NGD: One guitar to rule them all

[James]

I'm having a bit of a gear cabinet reshuffle , trying to get rid of a bunch of stuff and simplify. Guitar-wise I'm planning on dropping to a 6 string acoustic and a 6 string electric. The acoustic I already have but I wasn't really sure what I was aiming for other than something versatile. Read through a ton of forum posts and saw a few themes. HSS strat, PRS, maybe a Les Paul, even read through The Gear Page bluez lawyers saying the only answer was there limited edition, hand crafted $10k strat or early 60s Les Paul.

Eventually got it down to a criteria of

• Bridge humbucker

• Neck single coil

• Middle single would be nice but not essential

• Able to do the jingly janglies and the chugga chuggas

• Trem also nice but not essential

• Ideally somewhat similar stylings to something else I have (being unncessarily fancy here, just aesthetics)

• Top end of £500

Came across this and threw a just higher than low ball offer to the seller. A 3 hour round trip, a new set of strings and we have a winner that ticks all the boxes.

► Show Spoiler

If you would have told me 10 years ago that I'd sell get rid of all my guitars except an acoustic and buy a PRS I wouldn't have believed you on either count. It's absolutely lovely though. Neck and bridge pickups sound great. I have an old JB in the parts bo (49mm spacing, whereas this is 52mm though I'm not sure that really matters that much) that I'm tempted to put in and try out but for now will leave as is. It's from about 2005, will do a serial number check later on. Now of course they have the John Mayer Silver Sky and the NF3 which has 3 minihumbuckers with a character closer to a P90. Neither of those quite ticked the box in the same way.

Really like how it is a nice match for the Guild bass. Lot of similarities between the 2 with both set neck, mahogany body and neck and of course aesthetically very similar. Both also a bit of an outlier in otherwise very well known brands.

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[Nick]

PRS has the most unfortunate headstock shape. It does look great with the Guild bass and the all black is always badass.

I feel I'm past the point of no return for gear hoarding, always a bit jealous of anyone who can get down to one electric.

[plopswagon]

Guitargomy.

[Freddy V-C]

I really wasn’t sold until I scrolled down far enough to see it next to the Guild bass, they really are quite a pair and somehow compliment each other so well.

How is it weight-wise? An old flatmate of mine played a PRS as his main instrument and I remember it weighed an absolute ton, bearing in mind this was circa ~2012 at which point I essentially didn’t care at all about guitar weight (now I very much do care), it really must have been a hefty bugger.

Annoyingly I think if I ever thinned the herd down to one electric it would be the Ibanez ICX, which I essentially bought as a joke, but it just sounds so incredible. Every time I gig with any other guitar these days I end up switching back after one show because nothing else quite cuts it. I actively don’t want it to be my number one, and yet… lol.

[James]

Roughly 3.6kg/8lbs

I don't have much reference to that but a google suggests it's typical Strat weight and a couple of lb lighter than a typical Les Paul.

I've always loved the Iceman. Absolute class looking guitar. Embrace it (though not too intimately, that lower horn is a bit sharp).

[Freddy V-C]

Don't get me wrong, I do like the Iceman! I just wish my other guitars could get more of a look-in, it's daft how much more solid it is for live shows.

[MattK]

Does the thread title indicate you’re planning to cast it into the fires of Mt Doom?
Nicest looking PRS I’ve ever seen - glad it’s ticking all the boxes for you!

[sunshiner]

Looks dapper