The
Chapman Red Sea ML1 Modern is at home!
It is a fantastic guitar. It doesn't look or feels like a cheap guitar at all. Excellent construction and finishes, outstanding fretwork, great playability and tone... what else can be asked for? (I hate reversed tuners, though, but I will get used to it. The guitar is worth enough to accept that downside) I will write more details when the honeymoon has passed
At the shop they had all the range of Chapman guitars hanging on the wall, and I played some of them. I love the
ML3 Semi-Hollow P90, but wife rules says "guitar-in guitar-out". 5 is the magic number, and I already let a Strat with EMG DG20 and a Schecter Hellraiser C-1 Special go out to let this one and the Charvel Pro-mod dk24 HSS 2pt go in. No regret at all replacing the Schecter with these, but the DG20 pups will be missed
(*)
All the Chapmans I tried came with a perfect setup and intonation. I asked the seller if they had adjust them, but he said that they already came like that from the Indo factory. Robert Chapman says that he changed to another factory few years ago because there were some QC issues. Perhaps an accurate setup is part of the new QC policy.
(*) p.s.: on the way I had also let go a $3,000 J-Custom RG8550MZ, JS2410, JEM7VWH, S5470Q, Fender Custom Shop Jeff Beck, and other expensive guitars. Not because of money issues, but because they were problematic and/or I was not comfortable with them. Now I realize that I have downsized the monetary value of my collection, but increased my satisfaction. So, this is a real tribute to the "Inexpensive guitars" thread