2.25.2010

Review of Indie Guitars From Rock House GEAR 411

Not sure what to buy, that piece of gear not working, trouble with your amp, want to sound like an expert in your local music store? Let Dr. Tony, Rock House’s resident expert on the topic help you.Check out the rest of Tony Pasko's articles at GEAR 411 at The Rock House.

Hey everyone I’m back from the NAMM show in California and I have to tell you about a new guitar company that is making some very cool guitars for not a whole lot of money. You might remember me telling you about these guys at the last summer NAMM, well since then they sent me a very cool guitar to review, and I can’t wait to show you.

It’s the ISG Extreme from Indie Guitars. The guitar showed up in a very nice hard-shell case and supports a translucent black finish with chrome hardware. The guitar is well balanced and not neck heavy like some other guitars with this shape. The neck has a nice “C” shape to it and should be very comfortable for most guitarists.

The fret work is very clean and the set-up was good right out of the case. This guitar came with D’Addario strings and it tuned right up. The tuners are smooth and I didn’t notice any slipping of the strings and the intonation was dead on. The pick-ups were adjusted properly and allowed the correct amount of space under the strings.

The reason I bring this up is that the set-up of the guitar is very important in how a guitar is built and assembled. If the company spends a good amount of time setting up their instruments then there is a good chance that it’s made well. As consumers we should expect to get the most out of every dollar we spend no matter the price, and I can tell you that they are offering one hell of a deal with the ISG Extreme. This guitar retails for: $949.99 and streets for: $749.99 this is a very good deal.

Indie added a couple of features that I feel are very cool and different from anything in this price range. First they added the Maple veneer top a very cool upgrade that made the guitar a little brighter than an all Mahogany body would. Second they added an active pre-amp so you can switch from active electronics to passive. This alone makes the guitar twice as versatile for any style of music.

The other thing I wanted to mention about the ISG Extreme is that the pitch of the neck is like the old SGs. This might seem like a small thing to mention but to us players it’s huge. The old SGs had a straighter neck pitch, different from the Les Paul. Gibson changed this spec on the SGs so they all were the same. The problem with this is that the tailpiece on a new SG sits very high off the body and so does the bridge pick-up. This makes the guitar thinner sounding with less sustain. Not very characteristic of an SG; Gibson does fix this however with their reissue models etc… But those guitars are in a completely different price range.

The stock DV8 pick-ups sound full and are a bit hotter than PAF style Humbuckers and the active electronics gives you tone from the metal gods... You can split the coils and have some fun with single-coil sounds; again I said this guitar is versatile…

If you are in the market for a classic styled guitar but want to make sure every dollar you spend is worth it? Then buy the Indie ISG Extreme. This guitar comes with “No buyer’s remorse”; in fact you’ll wonder how they were able to give you so much for so little.

Check them out at: www.indieguitars.com
Retail: $949.99

Features
  • Body: Solid Mahogany/ Quilted Maple Top
  • Neck: Mahogany Set Neck
  • Fingerboard: : Rosewood , 22 Fret, Scale: Length 24.3/4”
  • Headstock: Black, w/ Grover Machine Heads
  • Hardware: Chrome, Tune-O-Matic Stop tail
  • Pickups: Neck Active DV8, Bridge Active DV8
  • Controls: 2 Volume, 2 Tone, 3 Way Toggle Switch 1 Passive Switch 1 Coil-Tap Switch
  • Truss Rod: 2-Way Dual Action
  • Finish: Black Flamed Top
Cheers,

Tony J. Pasko

No comments: