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All right, as promised, here is my evaluation of the JJP I recently acquired from Brad (YetAnotherOne).
First of all, this thing is one of the loudest guitars I've ever heard unplugged. You would almost think that it's a semi-hollow body or something. It's got a bit more twang than I would have expected from a short scale guitar. It's almost Strat twangy.
Plugged in, it took me a little bit of fooling around with my amp settings to find something I really liked. My amp is used to Duncan Distortions and the DiMarzio Super Distortion in the JJP has a different character. Once I dialed in "my sound" I played for a while. I can sum up the tone of this guitar in one word, "crisp." The notes are articulate and clear, even under heavy gain. Harmonics are not quite as readily available as on some of my other guitars, but they are there. They just take a little bit more work to get them to ring out as loud (I use a lot of Zakk Wylde type artificial harmonics). This guitar is perfectly suited for hard rock riffs a la AC/DC and bands of the like. Solos are snappy and cut through like a motherfucker. I'm used to soloing with the neck pickup to get a good smooth shred type lead sound. This is a good change of pace. When I sit in with my school instructor's band next time, I'll be taking this guitar (they play a lot of classic rock).
Playability: once set up the way I like, this guitar is practically effortless to play. The frets are smaller than on my Charvels, but pretty much the same as on my Hamers, so it was familiar. Next time I restring, I'm going to polish the frets, though. Just to get a couple of rough spots out of them. I was a little worried about the combination bolt on/single cut construction as far as upper fret access was concerned. Let me tell you, it is not a problem. I can get up to the 22nd fret without running into any trouble at all. The neck is just about the perfect size for my hands and I really like the back shape. The matte finish is amazing on the neck. There's no way it'll get sticky when sweating due to lengthy playing.
My final verdict, I'm glad that I had a lot to drink the night I told Brad I would buy this guitar. It just goes to show you that beer does allow you to make good decisions. Ahem, ladies.......??? It won't be my number one shred guitar, but it will get a lot of use when hard rock is my mood of choice.
First of all, this thing is one of the loudest guitars I've ever heard unplugged. You would almost think that it's a semi-hollow body or something. It's got a bit more twang than I would have expected from a short scale guitar. It's almost Strat twangy.
Plugged in, it took me a little bit of fooling around with my amp settings to find something I really liked. My amp is used to Duncan Distortions and the DiMarzio Super Distortion in the JJP has a different character. Once I dialed in "my sound" I played for a while. I can sum up the tone of this guitar in one word, "crisp." The notes are articulate and clear, even under heavy gain. Harmonics are not quite as readily available as on some of my other guitars, but they are there. They just take a little bit more work to get them to ring out as loud (I use a lot of Zakk Wylde type artificial harmonics). This guitar is perfectly suited for hard rock riffs a la AC/DC and bands of the like. Solos are snappy and cut through like a motherfucker. I'm used to soloing with the neck pickup to get a good smooth shred type lead sound. This is a good change of pace. When I sit in with my school instructor's band next time, I'll be taking this guitar (they play a lot of classic rock).
Playability: once set up the way I like, this guitar is practically effortless to play. The frets are smaller than on my Charvels, but pretty much the same as on my Hamers, so it was familiar. Next time I restring, I'm going to polish the frets, though. Just to get a couple of rough spots out of them. I was a little worried about the combination bolt on/single cut construction as far as upper fret access was concerned. Let me tell you, it is not a problem. I can get up to the 22nd fret without running into any trouble at all. The neck is just about the perfect size for my hands and I really like the back shape. The matte finish is amazing on the neck. There's no way it'll get sticky when sweating due to lengthy playing.
My final verdict, I'm glad that I had a lot to drink the night I told Brad I would buy this guitar. It just goes to show you that beer does allow you to make good decisions. Ahem, ladies.......??? It won't be my number one shred guitar, but it will get a lot of use when hard rock is my mood of choice.
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