Ibanez S-1520 NT Review

Made in 2000, at the Fujigen, Japan shop. 22 Frets, original wizard neck, cream'ish colored vinyl bindings on the neck only, Rosewood fingerboard 3 piece maple/bubinga neck, Jumbo frets.



Price paid: $ 600.00

Purchased from: EBay

Features: Made in 2000, at the Fujigen, Japan shop. 22 Frets, original wizard neck, cream'ish colored vinyl bindings on the neck only, Rosewood fingerboard 3 piece maple/bubinga neck, Jumbo frets. It's a mahogany body, with a bubinga top. It's a lightly stained bubinga top, with transparent finish. The body style is of course the S-series body style. The bridge is a Ibanez-licensed Floyd Rose Lo-Pro Edge tremolo system (in my opinion the finest they've ever made. Err I've ever played) It had passive Quantum 1 & 2 pickups in it, but those weren't quite nice enough. So I installed a much hotter Kramer quad-rail knock off in the bridge, and a Bill Lawrence XL500 Bridge pup in the neck position. Standard volume knob/tone knob, 5 way selector, running in series and one parallel setting. The pickup topography is H-H, two humbuckers. The tuners are very nice, I think they may be gotoh, but it has a locking nut. I got the case with it, the tremelo, aaaaaand. That was it. No tools, etc. (EBay) // 9
Sound: This suit's my style rather well, I play mostly metal and classical-style guitar. The guitar's extremely resonant due to quality woods, and the hollow intonation cavity. Everyone with any common sense or awareness in regards to guitars knows that Ibanez are the best-built, mass-distributed guitars for. Virtually any style, especially at their price. If you paid 3 times as much as this cost when it was originally bought for a Gibson, you'd still get an inferior guitar. I play through a few multi-effects processors, and various effects looped in, to a digital power amp intended for movie theater surround sound, to multiple JBL Studio monitors.

The guitar always sounds as good as it possibly could, as long as the player is worthy. For the most part, it's tone is suprisely high-end for mahogany (high frequency, that is). It's well rounded as far as EQ goes, but it is on the higher end, it's designed for metal. Pinch harmonics ring out due to this.

As I said, pinch harmonics are a breeze, partially due to my bridge pickup. The neck pickup is, of course, bassier and duller, but it definitely sounds excellent as well. The Lo-Pro Edge is probably the best sustaining Floyd Rose trem, if not the zero resistance trem's they've been making. But the ZR trem's function as a vibrato is definitely not as nice. Overall this guitar sounds excellent. I've actually never found a better one in a store, ever, especially for metal. Don't get me wrong though, this thing sounds excellent either way. It's just not a fat-neck resonator, or puny little Fender. So it can't emulate those sounds. // 10

Action, Fit & Finish: The lo-pro edge on it actually sit's a little higher than I'm used to. As in the area it's affixed to is slightly higher than I used to like. Now I've actually come to appreciate it. It allows me to loosen the strings by loosening the intonation plate, which creates better sustain, and more exaggerative bends. It feels like my Jackson did when the trem was completely loosened. Which is good, cause it was a stiff little bastard. The pickups that came with it were the best stock pickups I've ever heard... But they were still trash. They sounded about like an EMG 81/85. Which is by slightly too weak for my taste. I wouldn't say there are any flaws with this guitar, after I've rewired it. However, due to the fact that my bridge pickup is a double humbucker and not a normal humbucker, the 5th selector Switch position is now a ground. ie, it's essentially a killswitch that isn't very fun to use. I don't mind that at all though, I can still get series bridge, series neck, series both, parallel both. I wouldn't want any other path arrangements.

