Guitar of the week #54 - Reverend Sensei

I consider this one of the better offerings from Reverend just because it doesn't look dopey.

And what is a dopey looking Reverend? The Jetstream model. Everything looks good until you get to that headstock on that particular guitar, and it's all downhill from there.

The Sensei model however, seen above, looks way better. And it costs less.

The particular model above is a Sensei RA FM, and it's actually specifically designed for rock and metal players, although it could suit any music style.

Outfitted for this particular guitar are Railhammer pickups where you have rails under the wound strings and poles under the plain strings. This actually does make sense, because wound strings vibrate "off the pole" more often, and since there are rails for the wound area, you get more sound out of the string. At the same time, the plain/unwound strings keep their poles for the best possible clarity.

Typical to every Reverend (as far as I know) is a bass contour knob. It's a way of adjusting the overall voice of the sound via a passive bass roll-off. This does help out when switching from amp to direct plug-in and back again, as you can adjust the bass "kick" for whatever you're plugging in to.

Other quick specs: 24.75-inch scale (like a Les Paul,) 12-inch radius fingerboard (again, like a Les Paul,) medium oval neck shape (like a Fender,) 22 medium jumbo frets.

Not exactly like a Les Paul, not exactly like a Fender, but borrows from both, while at the same time having electronics goodies that make it truly a Reverend original feel and sound.

Is the Reverend worth its price? That's up to you, but you do get a lot of guitar for the money. Reverend builds guitars right, no question about that.

Published 2016 Apr 20