Xaviere XV600

[Ro3b]

What it is: a semi-hollow-body telecaster-shaped guitar. Mine is surf green with cream-colored P90 pickups and a maple fretboard. Unlike the standard thinline tele, this guitar is built more like a Gibson 335, i.e. separate sides, back, and top (all thin maple laminate) with a poplar block running down the middle. The maple neck bolts on and is a separate piece of wood from the fretboard; it has a high-gloss, vintagey-looking amber finish. The fretboard has a 12" radius and medium/jumbo frets (Jay says that vintage frets are only useful if you wear a beret). The string-through bridge has bent steel saddles. Knobs and switch feel nice and solid. The wiring looks well done to my untrained eye. The guitar came strung with .009s, aka The Strings That Rob Will Never Be Able To Play In Tune. I slapped a set of .010s on first thing.


What I love about it:

• The tones. The cleans are fat, but chimey. The neck pickup can achieve very nice jazz tones. The two pups together are almost pianolike. At higher gain levels, things turn loose and snarly; the guitar really starts to sound like it wants to hurt you. I haven't ever sat down and gotten to know what P90s are capable of before, and I've got to say I'm a convert. This is an incredibly versatile instrument with a vast vocabulary of sounds. I’m finding myself pushed into unfamiliar realms of knob-twiddling on my still-pretty-new Valvetronix amp. Right now I'm really feeling this guitar with the AC15 and AC30 models.
  
  
• The playability. The neck is very fits very nicely in my hand. In fact, I'm going to go out on a limb and say it's the most comfortable neck I've ever played. Jay says the neck was CAD/CAMed from a vintage guitar he owns, so no wonder. It's a little fatter than the Squier and Mighty Mite necks I'm used to. Very smooth and fast. The frets are medium/jumbo, and they're set and finished perfectly. Actually the whole setup job on this guitar was expertly done. All I had to do was lower the action a bit. I'd read somewhere that the bridges on these are set a little high for shipping, for reasons I can't fathom. Anyway, three-quarters of a turn of the allen key on each bridge saddle screw was all it took.
  
  
  There's no belly cut, which I like. It feels a little like holding an acoustic guitar. The instrument balances very nicely. I was afraid it would be neck-heavy, but it's not.
  
  
• How it looks. You've seen the pics. It's beautiful. I tend to like guitars that aren't copies of Les Pauls or stratocasters or whatever. This guitar is obviously a tele, but just as obviously not. Like a 1950s refrigerator designer had heard of a telecaster and decided to build one for himself. As I said, I'd really wanted the red sparkle finish at first, but the combination of surf green with cream pickups has really grown on me. It's very, very cool.
  

Flaws/Nitpicking:

• There's a bit of roughness on the inner edges of the f-hole. This is very common in factory-built instruments with f-holes; I don't like it, but it's to be expected.
  
  
• The inside of the guitar on the f-hole side is painted flat black, which makes for a nice look, but it's done sloppily. It looks almost like they stuck a brush through the f-hole after the top was put on. Not a big deal unless you look at the guitar really closely.
  
  
• I’ll probably eventually replace the white plastic nut. I’m not in a rush, though. It’s very well set up and doesn’t bind at all, and the guitar sounds just fine.

All in all, I'm tremendously satisfied with this instrument. At $179 it's an insane deal.

[Tone2TheBone]

I love surf green and P90s. Great combo congrats...it sounds like a decent fun guitar for the price heck.

[sunvalleylaw]

Sounds like an awesome deal. Pics and clips?

[Ro3b]

I'll get some pics up soon, but I'm not really set up to make quality recordings, alas. I'll try sticking my crappy computer mic up in front of my amp, but it probably won't give a good idea of what this thing sounds like. The samples that were posted on Harmony Central are pretty accurate.

[Guitar Gal]

Nice review Ro3b :

Looks like you have yourself a winner. Enjoy

GG

[Brian Krashpad]

Congrats Rob!