Did I mention that it looks beautiful? No dots on the frets, man that's nice looking, lol. // 10

Reliability & Durability: I'd say it's very durable. But it IS any s-series, so it's very thin. I feel like I could easily break it, but it's sustained zero-wear and tear after me totting it all around town to play with various people/groups. Nothing on it seems to be getting damaged. No rust, no warping, no cracks, finish is still virtually perfect on the front. I'd use it in a gig without a backup. In fact, I can barely stand to play on my backup, cause this thing's so nice. // 9

Impression: I mostly play Metal/classical style guitar, this thing is absolutely immaculate for my playing style. I would want it to be 24 fret, but. Somehow I've found it to be more comfortable playing on a 22, and I rarely find myself wishing there were two extra frets. I've been playing guitar at least 8 hours a day for the last year and a half semi-professionally. Before that I'd only tinkered with guitar for a short while as a child. I've played extensively on a Gibson Explorer, a lot of Les Pauls, a few Fender-styled guitars. They all suck by comparison. Very badly. When I played on my first Ibanez, I literally felt as if I had orgasmed. I've never found any guitar comparable to that of finer Ibanez guitars. Or even the cheap ones for that matter. I do not regret owning this guitar in any way at all, I will never sell it. If it were to be stolen, it wouldn't be easily replaced, and I would murder whoever did it. I'd at least castrate someone who thought about it. I will reiterate, it's difficult to compare this guitar to other guitars, the only ones I consider to be comparable are other Ibanez's. Jacksons are trash, Gibsons = trash, Schecter. Trash, ESP = trash, I think it goes without saying that Fenders are trash. I played a fernandez that was moderately nice once. My friend's 80's Kramer is almost as nice, but it's trem, headstock angle, and frets don't quite cut it. That says alot, given that his Kramer was essentially the definitive metal guitar during a period of time when metal guitars were actually really popular.

If you find one of these guitars on EBay, floating around, and it's not damaged, and you like owning excellent-sounding guitars. I'd suggest you jump on it. I

review from ultimate-guitar.com'm glad I did. // 10

RG 8420 ZD Review

Price paid: $ 1800

Features: This guitar was made by Team J Craft in Japan in 2008. This guitar is very well built, since it's made by the best builders in The Ibanez Company. The neck is a five piece "super Wizard" neck (maple and walnut). I think this neck is in a good way different from other wizard necks. The neck profile is thin, witch makes it easy to play fast. It has 24 fret fretboard with "Tree Of Life Inlay" inlays.

The bpdy is made of African mahogany and has a flamed maple top that's looks amazing in the color of red. The bridge is the new Edge Zero with the "zero-point" system witch works perfectly fine. When it's set up properly (it comes from the factory very well set up) it stays perfectly in tune, even after heavy use. But I don't recommend you to change bridge settings on a gig, because you'll need to retune the guitar (at least I had to do it). I experienced that the tremolo arm made som sounds, but the seller said that they will go away after some use.

The electronics is passive and this guitar comes with Seymour Duncans. In the bridge position it has a Seymour DuncanR CUSTOM 5 TB-14 and in the bridge position it has a Seymour DuncanR JAZZ model SH2-n. The pickup selector is a 5-way Switch. The guitar also has a volum nob and a tone nob.

It comes with a J custom case identical to the Prestige cases. It also comes with wrenches, straplocks from Gotoh, and the coolest thing is the certificate that comes with the guitar luthiers signature and all other documents. // 8

Sound: The pickups is powerful and has a nice sound for rock and metal. At the same time, you can have a Strat kind of a clean sound, because it can splitt the humbuckers to single coils, so the guitar is very versatile in sound. I only use a Dunlop Crybaby wah wah and a DigiTech Whammy IV into a Marshall AVT 10, and I love the guitar sound. It has a lot of options in sound and all of them sound very, very good. // 9
Action, Fit & Finish: Since the guitar is a custom shop guitar, and the seller was the first owner and the guitar only had been played for 3 hours, it was very good set up, it was even tuned perfectly. The pickups are monunted straight to the body and are very well mounted to the body. The bridge is very well routed for the tremolo and you can really pull the bridge up. The hardware doesn't make any sound and works very well. // 10

Reliability & Durability: I haven't tried the guitar Live, but I think it will stand a Live show with out problems, if you use it properly. The hardware works so good that I don't think thats the weak spot on this guitar. The strap buttons are very good, but needs to be tighten now and then, but since the guitar comes with straplocks, it probably won't be a problem. The finish is good and if you polish the guitar and take care of the guitar, it will last for a long time. I've had this guitar for a half week, but I think the finish can take a lot of beating. // 10

Impression: I play a lot of rock and instumental rock/metal like Joe Satriani and Steve Vai. The guitar suits my playing styles good. I've been playing for 3 years and was ready for a new guitar. I don't use a lot of effects, and I don't think it's necessary.

