Ultimate Rhoads

devorerd wrote:I have a tracking number, so it's in en-route...I have 3 Peavey EVH Wolfgangs including the hard to find Patent Pending model which play very nice, also my Meanstreet Frankenstrat and few other guitars...So those will be my benchmarks. It also took three months to make, I paid in early May...

Hopefully it plays better than Tony Romo

I have no doubt..lol

Concorde is in New York...I live in Florida..expecting it this coming week!

Be sure to post a review of it! I'd like to know what it's like. Thinking of buying one myself.


Wonder if I could get the guitar to be made completely out of Maple, like Randy's? By default I think they make them out of Alder, which is a lighter wood if I recall correctly.

Got the Concorde, but on business travel, I will run it through it's paces this weekend and post a full report!

Not to ruin your excitement but after I had mine custom ordered the frets still needed to be filled down a little other than that I am completely HAPPY

I am actually going to be getting another concord and use it as a display with a replica of Randy's strap

Well see...mine took 3 months so hopefully they have trued up there process..

I pmed them about the Concorde guitar. I wanted to get it with a maple body, but they said they couldn't do that since they were short on maple or something. They did however say that I could get it in mahogany. Do you think mahogany would be a better choice to alder? I know it's a lot of preference, but I like heavy guitars and I feel like a mahogany body would hold up better than alder. Alder, from what I've read, is a pretty light hardwood too.

Cryptic Night wrote: Alder, from what I've read, is a pretty light hardwood too.

not usually the case actually. I have 3 alder strats and they are all way heavier than my all mahogany V...the V does sound great (its my go to "playing live" guitar but I never play it at home) but lacks the top end bite I like in a guitar. An ebony board might fix that

Personally I would probably go with mahogany if I was making another V although I wouldn't mind hearing a alder V

I think the mahogany is heavy thing comes from the fact that les pauls are heavy as hell....but most of that weight is the maple cap (esp if its front and back like a lot of customs) at the centre of the guitar the maple can be 15-20mm thick and given that a LP is around 60mm thick compared to a strat which is 45-50mm, thats where the heavy thing happens

All good points, I unpacked the guitar today, wow, very nice looking..I tuned it a 1/2 step down and I'm letting it breathe overnight...Will crank it up tomorrow via my 5150 iii....stay tuned!

PROS
Fun To Play A
Good Feel A
Good Pick Up B+
Good Tone B+
Solid Electronics A-
Appearance A
CONS Upper Frets: Hard to access

BEST USES
Jamming Very fun
Practicing Not very practical due to shape
Recording If your standing, no issues
Rock Concerts Ask Randy
School Bands N/A
Small Venues Bars, you will get tons on questions…

The Appearance of the Concorde is awesome…Really nice job! So on to the questions, the Adler body provided decent weight, keep in mind I don’t own a Les Paul les and don’t consider weight that much of an influence at this point. My opinion is based on this: Feel is way more important, but overall it’s the sound/tone you looking for and with technology and volume, you can pretty much dial in what’s in your head..

The fret board is a little wider than my Peavy EVH Wolfgangs, but almost exact to the Kramer 5150 I own.

I started out playing “Over the mountain”, sounded good..On to “Flying High Again” off of “Tribute”…Had trouble with the second verse fill…19..D string, 14 G string, 21 G string…..The angle was difficult for me..I have normal hands, I’m 5’7 ½ when I wake up prior to gravity!

Played Diary, to test the versatility of the sound and clean tone (5150 iii)..Homerun, this was awesome, (even though Randy played his Les Paul on the recorded track) great tone, enough snap and sustain to kill the solo!

Overall, for the price (1K) and the wait (3 months) I am very happy…No issue with the frets, construction, etc…

I’d like to thank Nick Hughes, he helped me with the parts list and relieved my fears about purchasing from them…Thanks Nick!

Did they set it up for you, or did you do it? Did you request different electronics in it?

I have found with sitting playing a V the best thing to do is have the strap on, shorten it so it just holds the guitar while its resting on your leg....the good thing about sitting playing a V is it puts the neck it the best position for your left hand playing wise. Most (me included) home guitarists when using strats/LP etc have the guitar on their right thigh which makes your body twist a little which adds tension to your arms, a V fixes that once you get use to sitting with one...its also where the guitar is when you are standing so that transition is easier to

Cryptic Night wrote:Did they set it up for you, or did you do it? Did you request different electronics in it?

Yes, I order Seymour Duncan pickups, Floyd Rose, Schaller tuners, etc..They set it up..

That is really the main issue I have with the concord. is the up fret access is really hard. Esp if you are trying to hit something on the "A" string at the 20th fret or something like that with a wide stretch. It is just too hard to get up there and play effectively. I think that is why I am such a fan of the RR1 shape. A little easier (ok a lot easier) to get to the frets. And they still look killer. I would like to get a concord again, but I have other projects going on right now and it is low on the list.

Over all it sounds like you got a pretty decent guitar for not too much cash.