Ernie Ball/Music Man 20th Anniversary Silhouette

BACK IN 1990, Keith Richards said that the Ernie Ball/Music Man Silhouette guitar "has the opportunity to become like the Stratocaster or Telecaster or Les Paul, one of the classic electric guitars." This compliment, made long before Keith fell out of a coconut tree and underwent brain surgery (although his sanity has always been suspect), helped the Silhouette earn attention that it truly deserved.

Introduced 20 years ago, the Silhouette was the first solidbody guitar in the Ernie Ball/Music Man line, which now includes the Axis (formerly known as the Edward Van Halen model) and Albert Lee, Steve Lukather, Steve Morse and John Petrucci signature models. While the Silhouette may not be as popular as the Strat, Tele or Les Paul, it certainly has achieved status as a cult classic amongst in-the-know guitarists who have made it a success over the past two decades. The new 20th Anniversary Silhouette celebrates this model's unique appeal, while offering its fans something a little bit different.

FEATURES
Music Man has made a few minor changes to the Silhouette over the years, including several features that were introduced with the Silhouette Special in 1995. The 20th Anniversary Silhouette offers a handful of significant design differences, while it remains faithful to the original model's overall vibe. Unlike previous models, which featured a top-routed alder body with electronics mounted to a pickguard, the 20th Anniversary has rear-mounted electronics and boasts an alder body topped with an attractive slab of book-matched flame or quilted maple with a three-ply veneer layered in-between. In the center of the body, beneath the pickups, is a mahogany tone block, a unique feature found only on this model. It gives the guitar a tone similar to a mahogany-bodied set-neck guitar, without the added weight.

The pickups are two custom DiMarzio humbuckers instead of the stock humbucking/ single-coil/humbucking configuration of the standard Silhouette, and a three-position pickup selector replaces the five-position switch. However, the features that made the Silhouette stand out from the crowd are still there, including the distinctive 4+2 headstock, compact and lightweight body design and 24-fret neck. The body and neck joint are contoured for playing comfort, although the cutaway horns are flatter and not quite as sculpted as on the regular Silhouette and Silhouette Special. The neck is attached to the body with five bolts to ensure perfect alignment and steadfastness, no matter how much you abuse the guitar while playing.

One other significant new feature is a patented compensated nut that features several notches on its fretboard side, rather than on the overhanging "shelf," as on the conceptually similar Buzz Feiten tuning system. The guitar I received for examination was expertly set up, and the intonation was dead-on perfect.

PERFORMANCE
With its two humbuckers and maple top, the 20th Anniversary Silhouette is like a hybrid of the classic Silhouette and Axis. The guitar delivers lively and loud tone even before it's plugged in, and the maple/alder/mahogany combination and 25 1/2-inch scale produce nice, bright treble, fat-and-warm midrange and punchy, dynamic low end. Because of the 24- fret neck, the two humbuckers are positioned relatively close together, which means that the neck pickup doesn't sound quite as mellow and round as a Les Paul's neck pickup. The DiMarzios offer a good balance of hot output and clarity, with just enough guts to give your amp a good workout while they clean up to an acoustic-like shimmer when you back down the volume control.

My test guitar included the optional Music Man vintage tremolo, a nonlocking system with bent hardened steel saddles. The strings are anchored in a solid brass block, which enhances the guitar's sustain and inherently bright, lively tone. The tremolo stays in tune very well for a vintage-style setup, and even extreme dive bombs didn't knock the strings out of tune.

Ernie Ball/Music Man guitars are renowned for their outstanding craftsmanship, materials and playability, and the 20th Anniversary Silhouette is no exception. The neck has a slim, rounded profile and an almost raw-wood feel: instead of a polyester finish, the neck is treated with gunstock oil and hand-rubbed wax. While I typically prefer necks with traditional finishes, I found the results remarkably comfortable.

THE BOTTOM LINE
Keith Richards got it right when he called the Silhouette a classic. After 20 years, this model still impresses. If you're looking for a guitar with vintage appeal and tone but with modern playability and performance, the Silhouette aims to please.

