different tone as the third and fourth strings have the octaves. The result of the first and second strings being doubled just adds more fullness to the tone. Single notes and solos are surprisingly easy to play--one would think it would be a major adjustment to play two strings at a time, but they're so close together it is somewhat imperceptible. As previously mentioned, the guitar affords the flexibility of removing the additional four strings and just running it as a six-string. As far as electronics, each pickup has an individual coil-splitting mini switch and there is a third mini-toggle that is an out-of-phase switch when both pickups are engaged. There is also a five-position Varitone that switches in different capacitor values to brighten or darken the tone in more subtle ways. The coil-splitting and phase switches are great and it's nice to have them AND the Varitone included in the price. The bridge pickup is nice and cutting both clean and overdriven--the neck pickup is warm without being muddy. When the coils are split, nice strat-type tones are easily achieved. Although the phase switch obviously only works with both pickups engaged, the sound is nice old-style Brian May. Overall an EXTREMELY versatile guitar. I've thought of changing out the pickups multiple times, but then I play the guitar and decide against it. OVERALL OPINION I found it hard to find any fault with this guitar. If I HAD to call out something it would be that the guitar showed up missing one of the bridge saddle height adjustment screws--I called the vendor and they had BC Rich send out a replacement set of screws quickly. Very happy with the support. This guitar is the best of both worlds between a 12-string and a 6-string. Twelve-string guitars tend to be bigger or bulky and the Perfect 10 Bich exhibits none of those traits. This is a rocker at it's core. Since I've never seen another 10-string it's hard to say if I'd buy a different one. If you need flexibility and don't want to shoulder an SG double-neck I strongly recommend you pick up a Perfect 10 Bich and expand your horizons.

The BC Rich Mockingbird is a guitar I always associate with stoner metal for whatever reason. This guitar features a mahogany body with a bolt-on maple neck, a rosewood fretboard, quilted maple top, 24 jumbo frets, unique inlays, a hardtail bridge, two humbuckers, two volumes, one tone and a three way switch. UTILIZATION The guitar itself, despite having tons of great features on paper, didn't really jump out at me. The frets seemed like they weren't polished enough, and I couldn't get the action as low as I normally can with ESPs. The body itself is a bit funky and takes some getting used to, but that's kinda the whole appeal of the BC Rich guitars. Speaking of BC Rich's unique features, whenever I think of BC Rich, I think of neck-thru. Since this is a bolt-on, I was a bit disappointed. I realize it's a more budget guitar, but it's still disappointing. SOUNDS The sound was kinda dull, and it didn't resonate unplugged. The pickups sounded very average overall, and I think it needed a pickup swap. The bridge was kinda undefined, and the neck was a huge mess in terms of overall tone. I think those higher line pickups that BC Rich likes to use in these guitars would suit it much better. OVERALL OPINION If you're going to buy one of these, try it out first. Aside from its odd looks, the guitar just seemed to be pretty bland overall. Whether this was just the luck of the draw or how they all are, I'm not entirely sure. I'd put it on par with some of the lower end LTDs out there if you want something to compare it to. If you can afford it, try to get a higher model used on eBay or something. Especially something that is neck-thru...

I purchased an American made Beast pretty quickly after they premiered. It had 24 frets and a Floyd Rose tremolo system. There were three knobs, a volume and tone, and a pickup selector switch. It had a really awkward shape that I thought I would get used to, but didn't. It was also huge and had an unbelievably large hard-shell case that was pretty annoying to carry around. The floyd rose also proved to be unnecessarily difficult to maintain, even though I was taught how to do it multiple times. I later realized that they probably hadn't worked out all the kinks with this model yet. UTILIZATION The neck is good for playing metal riffs. Soloing wasn't a chore, but it could have been better with a Les Paul or even an ESP. The last notes were easy to reach as long as you kept your hand close to the fretboard... otherwise, you risk clipping your hand on a jagged edge (don't sit down playing this if you don't want to dig into your body.) It's heavy, and it's awkwardly shaped. The sound is decent if you're into strictly metal, otherwise, avoid at all costs. SOUNDS I grew tired of this sound pretty fast. Once I grew out of my pre-pubescent death metal phase, I had little use for this. I ended up selling it to some kid who paid way more money to have it fixed up because it was such a pain to maintain. I used to use a Marshall stack and a Crate Blue-Voodoo stack, which both were ideal for the kind of music I was playing. The clean sound is pretty much awful. It's only worth playing if you need to do machine-gun riffs or some two hand tapping stuff with the gain CRANKED. Then it sounds pretty good, I guess. Not being into those sounds anymore, I cringed when I picked one up again, just because I realized that I had actually paid for this at one point. OVERALL OPINION I used the guitar for about 3 years before I sold it. I didn't like it's lack of versatility, and I hated the clean sound. I liked that it wasn't too expensive, but I probably should have gone with something else. It's probably not even the best BC Rich out there, so I wouldn't recommend it over the Warlock or Mockingbird models, especially the higher end ones. Again, though, BC Rich guitars are for metal players only, so if looking like a badass metal god is more important to you than getting a decent-sounding guitar, then go ahead. Otherwise, avoid at all costs.

