New recordings for Kizu

While I was doing a recording for the Entwistle Dark Star neck pickup, I had Kizu right beside me. I picked it up, plugged it in and did a sound sample recording with Kizu. Kizu is equipped with Seymour Duncan Jazz neck pickup. Once again, pardon the sloppy playing.

Seymour Duncan Jazz Neo classical by Adrian Goh

Brand Concious Syndrome Part 1

There are many times when we decide to buy a piece of gear, the first thing that comes to our mind is probably the brand name of a product that we usually associate the product with. This is hardly a surprise and this is pretty evident in especially in Singapore. When I started changing the pickups of my first guitar, i wanted the best pickups with the amount of money I have. I bought a pair of Dimarzio Evolutions and don't take this in a wrong way. Dimarzio Evolutions are really good and probably still is my favourite pickup up till today. However, contrary to my believe at that time, installing Dimarzio Evolutions didn't make me sound or play anywhere closer to Steve Vai, as much as I would have liked.

However, there are many times when we make our decision relying too much on the brand image that we are being conditioned with and we make our decisions picking up those costly "branded product" without giving other lesser brands a chance. Guitar pickups are definitely one of those that are always being overlooked.

Thanks to a few local shops (namely Tymc and SVguitars), they have provide our market an alternative voice in the choice of lesser priced pickups; namely Tesla and Artec Giovanni. I personally believe that products of lesser brands should be given a chance instead of being bash and shove aside due to it's lesser known brand name and country of origin.

Next time, before anyone of us decide to buy any product be it pedals, pickups or tunners, do our necessary research on what's available to us and what exactly are we looking out for, before we make our final decision. We might just pick up a golden egg while saving a lot more money in the progress.

F spacing and Trembuckers?

Have you ever bought Dimarzio or Seymour Duncan pickups and you realized that there is 2 versions of the same pickups. One known as F-Spacing or Trembucker while the other known as standard spacing? Do they make a difference? Yes and No.

What the spacing itself means is that there are usually 2 kinds of bridge spacing, measuring 2.01" (51 mm) center-to-center from the first polepiece to the sixth for F space or Trembucker pickups and 1.90" (48 mm) for standard spacing pickups.

So which one should you get? If your guitar has a tremolo equipped, Floyd Rose or fender Vintage Tremolo, you should get the F Space or Trembucker. If your guitar is equipped without a tremolo or made in Asia or Mexico, you should get the standard spacing pickup.

What happens if you get the Standard spacing pickups for a tremolo equipped guitar or vice versa? Well, there will still be sound from your guitar (that's the yes) but not that the strings that are slightly not aligned to the pole pieces might sound slightly softer.

Why are there 2 different spacings? Before SuperStrats were invented, the only guitars that had humbuckers are Gibson lespaul kind of guitar. When people started putting humbuckers into strats, pickup makers decided to cater to the market for tremolo spaced guitars. Hence F space, for Fender or Floyd Rose (Dimarzio) or Trembucker (Seymour Duncan)

The next time, before you buy pickups to swap out the ones in your guitar, do take note that there are actually 2 different spacings.

Ibanez RG520QS "傷(Kizu)"

"傷(Kizu)" is probably the only one of my Ibanez guitars that doesn't follow my Dimarzio Evolutions configuration. The story started out with my friends giving me a Seymour Duncan Customs pickup for my birthday present in 2010. That is such an evil gift. Anyway, the rationale being, I wanted to build a guitar that might sound like Hizaki's(ヒザキ) guitar, which is an ESP Horizon III fitted with Seymour Duncan Jazz and Customs. But I didn't want an ESP guitar as I felt that the shape of the neck wasn't really to my liking.

At around the same time, there was an ebay auction of an RG520QS, my favorite non prestige RG model of all time. It sports a mahogany body with the standard Made in Japan Ibanez specs. So, after thinking it through, I bought it and had it shipped all the way from the United States to Singapore. When it arrived, I took a look at the guitar's condition and I nearly fainted. There were paint chips around the headstock and the neck had dings all over. The body of the guitar was sand out of shape and the sides of the quilted sapele veneer was being sand away. I knew I had to put my DIY skills into work again.

First thing I did was to dismantle everything and start with the most important part of the guitar, which is the neck. The dings were actually quite extensive and so, I decided to just refinish the neck, to my all favorite hand rubbed Tru-Oil finish. I removed the dings via the steam with hot iron and sand down the raised grain method. After that, I proceed in removing all the clear coat for re-coating of the neck. The neck was being refinished with 4 coats of hand rubbed tru-oil (for guides of doing this please click here)and being buffed down with rubbing compound for that baby butt smooth satin feel.

The next thing to tackle was the body. I initially re-sculpted part of the body with AB Epoxu and repainted the body with a black burst to cover up the veneer which the previous owner sanded away. However, that didn't turn out too well as rattle can sprays can only get me that far. Not to mention, the humidity of Singapore prevents the paint from drying rock hard. At about the same time, someone was selling a RG520QS body in Jemsite, condition almost intact save a few minor paint chips. After thinking about it, I decided that buying that body is way worth it than redoing up the current one, which I kind of hated. So, I bought the body, had it shipped all the way from United States to Singapore and began assembling the guitar.

At about the same time, I bought the neck pickup, Seymour Duncan Jazz from my local Seymour Duncan distributor, Davis GMC. The guitar was then quick assembled with all the hardware installed. I've also added a push pull coil tap pot for more tonal versatility. Mahogany and split humbucker actually gives of a pretty nice twang. The pickups being Alnico 5 based, is less hot compared to Dimarzio Evolutions ans is a tad bit too much on the highs. I've always been a lover of Ceramic based Pickups but this guitar gives me the option of a different tone on different days.

The neck, which is a Super Wizard neck measures 17mm on the first fret and 19mm on the 12th fret with a flat radius of 430mm and sports a Bulbinga stripe which isn't there for cosmetic reasons. It acts as a separate piece of hardwood to counteract the neck tension, therefore making it more resistance to neck warping. The thin profile of this guitar coupled with the flat radius of the fretboard makes shredding really easy. The action is set to a super sick action of 1mm on the 12 fret allowing players the lightest touch possible next to a scalloped neck. Due to the flat radius, players are also able to do high note bending effortlessly without choking the notes halfway.

The guitar got it's name "傷(Kizu)" mainly because the amount of scars it went through before I refinished it to a condition I am satisfied with. "傷(Kizu)" simply means scar in Japanese. In addition to the Seymour Duncan Customs and Jazz pickups, the guitar is also equipped with the Orange Drop and Treble Bleed mod.

Ibanez RG520QS "傷(Kizu)" Specs neck type: 3pc Made in Japan Super Wizard neck with Bulbinga Stipe fingerboard: Rosewood with dot inlay body: Transparent Rootbeer Mahogany body with Quilt Salepe Veneer fret: Jumbo frets bridge: Ibanez Original Edge Bridge neck pu: Seymour Duncan Jazz bridge pu: Seymour Duncan Customs Neck Specs Scale: 648mm/25.5" a : Width at Nut 43mm b : Width at Last Fret 54mm c: Thickness at 1st 17mm d : Thickness at 12th 19mm Radius: 430mmR

Seymour Duncan Jazz Neo classical by Adrian Goh