@@eduardolorandi3628 The issue is that it just doesn't fit his high-gain skillset, so in a way, it's a skill issue. "Skill" as a concept isn't a linear or one-dimensional thing, and so he's clearly good at guitar in general but it's just a mismatch of attributes between him and the guitar but yea when people usually say 'skill issue', it's usually not that deep loll
@@eduardolorandi3628 Maybe they're saying that he doesn't have the skills to EQ the pickups to his liking. The truth is, just by using parametric EQ, you can make humbuckers sound like single coils, and vice versa. The main thing you can't fix via EQ is articulation and string separation.
they literally make an identical guitar in both HH and HSS lol. Different finishes and the HH has no pickguard but that's it. Like hwy would he not buy one of those
Pretty much. But I think according to the tones I hear in the video, cleans, high gain, driven sounds are all good. To me personally I'd get evertune bridge.
I mean this is literally the embodiment of how different guitars excel in specific genres. Trying to find something that fits all of your musical interests will usually end up with you sounding "okay" in multiple styles but sometimes that isn't good enough for most players. This is why I literally just have different guitars-to fit the context of what it is I'm trying to play.
That's me. I tried to make my guitar "do it all" with using split coil humbuckers. It was close but never sounded exactly like a true single coil. Then later a standard strat solved all my sound chasing problems
wtf. I thought I was watching a channel with at least 300k subs until i checked. Keep up the great work man. Looking forward to see and hear more from you! :D
Additional review for Q54. Basically ichika guitar with a HSS instead of SSS. Love the tuners. Amazing tuning stability compared to my 2000$ custom. Qc is abit off tho have a rounded screw in one of my pickups. Felt like i got a b stock for full price
Nice vid. Things I would add to this video would be: the first version of the Quest series and ICHI10 uses Jescar EVO Gold frets, hence the gold colour. The current version, let's just called it version 2, uses stainless steel frets. Reason being, Jescar stop producing EVO Gold frets, because the material/metal manufacturer no longer produce that particular metal, from what I could gather. Ibanez didn't announced the change, so they just quietly changed it late last year. I'm a big fan of this series, and have been following it and have checking a lot of videos about them, ever since it was announced and released. Just don't have the cash to get them, yet. 😅
@@kessensuru IIRC, it was from Phillip McKnight's Kiesel factory tour, Jeff Kiesel mentioned it in the video. A quick Google search showed results from as early as February 2023.
As for how I know about the change on the Quest series, well, I always have a tab of the Q54 opened on my browser (for like 2 years now), just to stare at it, like the broke boi I am. And as soon as I heard about the Jescar EVO Gold discontinuation thingy, I refresh the tab once a day since and sure enough, the image of the guitar changed and the specs entry for the frets changed, from "Jumbo Jescar EVO Gold" to "Jumbo Stainless Steel"
guitar youtubers need more attention man, like this video was so well made i thought for sure he had atleast hundreds of thousands of subs, keep it up man
This is a good review. Without watching this I would never have guessed the sound would be so strange on that. Personally I would just pickup swap it and keep the originals around for a spare etc.
I did about a year of research before I bought my guitar. It didn't have a humbucker I wanted, so I bought it seperately and had it installed. You've got learn to figure things out in order to be a great guitarist. This is a skills and research issue.
Damn, I would love to see a review about the ichi100(his talman sig) because there are also no proper reviews on this guitar either. I think even less than for the ichi10. Great video!!
It’s interesting that you used the kadinja guitarist as an example of a single coil tone, but in the example video you ran he was playing through the humbucker. There is now a 7 string version with SSH pickup configuration. And all of the Ibanez quest series with 2 humbckers all have split/ single coil options thanks to the dynamix switch.
I only play metal with single coils, but I have some pretty crazy pickups on my instruments. I like how single coils work with low tunings. You need a little more sparkle on the low tunings. My main guitar these days is an HH strat tuned to B with Rio Grande humbucker sized P90s in it. It's absolutely nasty. I recently started using 10s on it because I'm changing as a player. Tuned to drop B. Those pickups work like nothing else for the lower tunings. It's like a humbucker but with an aggressive edge to it. None of that mud you get with humbuckers. I also have a strat with Lace Sensor Chrome Domes in it, which sounds glassy clean, with a really flat response, so you can really play around with the sound.
