Ibanez 2014 NAMM Thread

[CloudAC]

>2014
>stock EMGs

oh come on, Ibanez...

People complain when Ibanez put in their stock pick ups.

People complain when they put in higher quality pups like EMG... this forum is unbelievable sometimes... Take out the pickups and sell them, use the money to install the pick ups of your choice!

>win

 

[s4tch]

It may come as a surprise, but a lot of us still like EMGs.

I know, shocking, huh?

EMGs are still one of the finest pickups for traditional metal. Also, my tech showed me some rusty, unusable passives in some of his touring guitars: you just can't avoid humidity in some clubs, and that slowly kills passive pickups. That can't happen to EMGs as they have a closed structure, so they last forever in touring guitars. A very reliable choice. And when I hear people moaning like 'EMGs sound $h!t OMG', I go to youtube, start an Andy James vid, and smile...

IMHO Ibanez made a smart move by putting EMGs in some Iron Label guitars.

 

[Clydefrog]

That Orange 7 is not coming here. It will be available in 3 other finishes that are cool though. There is a different model that will have the Orange however.

Will they have matching headstocks, or a mismatched black headstock? It's a minor complaint, but it is a total dealbreaker for me, which is why I loved the orange so much.

 

[morethan6]

EMGs are still one of the finest pickups for traditional metal. Also, my tech showed me some rusty, unusable passives in some of his touring guitars: you just can't avoid humidity in some clubs, and that slowly kills passive pickups. That can't happen to EMGs as they have a closed structure, so they last forever in touring guitars. A very reliable choice. And when I hear people moaning like 'EMGs sound $h!t OMG', I go to youtube, start an Andy James vid, and smile...

IMHO Ibanez made a smart move by putting EMGs in some Iron Label guitars.

You know what, I just picked up a used MTM2 which had been fitted with EMG81 pups and it absolutely SLAYS. I was expecting to swap for BKPs but I seriously might not bother. Maybe the mahogany body helps, I've always had them in basswood before.

Either way, I got the guitar for £200 so I am on happy bunny right now.

 

[OmegaSlayer]

You know what...I'm not a big tech guy, I play for my pleasure and don't bother much about the sound etc... but from what I see around it's "kewl" to hate on the EMGs.
I reckon there might be active/passive preferences, brand preferences, whatever, but it's silly to treat EMG as turds.

 

[LordHar]

I'm curious about the 9-string specs.

 

[Given To Fly]

You know what...I'm not a big tech guy, I play for my pleasure and don't bother much about the sound etc... but from what I see around it's "kewl" to hate on the EMGs.
I reckon there might be active/passive preferences, brand preferences, whatever, but it's silly to treat EMG as turds.

To summarize, EMG's lack anything resembling dynamics and are WAY over compressed to be even remotely useable. On the other hand an EVH 5150 III with a compressor/boost/noise gate has a wide dynamic range without all that horrible compression, allowing players to bring out the subtly and nuance of the instrument. .......

In all seriousness, I think the EMG 808x is the best pickup I've ever owned and would like to see them in an Ibanez production model. For some reason the X Series seem to be limited to the aftermarket though.
It was also mentioned that no matter what Ibanez does people will always complain; yep...thats the way it goes. But if you take a step back, have you noticed that most of these new models are designs that this forum has been begging for? Baritones, ebony fretboards, 9 string guitars, its all there! The Ibanez theme of 2014 seems to be "we listened to what you wanted, and we built it."

 

[OmegaSlayer]

...
It was also mentioned that no matter what Ibanez does people will always complain; yep...thats the way it goes. ...

Though it's also worth of note that people expect a lot from the brands you can rely on, and from the brands you expect to release stuff with a quality way above the average.
In more than one way the complaining people, even if in a strange way, appreciate and respect Ibanez efforts, they're just disheartened that a guitar can't have all their preferred specs and they can't get their perfect combination.
It's just human.
But I think that variety is a wonderful thing, and having different setups and guitars that speak and handle differently is a blessing and a pleasure.

 

[BigPhi84]

It was also mentioned that no matter what Ibanez does people will always complain; yep...thats the way it goes. But if you take a step back, have you noticed that most of these new models are designs that this forum has been begging for? Baritones, ebony fretboards, 9 string guitars, its all there! The Ibanez theme of 2014 seems to be "we listened to what you wanted, and we built it."

