Top 6 Shred Guitars [by SHRED SEAN of BLESSED BY A BROKEN HEART]

Who am I, and why am I here?? How many children should I have? What is the right age to start having mammograms??? These are big questions, questions that keep many of us as night. Another one of life’s most difficult, persistent question is, WHICH AXE SHREDS HARDEST??? With so many guitars to choose from, and so little knowledge passed down from the elders to the up and comers of today, selecting the right axe is fast becoming a lost art. Luckily for us, Blessed By A Broken Heart guitarist, Carvin endorsee and guitar expert SHRED SEAN is here to help with this handy guide to the Top 6 SHRED AXES! – Sgt D

1) HM “Heavy Metal” Strat
This was Fender’s response to the shred guitar and super-Strat movement in the late 80′s early 90′s. This is one shred axe I find quite over looked and of course is long out of production. Most notable endorser of this guitar was Greg Howe in the late 80′s (“Bad Racket,” anyone?). A great playing guitar, it comes in a variety of awesome colors. To this day it is still a highly sought-after axe on eBay. I’ve seen quite a few come through, and it’s definitely worth the penny it sells for. For any further information you could possibly want to know about this lost shred gem here’s a nifty little site that features an obscure collection and has got allll the answers.

• Frets: 24 Jumbo
• Fingerboard: Maple or rosewood
• Neck Radius: Much flatter than standard 17 inch radius
• Neck Joint: A more rounded-off (as opposed to square) joint to allow better access to the upper frets
• Tremolo: A Kahler Spider or a Floyd Rose pending on what year
• Pickups/Configuration: Generally, the pickup in the bridge was mainly a Dimarzio Super 3 and stock Fender singles, or in the case of two hums they used two Dimarzio Super 3s, but I’ve seen them in every configuration.

2) Carvin Guitars, late 80s/early 90s
Not to sound biased, but these guitars are amazing shred axes of the era! Standard neck-thru design and ebony fingerboard, fast necks, low action… these guitars had all the top quality specs standard! And the proof is in the players they had using the gear: Jason Becker, Marty Friedman, Joey Tafola, Tony MacAlpine to name a few. The guitars come in any number of configurations for every aspect, because Carvin guitars are ALL custom-built for the owner.

Specs:
Just about whatever you want, dude

3) Ibanez RG Series
We all know these. I could pick just about any Ibanez 80s instrument for this list — from a pink Jem to the RG550 — and it would be a winner. I’m gonna go with the elusive RG565, with the single coil in the neck. These guitars were made to burn: the thin necks, the flat radius, not to mention the neon colors! With an artist lineup so dominating and well-known it needs no mention (OK, Steve Vai, Paul Gilbert, Joe Satriani…). Let’s have a look at some of the specs of the 565:

• Body: basswood
• Neck: maple Wizard
• Fingerboard: maple w/ matching body color fret-marker dots
• Bridge: 1991 Edge, Trem 1992 Lo Pro Edge
• Frets: 24 Jumbo
• Neck Joint: old-school ibanez block tilt joint

4) Jackson Soloist
This guitar set the pace in the early 80′s for the “Super Strat” design that was the shred guitar weapon of choice throughout the decade. The guitar featured a standard neck-thru the body design, 24 jumbo frets, and an ebony fingerboard. I’ve never owned one of these axes; I’ve always found them to be a bit overpriced, even for the quality materials. But if I were to own one, it would have to be a early 80′s San Dimas, or a late 80s/early 90s Deco Dream graphic… but absolutely, definitely nothing after Fender bought Jackson in 2002. Boo.

• Body: Alder
• Neck: maple
• Fingerboard: ebony
• Bridge: Kahler, Floyd Rose

5) Charvel Model 4
Where would shred be today without Charvel guitars? From EVH to Warren DeMartini, these guitars defined an era of big excess and bigger guitars. I happen to own an ‘86 fire engine red Model 4 with a Kahler trem and it’s one of the most comfortable and fastest necks I have ever played.

• Body: basswood
• Bridge: Kahler 2300
• Neck Joint: square bolt
• Frets: 22 jumbo
• Neck: maple
• Fingerboard: rosewood
• Pickups: Jackson stock pickups

6) Yamaha Pacifica 1221
From generators to jet skis to sweet shred axes in the early 90′s, this company seemed to be incapable of failure. Back then, Yamaha made some very quality axes. This guitar has some cool features, including stock DiMarzios, a very comfortable and well-engineered neck body heel joint for comfortable upper fret playability, and a thin shred neck much like an Ibanez Wizard. Too lazy to cut those ball ends off of your new pack of strings? Or are you looking to avoid completely replacing a string when breaks occur at the ends and prefer to cut the ball ends off? This quality licensed Floyd gives the player the option of leaving the ball end of the string on or off. Endorsers of the time include unsung shred hero Michael Lee Firkins and Bill Leverty of Firehouse.

• Body: offset single cutaway basswood
• Neck: bolt-on maple
• Frets/Neck: 24-fret maple fingerboard with black slash inlays
• Bridge: double locking RM-Pro II Floyd Rose licensed tremolo
• Pickups: two humbucker DiMarzio pickups (bridge, neck) and one DiMarzio stacked single coil pickup (mid) with five-way pickup switch with coil split
• 25.5 in. scale, mfg. 1992-93

Plus Three Guitars You DON’T Need
These probably seemed like a good idea to guitar-makers in the 80s riding the cocaine train at 3am, but in retrospect, well…. not so much.

Alvarez Dana Scoop
Some predicted this guitar to be the future of guitars… others merely thought it to be an accident involving an unexperienced intern with a bandsaw. How ever you envision this guitars coming about is up to you, but for me this was a big “WTF?” in guitar design history. Let’s start out by acknowledging the massive gauge between the neck and the body dubbed “Dana’s scoop” that extends all the way to the upper horn of the guitar. The classic notion of tone and sustain coming from the neck and body’s resonation together seems to be thrown out the window here. Not to mention — why the scoop? There’s only 22 frets, dude! So not only is there a pointless cutaway on my guitar, but i had to sacrifice fretboard real estate to get it there. Let’s move on to the the bridge pickup, the Tri-Force humbucker was supposed to be this turbo-charged pickup, and to the naked eye, this three-coil deal looks like the shit. However, it’s just three single-coils strung together so in my experience, it didn’t hum-cancel, it just buzzed in all positions. Sweet.

Steve Vai’s Ibanez “Stupid Heart Guitar”
OK how do I begin to describe this pointless 80s guitar wonder of the world? It’s got three necks, but one of them just sort of juts out into the air at a weird angle… what the fuck do you do with that? The enormous heart shape is unbalanced, an obvious obstacle to playability for shred maestro Steve Vai (who is such an monster guitar player he manages to overcome it). The only reason for this guitar to exist is eye candy. Vai to Ibanez guitar-makers: “You see, we need something more to entertain the crowd visually while Diamond Dave leaves for halftime because my neon swirl onesie just isn’t enough!”

Michael Angelo’s “The Quad”
OK, do the math: two arms, ten fingers and four guitar necks. Pointless.