Honestly this one sounds like a great candidate for a different bridge pickup. I’m mainly a Strat guy, but I’ll be one of the first to say a single coil in the bridge only really sounds good to me if I’m using a fuzz pedal. Something like a Dimarzio Injector or other single coil sized humbucker would probably make you love that guitar if the feel, tuning stability and the look you like is there. Finding a guitar that has all that is way harder than finding a pickup to suit your playing style.
Before changing the pickups try a tube screamer with the tone down instead of up + use some low-pass EQ before the amp to tame that harsh high end and you should be golden. and also only use the bridge pickup for the mentioned setup
I got the Q54 this past month, absolutely love it. HH on the QX model if I’m not mistaken but its a great guitar especially for the price, smokes my 2k fender I’ve had for about 5 years.
i knew it this guitar doesn't fit for high gain when i listen to ichika in his Demo Vid. But it would be really work for Japanese Style Alternative Rock that using lit overdrive and funky-like wet sound.
Roll your treble on the guitar back and that will help. I would also turn the bass and mid up a bit on the amp/modeler/plugin. Roll presence back as well.
Nice video, great production quality. I think your main mistake was expected to get pristine metal tones with an SSS setup. I have the HSS version of that guitar and its sounds so good with gain. It would surprise me if you could get really good rhythm tones, but for lead tones doing neck and middle split gets some great results. With that said, the high gain tone that you showed sounds decent, it needs some EQ (as you mentioned) and probably needs to be adjusted in terms of gain, drive and distortion, based on the difference between the pickups that you made the present with and the SSS pickups. The upshot is that if you really hate the guitar, they still resell for ~$900 so you're not entirely out of pocket.
I bought the same guitar and I composed a couple of songs which sound Ichika, but then I ventured into some heavier stuff and this guitar isn't the best for it. I used to live in a tight college dorm and wanted something light, and this guitar is just perfect in that regard because it's headless, but it's a pain to change the tuning oreven just tuning an out of tune guitar. I wouldn't suggest having this as your only guitar, but if you have a humbucker for heavy stuff, then this is a great option for clean stuff
I considered this guitar, but purchased the Q52. It has 10 pickup settings vs the Nito's 8 and has dual humbuckers. My only gripe about the Q series is the lack of a floating trem option, Thankfully, I have my Jacksons with FR. I plan to sell my Q52 because of the lack of a trem. My hardtail, dual humbucker of choice are my Ibanez PS (I have two PS60, one PS120 and a PS10). Ibanez really missed the mark with the Q series, they're great guitars but need a floating trem IMO.
Nice review. Actually, you might want to slap some hotrails if you haven't sent it back yet. That may change your mind about returning it if you want that humbucker tone. Did the same with my strat and I have no intention of routing the wood so yeah.
Thank you. Had actually thought about slapping on a hotrail but I ended up returning because I wanted a tremolo too. If I could afford both guitars would definitely keep both tho
@@kessensuru fair enough. Yeah, this guitar isn't exactly cheap I reckon. It looks really cool too, but if it's just missing the things you need, probably best to have it sent back.
Great video, man! It's kinda odd going from humbuckers to single coils when you play high gain stuff, but I really dig the way high gain amps interect with single coils and I got used to it really quick. If I'm not mistaken, AJ Rebollo from Issues uses a lot and sounds great. How long have you been playing this Ibanez? Hope the single coils can win you over.
Single coils work better in low tunings for high gain stuff imo. But then I'm running Rio Grande humbucker sized P90s in a strat tuned to drop B mostly. It's chunky. P90 style pickups are brutal actually. They are often more powerful than a lot of humbuckers, without the high end loss you get with humbuckers.
Swap the bridge pickup to a mini humbucker and you are good to go man! Keep the switchero thing to split it if you want the single coil sound at some point.
Just put two Seymour Duncan Hot Rails on it and you are good to go. You can even remove the midle pick up for some Fenderesque Mustang look, it will look sick. If you want to keep the single coil looks and still get hum canceling, try the Yngwie Malmsteen pick ups, also from Seymour Duncan.
