New Guitar!!!

cokebottles · 20 Mar 2007 at 15:55

Hey guys, had a bit of a spur of the moment guitar purchase yesterday. My current two axes' were a Gibson Les Paul Studio, and a Fender Tom Delonge Signature. I've been wanting something a little cheaper to throw around a bit at gigs, without jeopardsing my two babies.

Was looking at the Ibanez site online, as I had an RG321 a few years back for about £200 and it was a right little workhorse for the money. I'm a big fan of RGs with fixed bridges, and was pleased to see they had some new designs out by now. New for 2007 was the RGR321EX (emg designed pickups) and the MTM2 (Mick Thompson Sig) which had the lovely ibanez v8/7 humbukers with black covers on em!!

This was all well and good, but it's so hard to find new Ibanez models in-stock on the high street. I was in for a surprise when my local shop had BOTH in

. What are the odds!! I had to try them out, as they were being offered at amazing prices. I never thought I'd go for a second signature guitar, but after playing the MTM2, i realised how close to my dream guitar it realy is.

This really is a case of don't judge a book by it's cover. I do have some slipknot in my itunes library, but rarely listen to it, let alone play that style of music - but this guitar just works for me. Has a wonderful wizard ii bolt in neck, that is painted on the back (never seen another bolt in RG like this) and has the same quirky jack socket as the JEM series. I have always been a fan of the V7/V8 pair of pickups, and they have flat black emg-style covers on this guitar - really finishes off the look nicely!

The sounds are amazing. This guitar had a 5way switch over the 3 way in the RGR321EX and that REALLY helped. I'd never have imagined choosing this guitar for its clean sounds over another. In position 4 you get the neck humbucker in parallel. Genius, sounds sweet!!!

One thing i'd care to ask is.... anyone familiar with the 'Fixed-Edge' bridges. From what I can tell, its a regular Edge II/III tail piece, that is not floating, the strings lock at the bridge and the nut - the advantage I can see from keeping this design is the tuning stability, low profile and action and also the fat block of metal helps sustain.

Check out some (shody) pics.

cokebottles · 20 Mar 2007 at 16:42

Nope

Single volume. That is the way forward!!!

cokebottles · 20 Mar 2007 at 17:22

Yes, I was AB testing the RGR321EX with the MTM2.

I must say, the RGR321EX was what I intentionally wanted to buy - it was much more in my price range. It is a wonderful instrument, the place was doing it for £209 - I don't know ANY other guitar at the price range where you get as much.

Sounds wise, the two 'EMG-Designed' humbuckers were very good. No squeal and weren't noisy - good distortion tones on tap. Nice gibson like clean tones, not much sparkle I'd say, and my only gripe was the 3 way switch - the way Ibanez split 2 humbuckers over a 5 way switch is awesome, if this guitar had that, it would be faultless in my opinion.

The playability is nice, its basswood, so the guitar is quite light compared to the MTM2 and has the lovely wizard ii neck - same neck shape as pretty much all the Ibanez RGs, and I imagine the same neck that is fitted on all the Indonesian made RGs (sub £500ish). Feels lovely to play - nice white binding too. Bridge is a fender type hardtail, again, solid, and thru body stringing is nice.

Looks wise, its was a beatuy - looking EXTREMEMLY similar to my MTM2. The model I played was black, and had white body binding, with binding extending up the neck and headstock too, the pickups had flat black EMG style covers too, all hardware was black, regular plate jack socket on the side - all felt solid.

I imagine if I were not straight comparing the MTM2 to this guitar I would have bought it without ANY hesitiation - it's just the MTM2 had a few quirks to it, that were uncannily to my taste (pickup choice, jem style jack sockets and only one volume pot).

Hope that helps.

cokebottles · 22 Mar 2007 at 17:35

Hey.

The bridge functions exactly the same the Ibanez Edge III, except its completely fixed down (no tremolo action, doesn't float, so changing tuning on the fly is not an issue). The guitar does feature a locking nut though, which you can leave unlocked if you want to change tunings a lot (I leave the bolts on mine finger tight). I really have to say; I originally thought the bridge was over-complicated, but it feels really nice to play on, sustains loooooooooong (because it's a big block of metal that adds mass) and you always have the option of locking the nut down, so you get really stable tuning.

The main reason I wanted an Ibanez this time, was because of the Wizard necks. I love them, thin, flat and fast. The only thing I haven't like in the past about Ibanez necks is the fact that they only have a very light lacquer coating, so (like on my SRX350NT bass) dirt builds up visibly, and I don't like the 'grippy' feeling. As far as I know, other than the neck-thru designed RGT guitars, this is the only RG with a regular bolt-on neck that has the rear painted, so I don't have that problem, love this neck.

It's so easy to wax on about this guitar. I haven't taken such an immediate shine to a guitar like I have for this one, since forever. It's really versatile - just used it with the coils tapped to record a demo for an acoustic track. Thats a 'Slipknot signature model' used for acoustic!!! I love it.

Hope that helps. Shop around though - I've seen some places that do it for £380+ online - I managed to grab it for £320 on the high street with a crappy case to take it home in too.