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Today I went to this Belgian shop that I discovered purely by accident last week when making a wrong turn on the way to a party. This shop looked like a fun little shop to visit from what I could see from my headlights shining into the darkness. In short I was bound to return there when the opportunity would present itself and today was the day.
When I walked in i was delighted to learn that they carried Eastwood guitars, which had attracted my attention from the moment they first appeared. So I got my hands on a Sunburst specimen of their Non-reverse Firebird (Why do they call that a "Non-reverse" when it's actually the normal Firebird shaped reversed?) renamed the Stormbird.
And here's my review.
Overall feel
The guitar is a big wide and fat affair, which suits me fine being a player who uses explorers as his main stage guitars so I felt at home with that. The overall weight of the Stormbird was medium, not as heavy as a good Les Paul. Bulk, however, was plentiful in the neck, this certainly is no neck for people with small hands, it feels like a good size baseball bat and the Jumbo frets added to that feel of having a big guitar in your hands. Comfort issues weren't really that much of a hassle, it does feel neck heavy when played sitting down (I didn't strap it on) but with the long headstock with the cast-sealed tuners that shouldn't have come as a surprise. The guitar was set up with a set of 009 strings which clearly couldn't bring out the best this guitar can offer and frankly for me they feel like rubberbands.
Nooks and crannies
The fret ends of this guitar were worked out well, no razorsharp ends sticking out to slash your fingers. But the finish on the neck covering the sides of the fingerboard could benifit from more eye to detail. The edges were rough and charred, they were buffed to a shine but you could still feel them. Equally rough was the pickguard, there wasn't one straight and neat routing to be found and the edging was hobbly and crude. The P90 pickups looked rather cheap (more about them later). And frankly I thought that the sunburst looked a little too yellow for my taste. Kudos however on the hardware, the pots feel sturdy and solid, the bridge and tailpiece are two big hunking pieces of hardware and there's nothing wrong with cast sealed tuners.
Riders on the Storm
I love the big fat neck, it just feels like you're holding a quality piece of wood in your hands. Bending strings of course with a Gibson scale length is a breeze. (although with the flimsy 009 set, it's easy to go overboard with this)
For the righthand, the Gotoh bridge is a comfortable resting point, no high up saddels piercing your skin here. Apart from the neck dive I mentioned earlier, it's a comfortable instrument to play.
Songs of the bird
I plugged the Stormbird in to a Marshall valvestate Halfstack and let loose. Clean, the bridge pickup sounded like it needed a plasma transfusion and it needed it QUICKLY. The Bridge pickup sounded shrill and had a noticably less output than the neck pickup. That neck pickup however was a real winner, seldom have I heard a P90 sound so sweet and blooming. I could do a very convincing Jazzbox impersionation on it. When combined, the two pickups also made for a very sweet sounding guitar. Okay, time for the dirty channel.
As soon as I pushed in the channel selector I reached for the volume control to turn it down because the bridge pickup just began to screech like a Pig about to be slaughtered and it wasn't even on moderate gain levels, fickling about with the controls on both the guitar and on the amp helped but not much. The neck pickup however was a delight, I could do those Dave Murray (Iron maiden player who favors the neck pickup for his solos) leads or turn down the gain and do Clapton's woman tone, this is how a P90 in the neck position of a guitar should sound.
To buy or not to buy?
To be honest I'm a bit torn about this guitar, it has a GREAT neck, it has an absolutley wonderful sounding neck pickup, it looks great and it plays like butter. But on the other hand you have this rather crudly routed pickguard, the too yellow looking sunburst, cheap looking plastic parts and a horrible Bridge pickup. I can't say if all Eastwood Stormbirds are like this but this particullar example didn't really leave me with a sense of awe. As a luthier and a repairman I can easily adress such issues but I'm not really that sure if a guitar in this price range will be worth it. Never the less, I love the way the Non-reverse Firebird looks and I'm glad that eastwood have brought the look of that guitar closer for my to obtain without my having to spend thousands of bucks on an original.