If you didn't sell this guitar yet, I'd try raising the height of the bridge pick up, might get a little thicker of a tone for playing heavier stuff. If you want a single coil sound that works well with metal, get yourself a telecaster!
i dont mean to sound condescending but ichika doesnt play high gain stuff much. its made for his play style not yours that doesnt seem like an issue with the guitar but with the player. idk maybe im out of line here
You do know that the pickups are not glued into the guitar forever, right? You are aware that they can be swaped? And that the pots may be changed to 500k if they are 250k, too? I hope you do know that, because that guitar is just phenomenal. Or just start playing singles and make adjustments in your presets. I play singles in low or high gain and I found no trouble, if you just take some time to tweak things. Especially if you use modelers or the PC.
Might be a great guitar but maybe not match for you, that’s just how it goes sometimes. I played one of this guitars at a shop and noticed the pickups are low output and articulate. Before you sell it, you should try it in bridge single coil with a boost pedal like a Boss SD1. You can get a lot of that output back with a boost and it sounds better than high output pickups imo. Good playing!
Hey Kessen! New sub here. I thought I might make a recommendation or two since it seems like, other than the bridge pickup, you're a fan of almost everything the guitar has to offer: 1.) HSS is, to me, the best and most versatile pickup setup there is. If it were me, I'd swap the bridge pickup for a single-coil sized humbucker. I had the same issue with the single coil when I got my first strat. In my case, I chunked the bridge pickup for a DiMarzio Tone Zone S. DiMarzio in general makes some amazing pickups in this config, you've got lots of options to choose from, but the Tone Zone S seemed to be the best pickup for the job as a high gain player. Also, aesthetically, you can get them in cool metal platings like silver, which won't mess with the look like a white Duncan JB Jr might. My Tone Zone is all gold plated with gold rails and sounds amazing. 2.) If you do this, make sure you switch the pots to 500k to get the most out of it. In the beginning, I was using 250k at first and it sounded kinda muddy. I wasn't sure if I even liked the Tone Zone until I made this change. If you wanna get into the weeds about wiring, you can buy a stacked pot (or get nerdier and use resistors on a single pot) so that the humbucker "sees" a 500k pot while the single coils "see" 250k. 3.) With wiring, you might be able to repurpose the Dynamix-8 (for 3 singles) to a Dynamix-9 (for HSS), but I just don't know enough about the switch to say for sure. If you can, do it! I've always loved the Dynamix options. If you can't, I'd probably wire it where one pot is a push pull to split the humbucker, auto-split in position 2 for bridge-single/middle, and then repurpose the dynamix switch hole for a regular toggle switch as a "neck-on" switch where you can turn the neck pickup on in any position, since the bridge-split/neck combo is really good for math rock type tele sounds. As a high gain player, you could also turn the other knob into a push-pull for the "neck" on switch and wire the toggle as a blower switch where your pickups ignore the controls entirely (even when the knobs are at 10, they still affect the sound just a little bit) and it's basically like turning to 11. 4.) Lastly, I always recommend replacing your standard input jack with a PureTone multi-contact jack. Not for any reason other than I just think the feeling of it clicking into place is really satisfying. Anyway, you didn't ask for any of this, but as a tech, these would be my recommendations if you brought it to me and asked what I could do to make you love this guitar.
These are some gold advice! Appreciate it a lot. I have now moved on to an Ibanez AZ which was the versatility I needed on the guitar all along. Though the headless still definitely beats it in terms of looks 😂
IRs along with microphones and speakers affect tone more than pickups, no one else's fault but yours for thinking a new set of wood and metal will change your sound.
Just put a Seymour Duncan JB junior pickup in the bridge position. Boom problem solved....now you have a high gain friendly headless guitar. I swap out the bridge pickup in most of my guitars because I am a pickup snob.
So why didn't you get my Q-52, it's the humbucker version and sounds so good, articulate, powerful, great for either Jazz, Metal, everything. It's the best guitar ever for the ease of playing. Older models have Jascar gold frets, newer ones have Stainless frets. Ohh just saw the cat so cute!
