Suhr vs PRS vs ??

Narzugon said:
Unix-guy: I was in the same boat as you years ago. I've always had descent guitars but I wanted a boutique instrument. I was looking for a floyd, strat style, HSS and a flat thin neck (is my age showing?). I had just sold a Fender Customer Shop set neck strat because I never bonded with it. I looked online at new and used Surh's as well as a few other builder/mfg. I even considered a Warmoth build with top shelf components, me building it but having it plek'd and professionally setup.

I found a place near me that usually stocked at least 1 suhr. It was usually some form of the 24 fret modern which I'm guessing is their best seller. In my opinion those are usually the ones that people say sound sterile. I'm not saying they all do, but in my experience, every one I have played had that sound (not for me). I took a leap of faith and ordered a Classic Custom strat from Suhr (Matt's Music as well).

The build quality and intonation blew me away when I first played it and I still have it today. For me here are a few things I'd keep and a few things I'd change if I could.

Likes:
Alder Body - This thing just sings acoustically or electrically.
Pickups: Michael Landau Single coils are the best single coils I've ever had. Tone/balance etc.
DSV humbucker in the bridge blows me away. I'm a PAF nut and this pickup has the PAF thing going on but with an uncanny clarity.
Frets: Stainless all the way! Love'm.

I'd change:
They didn't offer as many neck options then. I settled with a Slim C Even taper (Reb Beach neck) and quarter sewn maple. I've almost sent it back many times. The first five years it just seemed unstable even in stable climate conditions. I think it may have finally settled down 7 or more years later. I'd opt for the roasted necks and a flatter radius (preference).

Floyd: I grew up with Floyds (Thanks Ed) and have played them for decades. The Gotoh is the best I've ever played (including the original Floyds). Smooth, accurate and came with a brass block. Full sounding. But with the advancements in standard style trems I would probably opt for the one Pete Thorn uses on his guitar (I think it's a special order from suhr if I'm not mistaken).

Jumbo Frets: I'd opt for the medium SS frets. These jumbos just feel like your fingers are bumping over train tracks when you slide your fingers on the neck. Above the 14th fret they are just too bulky (wide).

Don't drive yourself too crazy! :)

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I've been playing mahogany body guitars so long, I think would stick with that... Obviously, the maple cap will affect that some.

I have heard John Suhr and a number of other high end builders are of the opinion that basswood with make cap is the "best" combination...

I think the Edge tremolo beats every other Floyd Rose bridge by a mile... But they were (at least originally) built by Gotoh, and that would be my second choice behind the Edge.

Definitely roasted neck. I also think medium jumbo SS frets, too.
 
If I had a budget of 2-4K, I’d buy another Parker Fly. It’s the best playing most amazing guitar I’ve ever owned. Makes everything else I have ever touched feel like a cheap toy or old clunker.
 
Four to $6000+ for a guitar......, :confused: you guys have money to burn. No wonder so many of you were able to get the Axe III as soon as it started shipping.

Years of DIY pedal building have left me with a bad taste for anything called boutique. I'm sure they are excellent guitars, the many dedicated fans here are testament to that, but personally I'd rather build something for myself instead. It's also way more fun that way. And that is excluding the Suhr headstock. Whoever designed that monstrosity had to be smoking a big one.
 
Parker is another brand I couldn't bond with. I've owned several over the years. They're cool looking, super light, and play fantastic. But not one of them sounded very good to me. I really wanted to like them.
 
Musikron said:
If I had a budget of 2-4K, I’d buy another Parker Fly. It’s the best playing most amazing guitar I’ve ever owned. Makes everything else I have ever touched feel like a cheap toy or old clunker.
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Doesn't really match my description of what I'm looking for...
 
hippietim said:
Parker is another brand I couldn't bond with. I've owned several over the years. They're cool looking, super light, and play fantastic. But not one of them sounded very good to me. I really wanted to like them.
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Nothing short of a Strandberg is lighter..but the thing that always bugged me about my P Fly is that painfully eccentric Upper body horn that would bore into my sternum when playing it seated.......
 
bradlake said:
Nothing short of a Strandberg is lighter..but the thing that always bugged me about my P Fly is that painfully eccentric Upper body horn that would bore into my sternum when playing it seated.......
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Strandberg. Talk about a guitar I couldn't bond with. I've played a couple and I don't recall liking anything about them.
 
