Need tip on buying HH pickup electric guitar in calcutta in 35k-40k range

Discussion in 'Guitar Gear Talk Forum' started by soumyaranjan, Apr 25, 2012.

  1. soumyaranjan

    soumyaranjan New Member

    Hi guys, i want to buy an electric guitar in kolkata. I want the fat distortion sound of for metal core/ thrash grunge metal, wes borland, kirk hammet, kurt cobain style. I had been deciding on the guitars and am tending towards ESP for their EMG 81/85 or 81/60 configurations but i also really like the fender squire vintage custom jaguar which comes with duncan designed passive HH configuration. I would like to have a full clean tone too ... not the strat single coil like ting tings .... but frankly i like the clean tones of passive pickuos better than active ones (although the one for EMG60 is very neat) ... what are the suggestions from you guys on-

    1. Is ESP or Squire vintage Jaguar available in Calcutta? if yes, where?
    2. I am very much undecided about ESP models, the Kirk Hammet signature looks good, but i am really not into buying signature models, can you suggest some other options for ESP?
    3. Which should be a better option the vintage jaguar or ESP?

    I am quite utterly confused at this point. Please help me with your pro suggestions.

    P.S.: I am not from calcutta, so i have very little idea about the guitar shops there, i will arrive there next weekend ... plz guys help me. Ciao.
     
  2. soumyaranjan

    soumyaranjan New Member

    Also guys, i forgot to mention, i donot need tremolo and would be doing a lot of drop tuning. I have heard that the ESPs are neck heavy so the balance is not good. Is it true? i never had a chance to try a ESP, so no idea. For Fender, i have tried stratocasters and the balance of the guitar for me is fine.
     
  3. ayu135

    ayu135 New Member

    You can try for PRS guitars like the PRS SE custom 24. A very nicely crafted guitar. It does have a non locking tremolo but you can ignore it or easily block it with a piece of wood. Or you can look at the Singlecut SE or the Mark Tremonti SE. Then you can look at Schecter Omen Extreme. I am personally inclined towards passive pickups. Also have a look at some stuff from Greg Bennett they offer some great stuff at a lower price point. The Avion AV6 would be a good choice if you want a Les Paul styled guitar. Well i dont know about where to buy them in Kolkata. But these are some suggestions you can look into.
     
  4. soumyaranjan

    soumyaranjan New Member

    Hey ayu135, thanks man for advice. I checked out the prs mark tremonti (in youtube ofcourse) and it sounds very beautiful !!! but i am not sure if it available in Calcutta. I was also checking out the schecter hellraiser c-1, which is with 81/89 pickups, really cool sound, but the price is beyond my range. What is the word of mouth in the street, about the quality and service of schecter? ( i donot know actually) the ratings for schecter guitars in ultimate guitars is not as high as say esp's in the same price range .... the greg bennet stuff i hear about a lot, but am yet to find one who uses them, also i am open to checking out the AV6..
    I am really keen to know what brands are available in Kolkata, otherwise i make a choice and then find that its not available, that would break my heart !!! anyway what about the squire vintage jaguar? have anybody tried it? it looks and sounds very cool (checked in youtube) .. but it is not listed in bajaao or furtados (i checked the online catalogues), i would really like to get one of those, otherwise the prs mark tremonti SE also seems to be a good choice.
    I would also appreciate if you guys give me some advice on guitars in the price range quoted above, from your own personal use, so that i get a first hand criticism of the guitars ....
    Any reply will be greatly appreciated .... thanx again.
     
  5. dyorel

    dyorel New Member

    I got an AV6 second hand, plays beautifully. With the Av6 you get a really good Epi copy at a bargain, some even compare the AV 6 to Gibson LPs lol.

    The pickups are Duncan designed, both bridge and neck pups give warm cleans and nice thick sounds when you play distorted. I run the signal through a GT 8 with a Hothead and DF 7 in the effects loop, distortions through either the proc or the pedals sound awesome.

    You'd save a lot on your budget if you go with the AV6, retails around 24k. But then again, there are guys who'll argue that a 40k guitar is way better than a guitar you get for 24k :)
     
  6. soumyaranjan

    soumyaranjan New Member

    i am seeing a lot of positive reviews for av6, but why i donot know, here in where i am, nobody probably has ever even heard of greg bennet !!! i asked around a bit !!!!
     
  7. soumyaranjan

    soumyaranjan New Member

    Ok guys got a PRS SE Tremonti, 36k ....
     
  8. ayu135

    ayu135 New Member

    Got it from where? Wow man do post a review or something. What amp are you using btw? Congrats on your purchase.
     
  9. soumyaranjan

    soumyaranjan New Member

    Hey thanks man !!! i got it at Braganzas in Kolkata .... i will do a short review in sometime ... currently i donot own an amp, i am using garageband to play through .... can you suggest an amp .... say a cheap one .....
     
