Jackson DK2M Review

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July 3rd, 2009, 05:32 PM
marnold

Jackson DK2M Review

Jackson DK2M
http://lh6.ggpht.com/_OT7l0dXu4To/Sj...0/img_2263.jpg

As mentioned elsewhere on here, on the 19th of last month I sold my old Fender and Floyd to get a Jackson DK2M. Am I happy with my choice, or do I wish for a do-over? Here are the specs on it:
Made-in-Japan
Dinky-style alder body with cutaways on the lower horn and on the back by the neck plate
Maple neck and fretboard with black delrin (read: plastic) inlays and a matte finish, thin neck (maybe a thin C-shape? not as thin as some but not as thick as a standard Fender), compound radius 12"-16", jumbo frets, standard Jackson pointy headstock
Seymour Duncan JB and Jazz pickups
One volume, one tone, three-way switch
Jackson JT580LP Licensed Floyd Rose tremolo

One thing that struck me right away is how much better the construction is on this guitar than my Floyd. The paintjob is very nice. The neck sits tightly in the pocket. The control cavity is shielded. Nothing is cockeyed or otherwise out-of-spec. I had been warned that some DK2Ms have their necks slanted in the pocket (i.e. the low-E side is lower than the high-E), but mine doesn't do that. My only complaint is that for some reason the trem springs have this tarnish on them. I can't tell what the deal is with it. If it proves to be an issue, I can swap them out easily enough. There is also the tiniest little bit of fret sprout in places. Since the neck has black binding, I'm loathe to try to do anything about it. We'll see how I feel when winter comes back.

The alder body is much heavier than my old, basswood guitars. It's not Les Paul heavy, but more than I'm used too. It won't be an issue. I had to re-EQ my amp because this guitar is darker than my Floyd was (no surprise since my old Screamin' Demon and Area 61s were quite bright). A quick little treble boost and drop in bass and we're in business.

I really like the Duncans in this. The JB sounds just OK clean, but with any level of distortion it sounds clear and punchy. I thought I'd be itching for another Demon, but now I'm not so sure. The Jazz has been a revelation. I really like it for clean and/or bluesy stuff. I've heard people describe it as a humbucker with the soul of a single coil. I'd agree with that. I also understand now why Jimi likes the middle position on HH guitars so much. Despite the JB and Jazz being quite different in output and tonality, they come together nicely in the middle. I think I can see why Seymour Duncan himself calls this his favorite combination.

The thing that really struck me about this guitar is how low I can get the action without any buzzing. I hate fret buzz, so I usually set my guitars a bit higher than I might otherwise like. This one is set low, low, low. If I could only shred, I could do so on this guitar :)

The jury is still out on the trem. The GC goons sold the bar with a different guitar and I'm still waiting for it to arrive. It's got three springs with one in the middle and the other two in a V formation. When I had them put on 10s I should have had them put in a fourth spring instead of cranking down the claw. Oh well. I've pushed down on it with my palm and pulled up on it with my fingers and it's come back into tune, but I haven't had the chance to dive bomb with it yet. It certainly is not the quality of the Floyd that was on my Speedloader. There's some slop in the fine tuners--nothing awful, but still noticeable. The block looks somewhat crude and smallish. If it stays in tune, I won't worry about it. If it doesn't, an Original or Gotoh Floyd is a drop-in replacement.

The only mods I would consider doing soonish is adding a Floyd Rose trem stop. Otherwise, restringing and intonating a Floyd Rose equipped guitar is a pain. I'd like to get some black Schaller strap-locks too.

So am I happy with my purchase? You bet! Do I have the slightest urge to have a do-over? Surprisingly, no. This is the nicest guitar I've ever owned by a good margin. Did I mention it's a little bit pointy too?
July 3rd, 2009, 09:09 PM
Ascension

Cool bro! I have played a number of those and they are nice guitars congrats :AOK: .
July 3rd, 2009, 10:02 PM
sunvalleylaw

Thanks for the review Matt! I am glad that you like it, and it sounds like it was a great deal on a professional quality instrument.
July 4th, 2009, 02:40 AM
SuperSwede

Seems like you are in pointy metal heaven at the moment Marnold :R

I still think that your Fender was awesome!

(btw whats that turtle thing to the left?)
July 4th, 2009, 08:48 AM
marnold

Quote:

Originally Posted by SuperSwede

I still think that your Fender was awesome!

I agree. I would still have it if it had a neck pickup. I really wanted it to have more flexibility. I debated about having it routed for a neck pickup but I was afraid of wrecking its structural integrity. Since I can't afford to have a huge Spud-esque stable of guitars, I really couldn't afford to have a one-trick pony. If I could have gotten away with just selling my Floyd, I would have.

