Spudman
July 16th, 2009, 11:38 PM
I stopped in to Chesbro Music in Idaho Falls today. They are the Ibanez importer for the western USA. I was surprised to see a friend working in the guitar department who I had played music with. As Paul and I were catching up my eyes kept drifting to the wall of guitars and a new brand that I had never seen before - Anthem Guitars. http://www.anthemguitars.com/home.html
I liked the look of the single cut PST20 (http://www.anthemguitars.com/product-details.html?index=15) and pulled one down and plugged into a Bogner Alchemist. Wow! This was a pretty cool guitar. It played well with a substantial but not fat neck, string tension felt good, frets were nicely done and the pickups sounded great. The whole guitar felt very alive and resonant. I checked the retail price and found it to be competitive with MIM Fenders. I really liked the fact that the body is chambered because it reduced the weight and made the guitar very resonant. I also plugged it into an Ibanez Tone Blaster and it sounded good there too.
Paul asked if I'd like to meet the designer. I said "sure" thinking sometime in the future I might get to. A couple of minutes later Paul comes back with two guys in tow, Ben Parker (product development) and Benson Taylor (marketing mgr.) Cool! They were very nice and answered all the questions I could ask in the limited time I had. They have a very clear vision of where they are going with Anthem and are eager to get these into real players hands.
What I found out is they have been out for about a year, they are made in a very good plant in China, much attention is paid to detail, and they have new models, colors and models with new features coming out in the next batch that arrives soon. On the list is a stacked P90 guitar and coil taps for the PST20 (http://www.anthemguitars.com/product-details.html?index=15) which is the guitar I played.
The big news is that the other member of the design team has a custom shop in the eastern USA and will be making custom version USA Anthems in his shop. All Anthem guitars will only be sold on line or through mom and pop music stores.
I had thought I had completely gotten over GAS, but alas it is not to be. I'm excited to get one and play live with it. The tones I could get from it were diverse enough to keep this hardcore Strat player happy. The pickups are custom made and designed for each model. The humbuckers on the PST20 (http://www.anthemguitars.com/product-details.html?index=15) were full frequency with a vintage tendency and sounded very sweet like a good Les Paul with bite. I really liked the pickups.
Stay tuned for more information about these guitars. I invited Ben and Ben to come check out the forum. They might stop by to answer questions and say hello.
I liked the look of the single cut PST20 (http://www.anthemguitars.com/product-details.html?index=15) and pulled one down and plugged into a Bogner Alchemist. Wow! This was a pretty cool guitar. It played well with a substantial but not fat neck, string tension felt good, frets were nicely done and the pickups sounded great. The whole guitar felt very alive and resonant. I checked the retail price and found it to be competitive with MIM Fenders. I really liked the fact that the body is chambered because it reduced the weight and made the guitar very resonant. I also plugged it into an Ibanez Tone Blaster and it sounded good there too.
Paul asked if I'd like to meet the designer. I said "sure" thinking sometime in the future I might get to. A couple of minutes later Paul comes back with two guys in tow, Ben Parker (product development) and Benson Taylor (marketing mgr.) Cool! They were very nice and answered all the questions I could ask in the limited time I had. They have a very clear vision of where they are going with Anthem and are eager to get these into real players hands.
What I found out is they have been out for about a year, they are made in a very good plant in China, much attention is paid to detail, and they have new models, colors and models with new features coming out in the next batch that arrives soon. On the list is a stacked P90 guitar and coil taps for the PST20 (http://www.anthemguitars.com/product-details.html?index=15) which is the guitar I played.
The big news is that the other member of the design team has a custom shop in the eastern USA and will be making custom version USA Anthems in his shop. All Anthem guitars will only be sold on line or through mom and pop music stores.
I had thought I had completely gotten over GAS, but alas it is not to be. I'm excited to get one and play live with it. The tones I could get from it were diverse enough to keep this hardcore Strat player happy. The pickups are custom made and designed for each model. The humbuckers on the PST20 (http://www.anthemguitars.com/product-details.html?index=15) were full frequency with a vintage tendency and sounded very sweet like a good Les Paul with bite. I really liked the pickups.
Stay tuned for more information about these guitars. I invited Ben and Ben to come check out the forum. They might stop by to answer questions and say hello.