I'm 14 and I've been playing for about 4 or 5 years. I play mostly heavy metal. I love industrial, death, and black metal. I got this axe at the Guitar Center in Lynwood (WA). I can't exactly remember how much it was, and I can't check because there was only one in stock. I think it was around $750-$850 (American). It was on sale, I think it was originally $1000. Around there. I pretty much love everything about this guitar. The pickups sound absolutely amazing. They can really wale. They mostly play metal and they have a great crunch tone, ranging from classic rock to death metal. This guitar isn't bolt-on, so the sustain is great. Which is really great for the overdrive it can take. The Grover tuners have no need to be replaced. They stay in tune great. I love the shape too. It's not really gothic but more of a stylish badass kind of look. So you dont have to get a more gothic shape to get the tone you want. The sleek finish has great shine and really adds to the beauty of the guitar. One of my favorite things about this guitar though is how light it is. Its really great for me cause i love to play metal so I want something that i can throw around with a strap. Like all guitars with this kind of finish, its gets allot of smudges. So its a good idea to clean it regularly. Another thing that I honestly dont worry about is that the pickups cant exactly clean. But the reason i dont worry bout that is that...who would play such a badass looking guitar to a soft song? Don't get this guitar if you want it to be an all music guitar. It's not. Expect rock and metal. Nothing softer. I havn't had it long. But long enough to know the quality is amazing. From my previous years of being a musician. I learned to hate B.C. Rich's cause all the ones i had played were terrible quality. Thats just cause they were cheap ass. Don't judge the upper price B.C. Rich's badly becasue the cheap ones arnt good. Because they're a different breed. Amazing quality. My faith is restored in B.C. Rich's :) Amazing. If you like to play metal, get this guitar. If you like the looks, trust me, you'll love the sound. This review was originally published on http://www.musicgearreview.com

I play in a cover band which covers all music from country all the way to death metal. Bought from Guitar Center roughly 3 years ago for $215 after tax. To be honest, there isnt much to like about it, i liked the feel of the neck, and it used to stay in tune when I first bought it, dont know what happened, but i doesn't stay in tune very well anymore. The pickups are very poor quality, sounded decent when i first bought the beast, but after about a year and a half, its jsut liek they wore out or something, terrible quality, now they are much to muddy, and I have since sold them for 5 bucks to my buddy and put some older Dimarzio's in that I had laying around. Now, it sounds great, jsut wish it stayed ni tune. Quality, sub-par I would say, I didnt think it was very great, at first it was OK, but it declined over time pretty rapidly. Made of some sort of cheap wood, dents very easily and finish is easy to chip off. I use this as a backup to my Fender strat, I'm suprised it's even lasting as a backup. Would never use as a primary. Bottom line, a cheapy for sure, I wish I would have went with a cheap Epiphone or Squier, maybe even Ibanez, but my point is, you can get better stuff even in this price range. This review was originally published on http://www.musicgearreview.com

I saw the ad on the internet this guitar was on sale for $600 its going online at music123.com for $830 so that was a steal! I bought it at guitar center here in Albuquerque. Thanks David for hooking me up man I like the shape, finish and the pickups. The finish is beatifule it has a quilted maple top and a mohangony back, it also has two rosewood stripes along the neck one the body. The pickups get awsome distortion. They get great clean tones to but are a little bassy but i wont replace them unless i have to. The shape is awsome slap the beauty right down on your knee and play all day. IT ALSO FITS INTO ANY STANDARD CASE!! so dont let them rip you off for a BC rich case. I love the ebony fretboard with the cloud in lays they worn like crap online but the pics dont do them justice at all. The only complaint i have is that it is neck heavy but i can deal with that. nothing else that i dont like. the guitar is built so solid its a little heavy but nothing that i can complain about because i can deal with it. The electronics were well sodered together. great peice of ger the only modification that i will eventually do to it as i do to every elcetric i own is install a les paul style 2-way on/off switch GREAT GUITAR thinkin about buying the classic BICH This review was originally published on http://www.musicgearreview.com