Amen! Look, I know the complaining gets old every time this thread comes around for Winter NAMM, but think about it this way... if people didn't complain in past years, we might not have Ebony Fretboards (some without inlays), return of the almighty Lo-Pro Edges, Name Brand Pickups (Dimarzio, EMG, and Bare Knuckle), lower prices on the Japanese-made Prestige RG guitars, guitars that aren't Black, matching headstocks (Thank God!), return of a Prestige FR series, a whole line of cheaper 8 string models, more Fixed Bridge models, 30-fret Guitars, Baritone Guitars, 9-string guitars, new Korn models, etc.

For a while, we believed that Ibanez did not listen to us (and that may have been true to a certain extent in the 2005-2010 era). Although I am not a Schecter fan at all, I applaud them for giving Ibanez some stiff competition and forcing Ibanez to change for the better. Who knows? If you guys keep complaining in this thread, maybe next year we'll see Reverse Headstocks, more Maple Fretboards, and a limited Fanned-Fret model... umm, that's about all that I think we can complain about at this point that hasn't been addressed.

 

[BigPhi84]

Will they have matching headstocks, or a mismatched black headstock? It's a minor complaint, but it is a total dealbreaker for me, which is why I loved the orange so much.

The photos previously in this thread show matching headstocks!

 

[BigPhi84]

You know what...I'm not a big tech guy, I play for my pleasure and don't bother much about the sound etc... but from what I see around it's "kewl" to hate on the EMGs.
I reckon there might be active/passive preferences, brand preferences, whatever, but it's silly to treat EMG as turds.

As much as I hate EMG's, I never rag on them because I know that there are players like Jeff Loomis, David Gilmour, and Andy James that can make them sound glorious. It all boils down to your hands, your guitar, your technique, your gear, etc. I can't make EMG's sound good with my admittedly crappy technique, but I think that says more about me than the pickups. It kinda reminds me of that one video of Satriani playing a cheap Peavey guitar and making it sound fantastic.

I think a lot of EMG hate (at least from me) came from the proprietary pickup shape for 7 and 8-string guitars. "Who wants to route an existing precious guitar, or buy a guitar with the huge EMG cutouts?" is what I used to think, but now that Seymour Duncan and BKP are doing pickups in the EMG size, and now that EMG has passive sized pickups, I can no longer use this argument. Cheers to EMG, SD, and BKP for listening to their customers!

 

[canuck brian]

To anyone complaining about EMGs - Loomis has never had a problem recording a great sounding album and the Black from Metallica has a crushing guitar tone.

I'm really hoping to see Jake's Titan sig. I might do something stupid and buy one.

 

[jonajon91]

Seems like the best place to ask. What is the closest NAMM equivalent in London?

 

[BigPhi84]

Seems like the best place to ask. What is the closest NAMM equivalent in London?

Musikmesse?

Musikmesse 2014 - the international fair for musical instruments, sheet music, music production and music business connections.

 

[s4tch]

Seems like the best place to ask. What is the closest NAMM equivalent in London?

Musikmesse in Frankfurt.

Edit: ninja'd.

 

[jl-austin]

You all can stop with the EMG talk, from what I saw, none of the American models had EMGs. There might have been one that slipped past me, but all of the prestige RG's had DiMarzio. Seeing how this is the NAMM thread, North American Music Merchants (or something like that), that is what the info is geared toward. Europe has their own trade show, and they are just as excited as we are.

 

[BigPhi84]

You all can stop with the EMG talk, from what I saw, none of the American models had EMGs. There might have been one that slipped past me, but all of the prestige RG's had DiMarzio. Seeing how this is the NAMM thread, North American Music Merchants (or something like that), that is what the info is geared toward. Europe has their own trade show, and they are just as excited as we are.

The EMG talk was based on the new Iron Label series models, I believe.

 

[celticelk]

umm, that's about all that I think we can complain about at this point that hasn't been addressed.

More non-superstrats. To be fair, that's a complaint against everyone, not just Ibanez.

 

[rockstarazuri]

I find EMGs have lovely sparkly clean tones as well, especially if you're playing thru clean amps that doesn't distort.

And the new 57/66 sets are amazing.

 

[Marchpip]

stupid question, but why is the Jake Bowen Sig presumably going to be a 6 string? always thought Periphery would use 7 string guitars