Quote:

Originally Posted by SuperSwede

(btw whats that turtle thing to the left?)

That's my kids' sandbox. It doesn't sound like much without the optional 4x10 cab :)
July 5th, 2009, 04:22 AM
SuperSwede

Quote:

Originally Posted by marnold

I agree. I would still have it if it had a neck pickup. I really wanted it to have more flexibility. I debated about having it routed for a neck pickup but I was afraid of wrecking its structural integrity. Since I can't afford to have a huge Spud-esque stable of guitars, I really couldn't afford to have a one-trick pony. If I could have gotten away with just selling my Floyd, I would have.

Cannot say that I dont understand you, but I do think that these kind of "rare" Fenders will be sought after in the future..

Did you get a fair price for it?
July 5th, 2009, 04:36 AM
ibanezjunkie

Ebony on maple is about the coolest thing around.

played a USA jackson the other day, but it was a secondhand one, machinehead never stock new jacksons or the japanese ones.

duncans?

sweet.
July 5th, 2009, 09:48 AM
pes_laul

Hey marnold excuse my lack of ignorance (and lack of being born) but back in the 80's when they still made charvels wer they pretty much the same thing as jacksons? Because on my step dad's charvel model 88 it plays exactly like any jackson except on the locking nut it has three big screws instead of allen wrench slots
July 5th, 2009, 10:04 AM
marnold

Quote:

Originally Posted by SuperSwede

Cannot say that I dont understand you, but I do think that these kind of "rare" Fenders will be sought after in the future..

That certainly is a possibility. My guess is that it wouldn't be that way with that guitar just since it is so non-Fendery.

Quote:

Originally Posted by SuperSwede

Did you get a fair price for it?

Relatively. I had looked into selling it when I was hot for that white Jackson RR3 (I'm thankful I waited). Given the prices on evilBay/Craigslist that I saw, people were lucky to get $225 for them. I probably could have gotten a bit more than I got but then I'd have to deal with the headaches of eBay, shipping, hoping the buyer isn't a jerk, etc. If I consider myself having bought the DK2M at its original going price, I got a screaming deal for my guitars. When you consider the sale price, it was just OK.
July 5th, 2009, 10:10 AM
marnold

Quote:

Originally Posted by pes_laul

Hey marnold excuse my lack of ignorance (and lack of being born) but back in the 80's when they still made charvels wer they pretty much the same thing as jacksons? Because on my step dad's charvel model 88 it plays exactly like any jackson except on the locking nut it has three big screws instead of allen wrench slots

Yeah, in the mid to late 80s Jackson and Charvel were owned by the same people. The Charvels were all (IIRC) Japanese imports. They shared pickups, electronics, headstock shape, etc., with Jackson. I don't remember when Jackson was bought out by Fender. Since that time, Jackson has remained Jackson and Fender has started producing Charvels that are more like the original San Dimas Charvels that Wayne Charvel himself made in the 70s. I've heard that they are very nice guitars.

For more info on Jackson/Charvel, check out the J/C Forums.

My first electric that I bought about 10-12 years ago was a Charvel Model 7. It was a Telecaster-style with a maple fretboard and reverse-swept pointy headstock. It had been cruelly abused. I was going to refinish and rewire it but someone on the J/C Forums made me an offer I couldn't refuse for it so I sold it and got my Floyd.
July 5th, 2009, 02:35 PM
ibanezjunkie

hey Marnold, this is a bit off topic, but how is that AD30VT? ive seen a couple go real cheap on classified ad sites. the VT30 is like £160 and ive seen AD30VTs go for like sub-£100.

ive heard the AD series had some dodgy things going on with them, was i misled?
July 5th, 2009, 03:09 PM
marnold

Quote:

Originally Posted by ibanezjunkie

hey Marnold, this is a bit off topic, but how is that AD30VT? ive seen a couple go real cheap on classified ad sites. the VT30 is like £160 and ive seen AD30VTs go for like sub-£100.

ive heard the AD series had some dodgy things going on with them, was i misled?

That is off topic. Better to start another thread. There are tons of ADxxVT related threads on here.
July 5th, 2009, 03:26 PM
ibanezjunkie

lol k, im gonna search, Shiner told me to stop making threads...sorta :rotflmao:
July 5th, 2009, 04:30 PM
pes_laul

So is the tremolo your standard Floyd or is like a speedloader or a differnet model?
July 5th, 2009, 06:38 PM
marnold

Quote:

Originally Posted by pes_laul

So is the tremolo your standard Floyd or is like a speedloader or a differnet model?