If I wasn't flat as a floogie and didn't already have too many guitars (I have 3 Teles and 3 P-90 guitars) I'd be all over that like white on rice.

[Spudman***]

Here are some sound clips of the P90 version guitar.
http://www.rig-talk.com/forum/viewto...p?f=2&p=252366

[Ro3b]

Just an update. The P90s are consuming my soul. I'm hating the sound of all my other guitars. The Xavi seems incapable of producing a bad or unusable tone. Today was the first totally free Saturday I've had in a month or so, and I've spent a good five hours at least playing this thing. There's more to come before bedtime.

The cats dig it too.

[duhvoodooman***]

Great! Finally, a photo! Nice looking axe, I think. Love that Surf Green color....

[Bloozcat]

Hmmmmm....

Looks more like Daphne Blue....another of my favorite colors.

[Spudman***]

Man...I am so close to getting one with the Dream 180s that it isn't even funny. Because, you know...I really need another guitar. (sorry, I'm being sarcastic to myself) These are just a really good deal and almost everybody that has posted anything on line really likes to play theirs.
Decisions, decisions.....

[Ro3b]

Cool, I'll be interested to hear what you think of the Dreams. I'm really trying not to become inundated with guitars, otherwise I would have ordered one of each.

[Spudman***]

I'm a little beyond inundated so that excuse isn't going to stop me. Although, I've got another excuse going right now but I'm sure I'll get over it soon.ude:

[scgmhawk]

Ro3b,

Are you still happy with the guitar after 3 months? That price is making it tough for me to pass up! Thanks.

[Ro3b]

Hi scgmhawk, sorry, I didn't see your post till now. I'm still loving this guitar. These pickups really ring my bells.

If you're interested in getting one, you may want to hold off for another month or so. Jay's evidently getting another shipment in sometime in March. There will be new colors -- inca silver, fiesta red -- and some solid wood versions of this model as well. I'm really trying to own as few guitars as possible, but this same axe in fiesta red would be damn hard to pass up.

[tot_Ou_tard]

Ro3b,

Can you say more about the tone from those pups? How is the playability, fit, & finish of the Xaviere?

[Ro3b]

Can you say more about the tone from those pups?

Well, I'll try. I haven't had any prior experience with P90s, so I can't really compare these to Gibsons or PRSs or whatever. They're pretty bright. I said in my original review that I thought the neck pickup could have some decent jazz tones wrung out of it, but now I think eh, not so much. Even with the tone rolled all the way off it's still pretty sparkly. Um. Think of the Squire '51 humbucker after it's had a few drinks and starts to feel ornery and belligerent. Think of a strat pickup that's been lifting weights and hitting the Equipoise.

Running the bridge pickup through either the blackface model or either of the Vox models on my AD50VT, with a bit of dirt, produces something very close to my ideal rhythm guitar tone. It's rich, crunchy, slightly unhinged, and possibly prone to violence, like an ex-girlfriend of mine.

These pups are pretty noisy at higher gain levels, which I understand is a congenital thing with P90s. I don't mind this too much -- was it Nelskie who said the hum lets you know you're alive? I don't play teh br00tulz much anyway. The middle pickup position is hum-canceling, FWIW.

How is the playability, fit, & finish of the Xaviere?

Playability is great. I find it a really comfortable guitar. The neck has a glossy finish on it that some people have had trouble with, but it doesn't bother me. Fit and finish, well, as I stated before there's a bit of sloppiness in the F-holes that you can see if you use a dental mirror and a strong light source, but I'm generally pleased.

[tot_Ou_tard]

Thanks for the eloquent review R03b.

I'll be waiting for the new colors & may get one then.

[aeolian]

Ro3b, I wanted it exactly like yours (call me a copycat), but they no longer have them in that color. Good to know they are getting new colors, I'll have to keep an eye out.

One combination I don't have in my guitars is one with P90s. I've been close to getting a Godin LG P90 a few times but never found one at the right time.