Quality beats price
Two days ago I received an Ibanez AR 420 VLS guitar. I am familiar with the guitars of this company, because I own an Ibanez AM 93 semi-acoustic guitar with similar pickups.
The guitar met my expectations. Although made in China, its quality is better than my 2019 Gibson LP Standard at € 2,700 made in the USA.
The look is amazing. I tried hard to find at least some flaws and this is all I found:
1.The neck is heavier than the body - when playing while standing, the neck outweighs, which creates a little discomfort. When playing while sitting, there is no problem.
2. The three-position switch is close to the neck pickup and when playing actively I sometimes hit it with my right hand;
3. The potentiometers knobs are not at the same height from the guitar body. The gap is 1 to 5 mm.
4. Everything that is painted in gold color (bridge, pickups, tuners) has a different shade of color saturation.
But all these disadvantages are minor, given the price of the guitar.
Now about the obvious advantages of this guitar:
1. Very high quality of manufacturing;
2. Convenient neck with easy access to the topmost frets;
3. Decent sound.
Before buying this guitar, I didn’t know what a parallel humbucker would sound like and expected a completely new sound from it. However, I feel it is the same tone as the middle Tri-Sound switch when single coil is on, but with less treble.
While purchasing this model of guitar, I haven’t found a suitable case for it. The body of the guitar is 1.5 cm wider than a regular Gibson LP, so it is difficult to fit into a Gibson case, and it takes a little effort to close the lid.
There is only one negative moment in this whole story. The guitar was packed in two cardboard boxes. Upon receipt at the post office, the outer box was torn, and the inner box was badly dented, as a result of which the plastic handle of the three-position switch was broken. It would be nice for Thomann to pack more securely when sending parcels outside the EU.
Summarizing everything, I would like to say that I am very pleased with the purchase and recommend this guitar model.