I asked the guy if he could order me one in white. "No problem" he said "But it'll take around eight weeks to arrive"
Would be a nice addition to my white strat I recon.
but in the end I'm still not quite convinced that I should get myself one.
When I walked in i was delighted to learn that they carried Eastwood guitars, which had attracted my attention from the moment they first appeared. So I got my hands on a Sunburst specimen of their Non-reverse Firebird (Why do they call that a "Non-reverse" when it's actually the normal Firebird shaped reversed?) renamed the Stormbird.
And here's my review.
Overall feel
The guitar is a big wide and fat affair, which suits me fine being a player who uses explorers as his main stage guitars so I felt at home with that. The overall weight of the Stormbird was medium, not as heavy as a good Les Paul. Bulk, however, was plentiful in the neck, this certainly is no neck for people with small hands, it feels like a good size baseball bat and the Jumbo frets added to that feel of having a big guitar in your hands. Comfort issues weren't really that much of a hassle, it does feel neck heavy when played sitting down (I didn't strap it on) but with the long headstock with the cast-sealed tuners that shouldn't have come as a surprise. The guitar was set up with a set of 009 strings which clearly couldn't bring out the best this guitar can offer and frankly for me they feel like rubberbands.
Nooks and crannies
The fret ends of this guitar were worked out well, no razorsharp ends sticking out to slash your fingers. But the finish on the neck covering the sides of the fingerboard could benifit from more eye to detail. The edges were rough and charred, they were buffed to a shine but you could still feel them. Equally rough was the pickguard, there wasn't one straight and neat routing to be found and the edging was hobbly and crude. The P90 pickups looked rather cheap (more about them later). And frankly I thought that the sunburst looked a little too yellow for my taste. Kudos however on the hardware, the pots feel sturdy and solid, the bridge and tailpiece are two big hunking pieces of hardware and there's nothing wrong with cast sealed tuners.
Riders on the Storm
I love the big fat neck, it just feels like you're holding a quality piece of wood in your hands. Bending strings of course with a Gibson scale length is a breeze. (although with the flimsy 009 set, it's easy to go overboard with this)
For the righthand, the Gotoh bridge is a comfortable resting point, no high up saddels piercing your skin here. Apart from the neck dive I mentioned earlier, it's a comfortable instrument to play.
Songs of the bird
I plugged the Stormbird in to a Marshall valvestate Halfstack and let loose. Clean, the bridge pickup sounded like it needed a plasma transfusion and it needed it QUICKLY. The Bridge pickup sounded shrill and had a noticably less output than the neck pickup. That neck pickup however was a real winner, seldom have I heard a P90 sound so sweet and blooming. I could do a very convincing Jazzbox impersionation on it. When combined, the two pickups also made for a very sweet sounding guitar. Okay, time for the dirty channel.
As soon as I pushed in the channel selector I reached for the volume control to turn it down because the bridge pickup just began to screech like a Pig about to be slaughtered and it wasn't even on moderate gain levels, fickling about with the controls on both the guitar and on the amp helped but not much. The neck pickup however was a delight, I could do those Dave Murray (Iron maiden player who favors the neck pickup for his solos) leads or turn down the gain and do Clapton's woman tone, this is how a P90 in the neck position of a guitar should sound.
To buy or not to buy?
To be honest I'm a bit torn about this guitar, it has a GREAT neck, it has an absolutley wonderful sounding neck pickup, it looks great and it plays like butter. But on the other hand you have this rather crudly routed pickguard, the too yellow looking sunburst, cheap looking plastic parts and a horrible Bridge pickup. I can't say if all Eastwood Stormbirds are like this but this particullar example didn't really leave me with a sense of awe. As a luthier and a repairman I can easily adress such issues but I'm not really that sure if a guitar in this price range will be worth it. Never the less, I love the way the Non-reverse Firebird looks and I'm glad that eastwood have brought the look of that guitar closer for my to obtain without my having to spend thousands of bucks on an original.
I asked the guy if he could order me one in white. "No problem" he said "But it'll take around eight weeks to arrive"
Would be a nice addition to my white strat I recon.
but in the end I'm still not quite convinced that I should get myself one.
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