hippietim said:
Strandberg. Talk about a guitar I couldn't bond with. I've played a couple and I don't recall liking anything about them.
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I feel ya, I had to wait on the right opportunity for a .strandberg to even consider it. My purchase was more fueled by the desire to stretch my skills using a 7-string for lower chords than Emaj Emin in full octaves within my demog. of songs. I also use it to be provocative when playing to large audiences like my firm's Christmas program:


[no judgement, this was at 9AM lol]

With that said, @unix-guy have you ever tried a strandberg?? Enduroneck is cool, however, takes a lot of getting used to.

What're you leaning towards Mr. Unix?
 
ibanezfreak4 said:
I feel ya, I had to wait on the right opportunity for a .strandberg to even consider it. My purchase was more fueled by the desire to stretch my skills using a 7-string for lower chords than Emaj Emin in full octaves within my demog. of songs. I also use it to be provocative when playing to large audiences like my firm's Christmas program:


[no judgement, this was at 9AM lol]

With that said, @unix-guy have you ever tried a strandberg?? Enduroneck is cool, however, takes a lot of getting used to.

What're you leaning towards Mr. Unix?
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I have not yet had a chance to try one... I think they are a bit "plain" in the looks department, aside from the shape and being headless, of course.

I probably should also include Keisel in my list... I have never played one, either but some are stunning to look at!
 
unix-guy said:
I probably should also include Keisel in my list... I have never played one, either but some are stunning to look at!
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I've owned a Kiesel and talked to others who have as well. Kiesels are essentially ~$1200 guitars with a bucketload of customization options on top, and they play like it. Which is to say, it's like having a nice Fender American series Strat but customized, and spending $1800 on a Kiesel is buying you six hundred dollars of customizations, not playability improvements. A $2000 Kiesel will be freaking gorgeous, but the attention to detail on a similarly priced Suhr Modern Satin is really noticeable when you play the guitars. I've been down that road.

Of course, the customized Suhr will cost you double that.
 
Promit said:
I've owned a Kiesel and talked to others who have as well. Kiesels are essentially ~$1200 guitars with a bucketload of customization options on top, and they play like it. Which is to say, it's like having a nice Fender American series Strat but customized, and spending $1800 on a Kiesel is buying you six hundred dollars of customizations, not playability improvements. A $2000 Kiesel will be freaking gorgeous, but the attention to detail on a similarly priced Suhr Modern Satin is really noticeable when you play the guitars. I've been down that road.

Of course, the customized Suhr will cost you double that.
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Do guitars get much better in terms of playability (other than personal preference differences) above ~$1200 though?
 
Promit said:
I've owned a Kiesel and talked to others who have as well. Kiesels are essentially ~$1200 guitars with a bucketload of customization options on top, and they play like it. Which is to say, it's like having a nice Fender American series Strat but customized, and spending $1800 on a Kiesel is buying you six hundred dollars of customizations, not playability improvements. A $2000 Kiesel will be freaking gorgeous, but the attention to detail on a similarly priced Suhr Modern Satin is really noticeable when you play the guitars. I've been down that road.

Of course, the customized Suhr will cost you double that.
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To add, I've never read more customer service horror stories than I have with Keisel. Just google "Keisel horror stories" and get into some heavy reading. There have been a couple of threads that have made sure I will never give them a dime of my money. Why even take a chance when there are so many good options out there.
 
Personal preference will play a huge part for sure. I've owned pretty much all of the major guitar brands out there and even quickly tried some rarities from Misha's collection like the one off Blackmachine and I'll tell you what I told Misha. These are sick but I love PRS more. :)

I have a problem with Suhr. First of all many people who have ordered Suhr guitars in Europe are having problems that may be the dealer's fault but things like lacquer cracks and wrong pickups inserted in the guitar and weird stuff like that. For me Suhr sounds and plays really great but no matter what model it is there's just something in my head saying "if the headstock didn't say Suhr, this would be worth something completely different". The more modern series remind me a lot of Ibanez and there's no price comparison there. The Fender copies kind of make think that I'd actually prefer to have a really high end Fender even though I know the Suhr would outperform in a comparison. I actually have Suhr V60LP pickups in my Fender Strat and I'm never messing with it, it's incredible.

