Guitar of the week #50 - ESP E-II Eclipse
This is what happens when a guitar company does a Les Paul copy correctly but at the same time makes it their own.
The ESP E-II Eclipse has pretty much has everything a Gibson Les Paul does and is a real-deal Japan import. This is not an LTD brand guitar. This is a true made-in-Japan ESP, and the price tag reflects that.
So what do you get for the cash you put down for this axe? Extra jumbo fret wire, a thin U-shape neck (with set-neck construction), Gotoh locking tuners, Gotoh bridge and tailpiece a pair of Seymour Duncan pickups (SH-1 and SH-4)... but all those goodies don't accurately describe what playing a real ESP is like.
If I were to pick one word to describe a real-deal ESP from Japan, it would be solid. Japan just knows how to build an electric very well. The E-II Eclipse will exhibit absolutely none of the typical problems a Gibson Les Paul would. The Eclipse is built to last, and moreover built to be played. This is not a guitar that's meant to sit in a case and stay pretty forever. Rather, it's meant to be played day after day, night after night and keep coming back for more.
In other words, this is one of the very few guitars with a high price tag where I can say yes, you are getting what you pay for. The Eclipse is a guitar you can depend on whether for studio or stage use or both.
In the end, if you have the money to spend on a high-end electric, you basically can't go wrong with a Japan-made ESP.
There is no such thing as an HSS guitar
You may think there is, but there isn't.
The vast majority of players out there not only identify pickups incorrectly on an electric guitar, but also identify obvious electronics incorrectly as well. But I will admit that a large part of the blame here can be pointed squarely at Fender themselves for this. More on that in a moment.
Which body side is which?
The side of the body where the neck connects is the FRONT. The bridge, given it's usually the furthest thing away from the neck pocket, is the REAR side.
When looking at the entire area of the guitar where the strings bridge are, that is the OBVERSE side of the body. If you flipped it over, you would then be looking at the REVERSE side of the body.
Is there such a thing as a "bridge" or "neck" pickup?
NO.
Now before continuing, yes I have made mention in a few articles here of "bridge" and "neck" pickups. But I've known all along that identifying a pickup bridge or neck is wrong.
Where the neck connects is the front of the guitar body, so on an electric guitar with two or more pickups, the pickup closest to the neck pocket is the FRONT PICKUP.
The pickup that is furthest away from the neck on a guitar with two or more pickups is the REAR PICKUP.
Is there such a thing as an "HSS" guitar?
NO.
This is something that can be completely blamed on Fender.
Fender has over the lifespan of the company renamed things and has totally gotten away with it even though being blatantly wrong the entire time. The classic example of this is the Stratocaster "tremolo" system. It's not tremolo. Never has been and never will be. It's a vibrato system. The tremolo effect happens with changing back and forth the volume of the sound while vibrato happens with changing back and forth the pitch of the note(s). A Strat's "tremolo" system in reality can't produce a tremolo sound effect at all. Vibrato, yes, but tremolo? Not possible.
A literal "HSS" (humbucker-single-single) pickup configuration doesn't exist and to the best of my knowledge never has. But according to Fender, yes it does.
The SSH pickup configuration is what it's supposed to be identified as. When using proper front-to-back body naming convention, the first pickup at the front of the body is a single-coil, followed by another single-coil and then finally with a dual coil (humbucker.) That's SSH and not HSS, yet Fender flipped that around backwards when naming the configuration.
5 is actually 1
Using the Stratocaster guitar again, the way Fender identifies blade selector positions is, again, wrong.
The "fifth" position on a Strat is actually first. Yes, this means "fourth" position is actually second, third remains the same and "second" is actually fourth.
Being the blade selector position closest to the front of the guitar activates the front-side pickup, and being the front is where things begin, that is why the "fifth" position is in fact the first.
"What about guitars with vertical (up/down) movement pickup toggle switches?"
Although you can call these positions front and rear, neither position points to the pickup being used, so the alternative is to call the positions rhythm and treble - which does in fact make sense.
The most well-known example of this is the Les Paul with its "poker chip" surrounding the pickup toggle switch that openly states the "up" position is rhythm (front pickup) and "down" position is treble (rear pickup).
And as I said, yes it does make sense to call these positions as such. A rhythm position has more bass in the sound and blends in a mix better as a background instrument. A treble position has less bass and literally much more treble to the sound, which is why some call it the "lead" position, as in "the lead instrument heard".
Will we ever get back to identifying pickup and pickup selection positions properly?
Unfortunately, no.
Fender has calling things wrong for so long that it's now become assumed that what Fender names things is true even when it obviously isn't. "The lie becomes the truth" actually happened with electric guitars because of the way Fender names things. Heck, they've even convinced other guitar companies to use their wrong way of naming things.
How can knowing the proper names of things on the electric guitar ultimately help you?
If you ever plan on building a guitar yourself or even just repairing one, identifying things by their proper names makes the build/repair go along a lot easier. You know exactly what front, rear, obverse and reverse means. You have a much better idea of where to wire things. A lot of confusion is eliminated.
Confusion is bad when building a guitar or performing a guitar repair. You want things to go as smoothly as possible, and the last thing you want is to potentially create problems just by calling things by their wrong names.
workout buddy: the wristwatch timer auto-repeat feature
If you do any sort of workout that involves repetitions, a.k.a. reps, you need a watch with this very specific feature.
This is kind of a follow up to my last post and the Which Casio keeps the best time? post.