  10. soumyaranjan

    soumyaranjan New Member

    Ok. Lets see, sorry for the late post, was too busy with my job (i had just joined after two long years - meaning lots of work), therefore i may be forgiven. The prs SE Tremonti i bought is of the 2012 batch, korea made. Its cherry red, and to my great surprise, it came with bird inlays, just like the original prs Tremonti (what a pleasant surprise !!!). The body is supposed to be mahogany, but the guitar seems pretty light. It has a full plastic binding and is really a beauty. The scale length is 25", with 22 standard frets. The fretboard is rosewood i believe. The tuners are nonlocking, but the tuning holds really good. The action is just excellent out of the box, i guess i shouldnot really comment on how fast the neck really is ( i am not at all a pro/ big shredder or anything), but playing the guitar is a piece of cake. The barres just sound good without too much effort, and soloing also seems easy. The intonation was good. But, let me tell you this the strings (.09 gauge), that came factory set was awful, and i managed to break the b string within the first 15 days, that i bought my guitar. Also let me tell you this, i was sometimes tuning down upto 1 and 1/2 step, but the tension in the strings was playable, not too flappy actually. The string tension in standard tuning is ofcourse just perfect. I think replacing with a .010 would be enough for a bit of down- tuning (comments will be appreciated).
    It comes with a fixed bridge (sadly it seems setting intonation with the prs wrap-over bridge is near to impossible). I donot know what metal/alloy it is made of but it already looks a bit dull after two months. Atleast one of the screws at the back of the guitar seems to started rusting, looking at the position, it seems due to sweat. Otherwise the guitar looks really solid.
    The guitar feature a HH configuration, with the bass humbucker (neck pickup) and treble humbucker (bridge pickup). There is a three way pickup selector switch on the top left, and two volume and tone knobs. Tone wise, for the clean tone, the bass pickup has a really beautiful warm and fatter but a bit american stratish kind of sound. The treble pickup sound is more twangy ( personally if i want a big metallic crunch, with heavy distortion, i prefer to use the treble position), the bass pickup is more conventional hard rockish with a fat bottom. The middle pickup position, i use to play songs like say - off he goes (rythm/lead), wishlist (rythm/lead), etc. PJ, the Vaccines, some oasis stuffs.. you get the drift right? i use the bass pickup position for playing alice in chains (sludge factory, etc.), arctic monkeys ( the song suck it and see, bakery, don't sit down cause i moved your chair, reckless serenade, pile driver waltz kinda songs sound just so f****** amazing with the neck pickup, f***). But very recently, i mostly prefer a bassy blues sound for basically PJ, coldplay, arctic monkeys softer stuffs, and some ambiental -sigur ros, mogwai, wes borland (times when you realize) stuffs for which i prefer to use the neck position, so i rarely rarely use the bridge pickup ( i used it to play- rob zombie (superbeast etc.) and those kinda stuffs), i mostly keep it in the middle position or neck position. Enough for the sound; you might agree or not, it depends on you, everybody has their preferences, but let me be clear here, until now i donot own an amp. i play through garage band with amplitube plug- in, so with a real life amp., the sound settings might vary depending on the amp, and their colouring/sound modulation. I donot exactly know how i can define the real clean clean channel, so the clean tones that i describe here are my perceptions of how they sound to me, through some standard amp modelling, with settings like say gain at 5, master at 5-7, output at 5-7, bass, treble and mids set at 5.
    I bought the guitar in Kolkata, it cost me 36k. Initially they were asking for 41k, but when i told that i have seen the price in bajaao/furtados at about 37-38k, the guy came back after sometime saying they had a special offer on the prs SE tremonti and quoted 36k ;-)
    This is my first costly electric (earlier i had played a squire strat and epiphone dot cherry) and i must say i am in love with this guitar, the looks, sound, they are just amazing for me. I would recommend this, the only thing that bugs me in the intonation settings or rather the lack of it. I did a bit of research on this. From what i gather, this wrap-over bridge is their configuration of choice, and apparently it is even used in more pricier models, and if more or less same gauge of strings are used as recomended everything should work just fine.

    Here are some more references on the review of this particular model :
    Tremonti SE Review | Paul Reed Smith | Electric Guitars | Reviews @ Ultimate-Guitar.Com

    Hope you guys find this helpful. Please comment.
     
  11. henrynh

    henrynh New Member

    It's Nickel Plated, it will go green if you continue to rest your palm on it. Wiping it of after playing each time is a good way to slow the oxidation process, but if you have really sweaty hands then I'd say it'll take about 6 months before you start noticing it turning greyish green.
    You could order the adjustable stoptail bridge but that would cost you. I haven't had intonation problems with my Soapbar yet but the Trems on the SE line, especially the SE Custom 22/Semi Hollow have poor metal screws that smear if you try to adjust them. I wonder if the pricier SE's have something made of stronger metal..
    Good Review.
     
  12. shubhamAT

    shubhamAT New Member

    I don't think so. Check out the SE Parts list on the PRS online store. These parts are same for all SEs. In some cases one may replace the SE parts with regular ones but not in all. If you look at the regular parts some of them have a note saying "For US mad models only".
     
  13. henrynh

    henrynh New Member

    Awww now that really sucks :mad::cry1::protest::badmood:
     

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