Charvel Guthrie Govan HSH Cooked Ash

For the short attention span ones, a short review:

Charvel has made a very fine instrument with a wide tonal palette and hard to beat playability.

Still want to read more? Ok, here goes:

My starting point for acquiring a new instrument was to really find one guitar that could operate in a variety of musical styles (jazz, funk, rock, avant-garde). Owning two very different kind of guitars (Fender EJ Strat and PRS HB II) I always struggled to find the feel for the neck every time I'd switch guitars.

The specs for the Charvel GG model looked the part I was hoping to find in a jack-of-all-trades guitar: HSH pickups, vibrato, 24 fret neck. The other specs that brought added value was the ultra-stable neck (cooked and reinforced with graphite rods) as I reside in the climatically guitar unfriendly location of Scandinavia.

As a former owner of a superstrat (Ibanez Jem7v), this guitar felt instantly familiar. The playability was there from the start (the one I tried and the one I bought were both factory setup) and the 5-way mic switch offered a variety of useful and high-quality tones. Ok, you might ask yourself: "where will I need a Tele tone" (position 3)? For me the thing is not to sound like a tele per se, but to have a different kind of tonal color at my disposal should I need it (i.e. for layered parts). So basically you have your humbucker sounds in the neck and bridge position and strat-type tones in positions 2 and 4. The neck position humbucking sound is round, smooth and "buttery" even. Bridge position has more output and punch (it's also setup closer to the strings). The tone and the volume controls work like no other I've encountered before. Even at extreme settings (i.e. both volume and tone set from 1 to 3) the sound of the pickups stay quite defined compared to the guitars I've mentioned above. Bottom line is: very high quality pickups with distinct sounds, able to mimic the F-type guitars in some fashion, the controls offer huge range of extended tonal possibilities and variation.

The build quality of Charvel GG is overall immaculate. Though you would expect it from a guitar of this price range. My only gripe is with the pickup height: there's no viable way to change it. The setup is spot on but I'd prefer little less volume from the bridge pickup compared to the rest of the lot, especially on clean tones. Apart from that, locking tuners, feel of the neck, truss rod adjustment, vibrato tuning stability, tremol-no operation, neck joint, etc. all work as you would expect them to do: at a very high level.

I've owned this instrument for about 9+ months now. Some thoughts on this instrument as the only guitar to take on a gig:
-huge sound options, no need for separate single coil and humbucking guitars
-tuning stability and intonation is very reliable even with vibrato bar antics
-lightweight
-pick scratch marks and dings on the body do not jump out of the dark roasted ash finish

Sie kam trotz Expressversand von Thomann (wegen eines Schlechtwettereinbruchs) mit mehreren Tagen Verzögerung an, aber war in einwandfreiem Zustand und hatte (trotz der Kälte und tagelangen Lagerung werweißwo) die Stimmung fast perfekt gehalten. Der Klang und die Klangvariation der Pickups ist unglaublich, die Gitarre ist perfekt verarbeitet. Das Holz (übrigens auch olfaktorisch charmant) ist großartig, am Hals fühlt es sich fast weich an, aber auch der Korpus ist wirklich schön ("pretty, but not annoyingly pretty", hat Guthrie Govan in einem Video mal zu der Zwillingsgitarre gesagt - das gilt auch für die "cooked ash"). Aber die Verarbeitung der Metallteile ist genauso eindrucksvoll (insbesondere der Vibratohebel ist unglaublich sensitiv, dabei zugleich sehr stimmungsstabil - wirklich cool). Ich habe mehrere Tests gelesen und viele Videos vorher angesehen, aber das Original übertrifft sogar die sehr positiven Besprechungen. Sie ist etwas ganz Besonderes - der Klang ist sehr individuell, und die Handhabung ist sehr entgegenkommend (man merkt, dass jemand mitgearbeitet hat, der hohe praktische Anforderung stellt). Viele Details gefallen mir: die Lage der Klinkenbuchse für das Kabel (genau dahin würde ich sie auch gelegt haben), die Tuners, die Hals-Korpus-Verbindung, und eine Reihe von kleineren Punkten mehr. Ich bin kein Experte, aber tatsächlich habe ich auch bei längerem Nachdenken keinen Kritikpunkt gefunden. Das schreibt man nicht so oft im Ernst - aber hier gilt einmal wirklich: Alles gut.

Lo strumento è giunto in tempi molto celeri rispetto alle previsioni di disponibilità sul sito di Thomann e in pochissimi giorni a casa. Non c'è possibilità di poter visionare in anteprima la chitarra in quanto si perderebbe la garanzia se venisse aperto da Thomann per cui si acquista a "scatola chiusa".
I legni della chitarra sono pazzeschi, manico in acero fiammato molto roasted (acero particolarmente scuro) con venature che vanno ben oltre le mie aspettative. Anche il corpo in coocked ash è particolarmente bello. La regolazione dello strumento è impeccabile, con action particolarmente bassa, anche se non la predilogo particolarmente. La chitarra è pervenuta praticamente accordata nonostante il trasporto non bellissimo a vedere dal collo esterno del cartone, danneggiato.
La chitarra costa davvero molto ma tutto è collegato ad una qualità strepitosa nella realizzazione; oltre ai legni di altissima qualità. Segnalo che le meccaniche indicate nella descrizione non sono le Sperzel bensì le Gotoh.
Ho tutte le versioni di questo modello (sia quella con top in acero sia la versione giapponese); questa per legni e regolazione è sicuramente la migliore. Consiglio l'acquisto al 100%