Although my Casio B640WD keeps the worst time (as in worst "for a Casio," which isn't bad at all really), there is one feature it has that none of my other Casio digitals have. A countdown timer with auto-repeat feature.
On the B640WD, the timer with auto-repeat means that when the time elapses, the timer starts over again along with 10 seconds of beeps to let you know of a timer restart. And yes, you can toggle the repeat on or off, your choice.
I personally use this feature for my workouts now. What the auto-repeat timer feature allows me to do is go from exercise to rest to exercise and so on without having to stop and reset the watch. This is a very convenient feature.
Do all Casio digitals with a countdown timer have the auto-repeat feature?
No. You have to specifically seek them out. For example, my AE1200 is packed with a ton of features including a countdown timer, but without auto-repeat.
These are the models (at least for the US market) that have countdown with auto-repeat:
- B640WD (as noted above)
- AE1300
- WS220 (this is a really fancy one with timer-to-timer with 10 repeats!)
- W734 (this one can count down from 100 hours, others are limited to just 24)
- F201WA
- AQ160W and AQ160WD (this is an analog-digital model)
What about G-SHOCK models?
The classic DW5600 model has the countdown with auto-repeat. However, the super-ritzy (and super-expensive) Casio GWG1000GB G-SHOCK model does not have a timer with auto-repeat. It has everything else you could think of except that one function.
In other words, where Casio is concerned, getting that auto-repeat timer function is a mostly-digital-only thing. Not exclusively. Just mostly.
Is the auto-repeat timer good for anything else besides working out?
Yes. If you're the forgetful type that needs to be reminded to do something every X hours (you set the interval,) a watch with an auto-repeat timer is a godsend.
Which model is the best?
For men, I'd recommend either the AE1300 or the DW5600 G-SHOCK.
For ladies or for guys with really small wrists, the F201WA is the best choice. It's also the cheapest watch of all the models mentioned here. Some really like this model because it has 4 alarms with 1 snooze alarm, 10-year battery life, dual time feature, stopwatch and full time/weekday/month/day information displayed on the face all at once. It's packed with some fairly decent goodies for being so cheap.
Guitar of the week #49 - Epiphone ES-175 Premium
Some fancy digs here. Is it worth the asking price?
The Epiphone ES-175 Premium is not cheap. Some would say, "Well, it's cheap compared to a Gibson ES-175!" I don't agree with that either. When you see the price tag of the Epiphone, you'll understand what I mean.
Now before continuing, the Epiphone Casino, Epiphone Sheraton II, Epiphone Riviera and of course the Epiphone Dot are all far less in asking price compared to the ES-175.
So what makes the ES-175 Premium by Epiphone worth so much?
It basically comes down to electronics, the finish and the fact it's an ES-175.
The pickups are Gibson USA '57 Classic models, the finish is "aged" lacquer (meaning fake-aged and not true aging), and then there's the ES-175 thing. It's the same style of guitar Joe Pass, Scotty Moore and Wes Montgomery played. And yeah, that means model name alone inflates the price.
Make no mistake, however, this is a fancy dan guitar. This is an Epiphone model where "premium" truly means upscale, from the "zig-zag" trapeze tailpiece to the parallelogram inlays to the deluxe tuners and so on. You truly do get an upscale instrument for what you pay for it.
Another reason Epiphone can price the guitar high is because Gibson and Epiphone basically own a big chunk of the electric hollow body niche market. What I mean by that is when you're shopping for a hollow body, there are basically only 3 names. Gibson, Epiphone and Gretsch. Yes, there are others. But the go-to brands are those three.
On the Gretsch side of things, a similar (and cheaper) option would be the G5422TDC Electromatic. But as you will notice, the guitar has an upper mid-tier price tag. When you get into hollow body territory, prices start going up and that's just the way it is. These guitars are more difficult to build and don't sell as well as solid-body guitars do.
Is the Epiphone ES-175 Premium worth its asking price?
I have to give conditional answers on this one.
For an import hollow body, no, it's not worth it. Epiphone has other hollow body models that are almost half the price.
For the fact it is an ES-175, yes it is worth it solely for the reason it's the only model of its kind at the price it's selling for that's built like an ES-175 is supposed to be built.
I have to explain that one a bit further.
There are some guitar players out there who have been seeking out an ES-175 all their lives but have never been able to find one they could afford. These players believe the ES-175 has that sound that only an ES-175 can make (which is probably the reason the Premium has Gibson USA pickups in it.)
In the end, guys who know hollow body electrics know what the ES-175 is and what it can do. The Epiphone Premium model, even with its high price tag, does deliver the goods.
Does the DigiTech Nexus software for the RP360 really work?
It's time for some software goodness.
If you have a DigiTech RP360 like I do (the DigiTech RP360XP will also work), you can download the free Nexus software from the DigiTech web site and edit the user presets with software instead of from the unit itself.
Does it work?
If you connect it properly, yes.
The first thing I recommend is installing the Nexus software first BEFORE connecting the RP360. Why? Drivers.
Second, connect the RP360 using a direct connection, as in unit-to-computer. DO NOT use a USB hub.
Third, backup all your user presets even if you've never modified any.
Fourth, if the software states your RP360 or RP360XP needs a firmware update, do it. It will make editing presets easier. While updating the firmware, LET IT FINISH. Don't do other stuff on your computer while it's taking place.
An example of a preset I made.
I was able to get a pretty cool Zeppelin-type sound for my Squier Strat using a minimal setup.