I was gifted an Epiphone Casino for my birthday. I've been wanting one for a while (am a big Beatles fan), they became hard to get in the blonde finish since the Get Back documentary.
The day I got it for my birthday out the case, I plug the jack in to the socket and the jack went straight through the body! Socket fell straight through! Not a good start! A replacement was ordered and I spent some time with it but I really could not get on with it. Not to sound ungrateful, but it literally felt like a toy rather than an instrument in the hands, the build quality on it was horrible and really disappointing. My fault for not checking it out first before wanting it but it was really disappointing. I'm sure these were never built so badly and they aren't exactly being sold for peanuts, so I was expecting a certain level of quality and build quality. Accessing higher frets also was a challenge, but I could have lived with that if it actually felt good in the hands to play.
Spoke to the partner and she saw where I was coming from, I had a look around at what is around in the same ball park of price (including the Epiphone hardcase which was also bought for the Casino).
I played a PRS Hollowbody II in blue finish in a store a couple of weeks back and I wasn't blown away by it, it definitely felt better than the Casino though, looking back!
I started looked at what else is out there. I want to try and go for different sounding guitars to broaden my collection but make the collection meaningful with some diverse tone. PRS have some good sales on at the moment. Visited Peach Guitars, wow.. what a place! It puts my local PMT to shame!
PRS Hollowbody II Piezo can be had for £799 at the moment, down from £1400. Andertons had these a few weeks back on sale, but they since sold out of this finish, with no sign of it anymore on their site. Peach Guitars have them, and speaking to them, they have a lot of these in stock, some 200, so I was told.
When I got there I was greeted by a member of staff and taken to one of their booths, the guitar had already been setup and was hung on the wall ready for me to look at.
Here she is below, I'm a sucker for blue guitars and I'm surprised this is only my first:
The example presented to me has nice flame on the top, appears they aren't all as flamey as this. So pretty happy I got a nice one! The one on display in store was very plan.
The features on this SE set it apart from the other SE's, even more so at this on sale price point:
Ebony fretboard
Bone nut
Bird fret markers finished in abalone
Flame binding on the body and neck
It's an absolute delight to play. It's an SE, so not built in USA but the build and finish on it is fantastic! Neck feels great, binding has been done to a high degree. I'd not have any issues buying an SE in future. The neck feels great and it sounds awesome. The piezo pickups are brilliant, switching to the acoustic setting on my THR30III it sounds very convincing, and being able to blend the piezo with the humbuckers means there is even more scope for a whole range of sounds.
It's 100% a keeper!