It's a licensed Floyd, so it's more like a standard Floyd than anything else. The only difference in design is that the screws to hold the strings in place are on the top instead of the back on the bridge. That's what makes it "LP" aka Low-Profile. If you've worked with a Floyd before, you could figure this one out in about two seconds.

It's about the only part of this guitar that seems lower-quality (relative to a real Floyd). I would be concerned about it if I didn't know that an OFR or a Gotoh Floyd are drop-in replacements.
July 5th, 2009, 09:46 PM
sumitomo

That's a sweet ride Marnold,I like the maple neck and the pup choice.I'm gunna have to try one.Very cool:rockon:Sumi:D
July 7th, 2009, 06:00 PM
scgmhawk

Great review, Matt, and congrats again on the new guitar! It looks great.

As an aside, I was going to sell my Floyd after I got my Carvin but decided to keep it to use for alternate tunings. I had it on Craigslist for a week and there was a lot of interest for basically what we paid for it new!
July 8th, 2009, 08:56 AM
marnold

Quote:

Originally Posted by scgmhawk

Great review, Matt, and congrats again on the new guitar! It looks great.

Thanks. I was able to get my hands on a tremolo arm yesterday and put it through some abuse. I didn't check with my tuner, but the guitar stayed in tune with itself. Usually if something is set up wrong, one dive bomb will tell you in a hurry.

Quote:

Originally Posted by scgmhawk

As an aside, I was going to sell my Floyd after I got my Carvin but decided to keep it to use for alternate tunings. I had it on Craigslist for a week and there was a lot of interest for basically what we paid for it new!

Everything's been really slow up here--bad time to try to sell guitars. Plus the population is relatively sparse up here so that limits the number of potential buyers.
July 8th, 2009, 11:38 AM
marnold

Quote:

Originally Posted by pes_laul

So is the tremolo your standard Floyd or is like a speedloader or a differnet model?

I just found this handy site for the various trems that come on Jackson/Charvel guitars. Here's the section on the JT580LP, including pictures.
July 8th, 2009, 03:09 PM
pes_laul

Quote:

Originally Posted by marnold

I just found this handy site for the various trems that come on Jackson/Charvel guitars. Here's the section on the JT580LP, including pictures.

cool, thanks,
July 9th, 2009, 08:47 AM
marnold

Just as an update, yesterday I was playing my DK2M and thoroughly abused the whammy bar as if it owed me money. I could pull it sharp about two full steps (I probably could have gone even sharper but I was paranoid about breaking a string, even though the guitar itself wasn't giving me any indication that I was in danger of that). I dive bombed until the strings stuck to the pickup poles. Lather, rise, repeat. When I checked it with my tuner today I was surprised to see that my low E had gone the tiniest bit flat and the high E the tiniest bit sharp, but that was about it. Rather impressive. So do I feel the need to immediately yank the JT580LP out and replace it with an OFR? Nope.

What I do desperately feel the need to do is fix the intonation. That's going to drive me a bit crazy. I don't know if I want to get a trem stop and then do it or just figure out another way to block it temporarily.
July 22nd, 2009, 10:31 AM
marnold

I placed an order with Axcessories.com on Monday for a trem stop and extra springs so that I can go back to four springs. I prefer the extra stiffness (sig material right there). Since shipping is a flat $6.95 no matter what you order I ordered a trem arm (they have the ones that Ping makes, like my old Speedloader) and a set of black Schaller strap locks. If GC comes through with a trem arm soon I'll just keep it for a spare. Otherwise when this order comes in I'm just going to call them and tell them to credit my card for the amount that I paid for the replacement. Eventually I'll order a set of Schaller buttons for my bass.
July 24th, 2009, 07:23 PM
marnold

Got my stuff in the mail today! It's now got four springs on it. The trem stop is in place, awaiting the inevitable string change. I found out that unlike my previous guitars, the screws for the Schallers are the same diameter as the originals, just shorter. No need for the old wood-glue-and-toothpick trick. I also figured out that Schaller uses a 13mm nut on those strap locks. Thankfully I bought a set of metric wrenches a while back. I also found that a 5/8" wrench does a good job of keeping the other side of the strap lock in place while tightening the nut down. The new Ping-made trem arm does the trick. It's angled away from the guitar more than I'm used to, but I don't mind it. It also seems easy to keep it in place, which is very nice.

Going to call GC and try to get credit for the trem arm tomorrow.

Now that I can finally play it with a strap, I discovered that it is very well balanced. No neck-dive at all. Even though it is heavier than my previous guitars, it doesn't feel heavy at all with a strap.