I'm a PRS guy for many reasons but the main one is, I used to be really into buying and selling guitars and there's only one brand that I could never sell and that's PRS because they were all so special and unique and honestly they have a special meaning to me. I don't have a problem with the playability and I feel like a completely stock PRS will always sound better than any other guitar no matter what mods you do to them. The only bad thing I have to say about them is that you want to have pretty fresh strings on them.
 
fractalz said:
The rounded fret ends on the J Custom Ibanez line is a nice touch.
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Seems to me more of an aesthetic benefit...? As long as the fret ends are properly dressed, whether they're perfectly rounded or not shouldn't have an effect on playability, or so I would think.
 
unix-guy said:
I think the Edge tremolo beats every other Floyd Rose bridge by a mile... But they were (at least originally) built by Gotoh, and that would be my second choice behind the Edge.
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I completely agree about the Edge trems. I am of the same opinion. FYI, I was floored to discover that this Gotoh felt like an Edge. At least better than the 80's-90's ones as I had a dated Ibanez GR550 (or was it the 450? It had binding) to compare it to.
 
Hey I'm also a former MIJ ibanez player. I absolutely loved my JS1000 and the lo pro edge trem. I didn't think any other guitar could ever replace it as my #1 main guitar.

Then I started watching what Kiesel was doing. I figured out they're pretty much the best bang for the buck custom guitar out there. Other custom builders seemed like they cost double and take twice as long to build it. I watched their facebook page for about a year and was really impressed by what I saw. I did see a few mishaps or "horror stories" among the thousands of other happy customers. The worst of which was a guy who had his ebony fretboard develop a crack after he received it. They offered to repair it free of charge, but refused to build him a brand new guitar. The guy wasn't happy and that's basically the whole story. Another guy I saw received a non-reverse headstock instead of the reverse one that he ordered and they refunded him for the cost of the reverse headstock option. I literally see about 3 of those type of stories per year.

So I bought a 6 string Kiesel Vader with a trem. Actually it was a wedding gift from my wife. They got every last detail of my order correct and man I was blown away when I opened the box. I've owned it about 1 year now and I fell in love with it. I did swap out the pickups, which I just expect to have to do on any guitar. The tung oiled walnut neck just feels so smooth, stainless frets, the headless design, the hipshot trem.... just everything was awesome. The Hipshot Contour trem took a little getting used to but now it feels weird going back to my edge trems. The contour definitely has a smooth feel to it and is very sensitive. Almost too sensitive but I got used to it.

So to sum it all up....

Kiesel pros:
Costs less than most other custom guitars.
fast build times (8-10 weeks usually)
Customizability
Beautiful figured woods
Regular communications, Q&A, & shop walkthrough videos on social media
Made in the USA

Kiesel Cons:
Some options make the guitar non-returnable
Electronic components used are pretty cheap (potentiometers)
 
I can’t speak to the quality or playability of a Suhr, other than what I’ve heard or read which is that they are fantastic. I do however own two Kiesels. Both of them are singlecuts and I absolutely love them.

The first one I bought was right before they changed to Kiesel, so it’s a Carvin. Plays wonderfully. My second is a Kiesel and I asked for a teardrop silverburst finish. This is not a standard option, which made the guitar non returnable, as mentioned above. I love it, definitely my favorite guitar I’ve ever played.

I’ve played numerous PRS and really enjoyed playing them, but wanted something with a little more customization. You can really get what you want for a fairly reasonable price IMO with Kiesel. My band mates both play PRS, so I play around with them fairly regularly. A custom 22, 24, and a Dave Navarro signature. They play great but my Kiesels just feel more solid to me if that makes sense. I’ll post some pictures when I’m at my computer in a while.
 
I've played three Suhrs: two Moderns and one Tele. Very nice, but out of my budget and not what I'm currently looking for.

I've also played two EBMM JP15s (one blue and one teal) and I think those guitars are fantastic. Love the necks. I would stay far, far away from the Sterling stuff though. They have fretwork like you'd expect from a $100 starter guitar.

I've never had the good fortune of seeing a high end PRS in person unfortunately. Only lower end SE stuff with plain tops. I want to see those 10 Tops in person – especially in Aquamarine!
 
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