LIST PRICE: $2,500.00
MANUFACTURER: Ernie Ball/Music Man
PRO: Compact size, 24-fret neck, compensated nut, bright and lively tone
CON: Neck humbucker not especially mellow sounding

Jackson Pro Series "Dominion" Mark Morton Signature Guitar

LAMB OF GOD'S Mark Morton is known as a monster guitar player. His precise rhythm strokes, rapid-fire riffs and deft incorporation of unconventional chords fuel the band's harmonious hardcore assault.

But what most don't know is that Morton is also a player of blues and country when he's off the road from touring (see "Metal Edge" sidebar). So when he sat down with Jackson to discuss the creation of a signature guitar, versatility was chief among his design goals. The result of that collaboration is the Jackson Pro Series "Dominion," a short-scale guitar based on Jackson's award-winning Swee-tone design, with distinctive classic looks and very modern features.

FEATURES
If you didn’t know anything about Lamb of God, the Dominion's spec sheet might lead you to believe Morton is a jazz-fusion or blues specialist. The guitar is entirely built around the goal of maximizing resonance and volume, without affecting tonal stability. This is largely accomplished through the mahogany body's tuned tone chambers, which help to keep the tone open and clear, even with the harshest distortion. A real quilted maple cap tops the partially hollow body and adds to the guitar's clean note definition.

Jackson created a chunky, vintage feel for the Dominion's 24 3/4-inch-scale mahogany neck. Graphite rods add stability to the neck-through construction, and the strings are anchored on locking Sperzel tuners. The heavy ebony fingerboard has a compound radius, which makes chords comfortable to grip in the low positions and technical artistry easier as you move up the neck. I also like that the 22 frets are side filled, making it unlikely that they will ever present a sharp edge. Extra eye candy includes an inlaid Jackson headstock logo, pearloid tuner buttons and shark's eye abalone and pearl inlays.

Although most metal players load their guitars with high-output pickups, a set of sweet Seymour Duncan 59s maintain this guitar's modern-vintage vibe. Miniature switches on the guitar tap each pickup, so that players can turn the PAF-inspired 59s into smoky single-coils, and each pickup has its own volume and tone control.

PERFORMANCE
The Seymour Duncan pickups delivered the Dominion's delightful tones to my Mesa Rectifier without overemphasis or harmonic exaggeration. Highs were full, harmonics punched out of the guitar with the same strength as fretted notes, and the bass was free of mud. The guitar's dynamic abilities and round tone were especially prominent beyond the 12th fret. But this wasn't just a grand instrument through a wall of distortion. Tapping the pickups tamed the output sufficiently to give the guitar a beautiful and raunchy Keith Richards-style crunch through my Fender Vibro-King and Mesa Lone Star. Once I dialed in my amps' best clean settings, I was also extremely impressed by the Dominion's ability to create thick country and blues tones.

THE BOTTOM LINE
Metal-playing aside, the Jackson Dominion Mark Morton signature guitar is a fantastic instrument. It's acoustically powerful, extremely versatile and sounds as good through a Rectifier stack as through a blackface combo.

LIST PRICE: Transparent color (as tested), $1,857.13; satin black, $1,642.84
MANUFACTURER: Jackson Guitars, Inc.
PRO: Great for any style, clear tones, chambered body
CON: No tremolo
ORIGIN: Japan
BODY: Chambered mahogany with quilt maple top
NECK: Neck-through mahogany with pultruded graphite rods for stability
FINGERBOARD: Ebony with 12-to-16-inch compound radius
FRETS: 22 jumbo frets
HARDWARE: Chrome
CONTROLS: Two Volume, Two Tone for neck and bridge pickups; coil-tap switches
BRIDGE: Schaller 456 fully adjustable bridge and anchored tailpiece
PICKUPS: Seymour Duncan '59 Humbucking
ADDITIONAL FEATURES: Shark-eye block position inlays, mother-of-pearl "Jackson" headstock inlay, knurled chrome control knobs

Paul Reed Smith 513 Rosewood electric guitar

PAUL REED SMITH seems to have a keen awareness of what's missing in the guitar industry. For instance, in the early Eighties, he recognized that there were basically two kinds of players: those that played Gibsons and those that played Fenders. What was missing was a high-end guitar that offered something to both camps. Smith's original Custom model guitar filled that niche neatly as a classic hybrid of the Fender Stratocaster and Gibson Les Paul.