I adquire this guitar because of the shape. I has the greatest shape I've ever seen. Since I love playing metal, i thought it would be nice to have a guitar like this. I paid $500 for it. What I like most of this unit is the powerfull sound, also the body and the widow headstock but really what I think I like the most was the neck of the guitar. It's extremly soft. You can play very but very fast thanks to it. I think I fell in love of it the first time I played this guitar. What I really didn't liked was the floyd rose. I get's out of tune easily. Also I didn't like much the wood of the guitar...is baswood but, it's not a good one. This guitar is very heavy, but if you take out the floyd rose the body will as light as a feather. What I'm trying to say is that this kind of wood is so soft that you can easily damage your guitar. It's a great guitar...sounds well, and I think I'm going to keep it until the end of my life because I know it would last. Even though all the problems I've mentioned, I think this guitar is one of the greatest I've ever played. It has everything someone who likes metal want...you won't be dissaponited if you buy it. This review was originally published on http://www.musicgearreview.com

I got this as a Christmas gift a few years ago. I asked for it and I got it. it cost $199.99. I love this guitar. I have a black one and it has little specs of silver on it and makes it look really cool. The bridge pick up is really good. Great tone and feel to it. Its grea for rock or metal. It's really good if dropped a lot and even tried to smash it but its really strong. The only thing I don't like about it was the original toggle switch was bad and so I had to replace it. It had a problem shorting out. Very good construction. Nice thick wood and very sturdy pick ups. Everything stays in place and toghter really well. The only thing I did to this guitar was take off the things for the straps. I put on some eyebolts. they work better for me. Great guitar I recommend it very highly! This review was originally published on http://www.musicgearreview.com

This bass was purchased to offset my current Cort GB34A (Musicman Stingray inspired) bass. I purchased it October 22 '04 from The Guitar Factory Parramatta (Sydney Australia), who got it in for me at an unbeatable price even though they don't usually stock Rico's. The deal included a Behringer Ultrabass BX1200 and the total price was AUD$1280 including padded gig bag. Talk to Bronson or Shaun, tell 'em Barry Newton gave the recco, no need to be pushy. Good guys both. This is one schmick black beauty and is a stunner to look at. The artistic design is (IMHO) just one of the very best shapes ever produced. The finish is deeply glossy black which is offset by chrome knobs and heavily chromed solid molded adjustable bridge and tuners, and the neck bolt-on plate at back is moulded BC Rich, chromed, and has the serial number perfectly scribed in ~ a lovely touch of detail and craftsmanship. The neck and fretting is equally well finished with rosewood fretboard on what appears to be light honey coloured hard rock maple neck. The woods used are of the highest quality ~ no flaws whatsoever. The headstock joint is almost invisible which means perfect join, and the headstock is deeply finished gloss black with B.C. Rich signature in white & Mockingbird on truss-rod cover. The twin/twin pickups are similarly signed BC Rich and the sound that comes out of them is at least triple what I get with identical settings from my Cort GB34A, though (not unexpectedly) much more metallic! Two tone knobs, one volume plus a three way (1,2, 1&2) p'up switch gives excellent tonal range and adjustability. It also fits into the lap a treat when sitting. Not balanced neck and body, but that's well known Might be a good idea to ask for it to be set up at point of sale if you don't like doing it yourself. Mine was straight out of the box and the truss-rod required relieving more than half a turn reduced tension due to upper register fret buzz. A bit of bridge raising was also needed, but that's about normal pre-delivery. The pickups were not sitting flat or straight, but hey! ~ I didn't ask for it to be set up, so it's all good and easy to set right. The only 'fault' I could give is that there is an ever so slight gap where neck joins body that I can slip my index fingernail into on both sides. Comparatively, my Cort has a perfect neck to body fit. This is the Axxe you need if you love a punchy sound with a razor sharp look. This review was originally published on http://www.musicgearreview.com