In my previous post today, I wrote about the value of using and evaluating gear in the place you’d normally use it before buying because you never really know how something will perform until you use it outside of a controlled environment. I got the chance to do that this past weekend, and in a word, this guitar is impressive. It’s incredibly playable, and even though the action is a bit higher than I like it, the neck is fast due to the slightly shorter scale length.
With a shorter scale length than my Strat, I was expecting even less sustain, but the solid mahogany body and neck combined with the beautifully polished rosewood fretboard provide for a warm, resonance with lots of sustain. It was pure joy bending a note, applying a bit of vibrato, and hearing the note just float in the air (sorry, couldn’t help but wax rhetorically).
Tonally, the P-90’s being single coils sit very close to the Strat, but without the chimey sound normally associated with a Strat. The tone is just a tad thicker and a little darker, but nowhere near as dark as humbuckers. I’ve been really diggin’ on the clean tone from neck pickup. It’s surprisingly deep without being boomy – almost like a plugged-in acoustic. It’s really great for playing clean leads. Switching to the middle position introduces the bridge pickup, and this setting is great for crunchy rhythm parts. Finally, I can finally say that I’ve found a guitar that has a single-coil bridge pickup that is usable to me. I’ve found bridge pickups on single coils to be just too trebley. The bridge pickup on the SE is indeed bright, but not so bright that it’s displeasing to me.
As far as saturated tone is concerned, my initial thought was that it would be thick – similar to humbuckers. But amazingly enough, it’s hard to get this puppy to break up a lot without boosting the drive on either my amp or my stomp boxes. This is NOT a bad sound at all. You get a bit of breakup, but loads of sustain. Very much like a Santana sound, and that’s never bad in my opinion.
I also love the simple two-knob volume and tone layout. The volume knob is positioned perfectly and doing volume swells is a breeze! Just extend your pinky. The guitar is very responsive to the volume knob as well, and you can clean up your tone just by rolling off the volume. The guitar is also very responsive to the tone knob, and unlike my other guitars, I found that I was actually using the tone knob in middle of songs to add or subtract edge and bite to my sound. Normally, it’s a set it and forget it affair.
Finally, one of the coolest things I found while playing this guitar is how responsive it is to how you attack the strings. Even with the gain cranked, playing lighter really cleans up the signal. But dig in, and you get a pleasant growl. I love this guitar!!!
In closing, I used to have this negative vibe about P-90’s. They always seemed way to bright for my liking. But the PRS SE Soapbar II has cured me of that negativity. It’s a truly playable and versatile guitar that definitely would fit in with any axe-slinger’s arsenal. Even though they’re not made any longer, you can find great deals on E-Bay. Imagine a tone machine like this for under $400! Simply awesome!
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It just occurred to me that I haven’t gotten any new gear lately. Okay, I just got a new PRS SE Soapbar II guitar a couple of weeks ago. But the thing that struck me was that I wasn’t really even in the market for a guitar when I got it – I wasn’t even thinking about getting a new guitar! The opportunity just kind of presented itself, and I acquired it.
In my humble (or not so humble 🙂 ) opinion, there’s no better way to evaluate gear than to gig with it. It’s one thing to play with a piece of gear in a controlled environment; it’s an entirely different matter when you use it to perform your music. Gigs can be a chaotic affair, and when you gig with something, its quirks and strengths show themselves.
After a minor scare last week with my heart and circulation and 
Guitar Gear 