The main reason most people want a headless is because of Strandberg. But none of the other companies add the thoughtful bottom cutout or replicate Strandberg's bridge hardware well (Apart from Aristedes).
Yo man, great video, honestly freaky how little subs you have. That said, i do think the inexperience shows a bit and you are learning a lot so there is no shame in this i wholeheartedly commend you the transparency. As you said you bought it online (which makes sense), but then tested it on the wrong rig, and also aren't used to the style. So in a way, it's to be expected it doesn't sound the way you would expect. At a guitar store you could have figured out what gear in the chain helps make it sound the way you want. I'll save the long version of the story, but i've had lots of guitar mismatches until i learned something in a weird way. I bought a transparent overdrive, (klon clone) since i wound up becoming a diehard fan of Steely Dan and in particular Larry Carlton. Turns out, the "muddy" you are describing might be the pickups, but with a treble boost and overdrive combo you can fine tune that muddiness. If you haven't already please try a transparent overdrive, it doesn't matter which you get. For me the initial impressions from the OD were "hugely dissapointing", because i thought it would fix my tone. Then after playing with it for a while and dialing it in a bit, i realized it improved my expression and perception of tactile feedback from the instrument. It allowed ME to fix my tone. This was HUGE, i could make it chimey, muddy, scream, and all with the same gear i before had considered lackluster. Same goes for a good compressor, i will never recommend any other gear since its all so subjective. But a good compressor and transparent overdrive provides versatility across the board that you never knew was there, and it made me better guitarist and sped up my learning. From what you showed in this video, i strongly believe you are in the same place that i was, albeit a better guitarist than I when i learned this lesson. So i hope you read this, and it helps, you might be able to make it sound exactly the way you wanted to for under 50 bucks, and in the process pick up a piece of gear that can be used with anything in your rig.
for sure, i think that every musician could benefit from a strat or a tele lying around. I've used mine for clean tones and leads on top of stuff that I've tracked with regular guitars
hey Friend! thanks a lot for the review! please don't forget that you can change your bridge single coil for a humbucker that is single coil size. pretty easy switch. you can also add a coil split. I had a tele with a hot rail. it sounded great on metal, but I've switched to vintage style single and was even happier because of how unique it sounded. but yeah, strat bridge pickup can be tricky to dial, so the easiest option would be to just change the bridge pickup
It might just be that your presets didn't suit those pickups. You probably could have installed a stacked humbucker in the bridge and it would have been a more versatile instrument. I think that guitar is meant to be more or a modern fusion-y take on a vintage stratocaster, and not necessarily a metal guitar, at least not in the stock configuration. Nice video though!
Honestly it doesn't make sense for a guitar to cost a grand as components can't ever be that expensive, if you're not a superstar level person. I mean... yeah more or less. For a grand, a better idea is to get 2 guitars each for half a grand, a single coil and a humbucker! Win!
Didn't like video but love video style. Well done actually! Defo got a sub out of me, can't wait to see what kind of videos you make in the future!!! :)
Why just not change pickups for what you like? That is singles, they couldn't do what you want from them. They are even not P90 with their versatility..
if you don't want it can I have it? lol Yeah it's a tone chasing issue. Honestly, I suck at it too. I bought vintage tele japan pickups to get a sound I was looking for and I ended up getting said sound out of a $50 squire somehow lmao I'm sure you can get the sound you're looking for but it's probably some mic placement or something that the example you gave did.
One pain point for me that I forgot to mention was there are more single coil sounds that I like more than humbucker sounds. However the R1 pickups not only cannot do high gain well, they also do not do single coil well. Its very nitpicky from my side but thats how I feel
@@kessensuru For like $1000 you deserve to be nitpicky. Still, I liked the sounds you displayed with it so this might be something worth picking up for me. Great video!
Feels like the model enables you to thoroughly grasp the natural wooden sound man, though i honestly believe ibanez surely could deliver numerous impeccable distortion-based guitar playing style like Fredrik Thordendal signature or may be just regular j-custom ibanez would surely delivers you the sound you want i think : )