His latest epiphany is about tonal versatility. Smith observed that, while many engineers are using digital technology and complex processors to create new sounds for the electric guitar, few manufacturers are concentrating on getting more sounds out of the guitar itself.

Enter the new PRS 513 Rosewood electric guitar with five single-coil pickups that, together, offer 13 switchable configurations (hence the 513 model designation). But PRS didn't just drop this new pickup system into an existing guitar design; the 513 also features a brand-new neck shape, incomparable materials and several aesthetic innovations.

FEATURES

THE 513 ROSEWOOD is built around one of the most spectacular necks in the business. It's cut from rare Brazilian rosewood and only sealed with a light coat of linseed oil. For those unfamiliar with this wood, a fine piece of hand-selected Brazilian rosewood is more than just an outstanding looking slab of timber: it resonates with unparalleled warmth and clarity, smells fantastic and feels like the well-worn stock of a generations-old English shotgun.

The 513's neck shape is actually a brand-new profile for PRS and every bit as exciting as the pickups. It's fat and round, but not wide. If you are familiar with PRS's neck carves, this shape is somewhere between that of a PRS Standard and a Santana. Playability is exceptional, and notes are easy to access. Plus, with the palm of your hand always full of rosewood, fatigue is nonexistent even over the long term.

The 513's neck joint is one unique aspect of its design. Because the pickups require especially deep cavities, PRS was unable to extend the neck under the pickups, as on its other set-neck guitars. On the 513 Rosewood, the mahogany body actually extends under the neck's heel to provide the necessary support.

Flawless fretwork added to the 513's playability, and the quarter-sawn Brazilian rosewood fretboard displayed attractive organic swirls of chocolate-brown grain. While I prefer the original PRS bird inlays, the 513's almost impressionistic mother-of-pearl birds are distinctive and beautifully rendered. Other artistic touches include an abalone-inlaid signature on the headstock, a truss rod cover inlaid with the 513 logo, scalloped amber/black bonnet knobs and a scalloped nut. A flamed maple "10 Top" cap is standard on the 513 Rosewood, as is the select mahogany body.

PICKUP SYSTEM

THE 513'S INGENIOUS passive pickup system consists of five proprietary single-coil pickups, a five-way pickup switch, a three-way mode blade switch and a very complex internal circuit board. Choosing from among the 13 pickup possibilities is rather intuitive. Using the five-way switch, located below the volume and tone knobs, you select pickup positions just as you would on most other guitars: the first notch activates the bridge-position pickup, the second selects the bridge and middle positions together, the third chooses the middle position alone, and so forth.

The blade switch, meanwhile, lets you choose from three pickup modes: Heavy Humbucking, Clear Humbucking and Single Coil. In Heavy Humbucking mode, side-by-side single coils are fused to create a hot humbucking tone. Clear Humbucking mode reduces the humbucker's output to simulate a tapped humbucking tone, while in Single Coil mode, only one side-by-side coil is active.

PERFORMANCE

BEFORE YOU QUESTION the price of a 513 Rosewood, you need to hear its acoustic tone. I don't know whether it's the craftsmanship or the synergy of the wood and metal components, but this guitar rang like a church bell and sang with the deep warmth of a cello. Overtones of one note continued to emanate from the guitar even after another note was struck, particularly in the upper registers. This wasn't a sibilant phenomenon; it was more like the airy resonance of a pipe organ sustained in a cathedral's dome.

The pickups' medium output and neutral voice allowed the 513's beautiful natural tone to translate extremely well through my Victoria and Mesa amplifiers. The tones were bold, warm and full bodied, with a firm foundation of ever-present midrange. Especially worthy of praise were the Clear Humbucker tones. Using either one humbucker or a combination of a humbucker and the middle single-coil yielded a hollow woody tone that can only be created by a stringed instrument of superior quality. The pickups were extremely quiet and controllable through high-gain channels as well, but I felt that the guitar's dynamic and smooth character lent it more to classic rock, jazz, country or blues applications.

THE BOTTOM LINE

VERY FEW PLAYERS can afford an instrument like the 513 Rosewood, but if you're one of the lucky few that can pony up the bucks, the PRS 513's fresh Brazilian rosewood neck shape and custom pickup system will reward you with a lifetime of glorious tone, unmatched versatility and pride of ownership.