PRS SE Mikael Akerfeldt

Oh, a small update on my whereabouts. Right now I am in Bangkok. 

One of this church member here is a big fan of metal. He plays metal and almost only metal. It appears he doesn't really favour other genres so much. For me, I listen, play and explore everything, maybe with an extra bit of attention towards blues and fusion.

Anyway, his gear was a signature PRS SE. Mikael Akerfeldt. I am not so much of an Opeth fan so it isn't surprising that I wouldn't touch this signature guitar at a music store. But I had the luxury to try it out for quite a long time.

It is a nice looking guitar. That was my first though. Tone-wise, it isn't that bad as well, considering the fact that I played through a Roland Cube 15x and I could get some nice tones. The pups there are the same ones as SE Orianthi, PRS Designed SE HFS Treble (bridge) and Vintage Bass (neck).

Let's talk about the neck. The guitar shop he'd bought this from didn't make a proper setup for this guitar.
Either that or he'd lowered the action too much. There was a very bad fret buzz in the 19th fret on the 4th string. Oh, for those who hates gloss-finished neck, I have a good news for you. The neck on this guitar is matte-finished. No more glossy feel. And it sports an ebony fretboard. The neck width is rather wide and it reminds me of some Schecters. I used to be very anal about the neck size but along the way, I got used to switching between different types of necks. Thus, it is not a big problem. The rest of its features are the same as most SE Singlecut models; the bevel at the cutaway, 1-volume and 1-tone control.

Tone-wise, the bridge pickup sounds really fine. Feed it with quite a bit of gain and it sings well. But for the neck, it wasn't my cup of tea. While it sounds sweet with the gain cranked up, its sweetness dies of when the gain is reduced. Some may like that tone where there is a huge mid hump thanks to the body shape and the humbucker. To me, I still prefer the wooly tone of a single coil and a strat. Personal preference I would say.

Once again, with that said, you still have that 3-band EQs on your guitar amp, unless it comes either with a single tone knob or 2-band EQs. I would normally place them in the low criteria list since I like to have more control over my tone and I feel uncomfortable with being limited to a single tone-knob. Mid-band is a very important band to me as well and I wouldn't want it to be lacking as well. Anyway, you can tweak and adjust your guitar amp to compensate or cut down any section of your tone. We should try to tweak first before we start to whine.