When I was going to buy a new guitar, it stood between Music Man JP6, Jackson SL-1 and this one, and I don't regret for buying this guitar. I chose this guitar because I felt that it had everything I needed on a guitar. This guitar is worth trying out, and are worth the money. // 10

Review from ultimate-guitar.com

Ibanez GAX 30

Purchased from: Long And McQuade

Features: Current model, made in China. 22 medium frets, rosewood fingerboard. Either basswood or agathis body (the site said basswood, the people at L&M said agathis). Really hot jewel blue finish, it looks completely different depending on the lighting, from royal blue to navy to purple. The shape is really cool, almost like a fusion of a LP and a SG, it has the Horns and thickness of the SG, with that big round bottom of the LP. The bridge is HardTail with thru body stringing, when I bought it, it didn't seem that big a deal, but it makes a huge difference once you sit down and play. Two standard Ibanez humbuckers in the bridge and neck positions. I really like them, and they sure beat anything I've heard on the squires and epiphones in this price range. Three way selector neck/neck-bridge/bridge. One volume and one tone (which really works). Generic tuners, but they do the job. Comes with a ten foot patch, but it's garbage, it's really thin, and I only use it to tune the guitar. Spend the ten dollars for a ten foot yorkville patch, it is 100 times better. The rating is not for all guitars, just ones in the under 300 bracket. // 10

Sound: I bought this guitar because it's the brand of a number of great metal and rock guitarist's, and I didn't want a fruity sounding Strat. I've had it for three days, and right now am playing U2, OLP, SOAD and Finger Eleven with much success. The guitar fits me perfectly (as opposed to the Epiphone Special 2 I bought a little while back and returned the next day). I bought a 15 watt Traynor amp, and they really seem to compliment eachother better than any other pairing I found (I really cannot overemphasize how important it is not to buy a starter pack for your first electric purchase. You wind up paying too much for substandard equipment. I spent only $380, including tax, for everything: guitar, amp, patch, tuner, strap and gigbag, and wound up with much higher quality gear than a Strat Pack which would have cost 100 more). Anyway, playing with the tone (again, why affinity strats suck) and the three band equalizer on the amp gave me a huge spectrum of sounds. I'm talking everything from the Edge's ES-335 in All Because of You, to Steve Mazur's Crunchy Bridge and Screaming solo in Not Enough to the myriad of sounds that Daron produces with SOAD - this guitar did it all. // 10
Action, Fit & Finish: Everything was pretty good. No fret buzz, the only prob was that the bridge PU was a bit slanted, closer to the low e that the high e, which took all of a minute to fix. Flawless finish. // 8

Reliability & Durability: I played several guitars while trying to decide which to purchase. Without a doubt this is the most solid of all of them. I was always ginger with strats b/c I felt like I was going to break them, but this thing is solid. The strap buttons aren't going anywhere, and the finish looks like it would withstand prolonged nuclear bombardment. // 10

Impression: This is my guitar! It fits me perfectly. I've been playing casually for a few years on the two acoustics in my house, some Suzuki POS and a Fender F-03. I had the oppurtunity to learn some songs on the acoustic that I transferred right to the electric with much success. If the guitar was lost or stolen today, I would get another. Down the road well in the words of k-Os, heaven only knows. If I get more into playing because of this axe, I'd ideally like to get both an Epiphone Dot and an Ibanez Iceman down the road. However, right here, right now, this is the s--t. My advice to all starting guitarists never compromise. Dont think that because some Fender major guitar manufacturer offers some crappy second line of guitar under another name packaged with a bad amp and a bunch of substandard accessories you have to buy that. Find the guitar that suits your style, taste and price. And if you seem intimidated by the prospects of getting all the required components to get started, remember that the staff of whatever music store you are shopping at are paid to help you. I wound up getting along really well with the woman who helped me get everything together, which is something that wouldn't have happened had I simply walked up to the counter and said "Hi, I'd like the generic Starter Kit that most buy." The bottom line is that you need to be true to yourself, your style, your music, your identity. // 10

Review from ultimate-guitar.com