I first met the owner of VG Guitars on Facebook (A very mild mannered down to earth guy by the name of Chris Conrad a couple years ago). I loved the classic looks of the guitars and basses he had made from Les Paul and SG copies to beautiful Strats and Basses. I originally had talked to Chris about possibly making me a guitar made from Swamp Ash a lighter wood for a very light guitar (This was right after I had my massive heart attack). After much talking back and forth and passing ideas back and forth we started a journey on another guitar. When the metal gods speak you must listen and between a mill messing up and stealing our design and flooding in Colorado to a musician chipping a huge piece out of it we went back to the drawing board and out of the ashes of our mistakes and others come this beauty we deemed our ''Phoenix''.Layout & Features
Maple neck, mahogany body, ebony fretboard, mother of pearl diamond inlays, 3 way toggle, 2 toggle switches, 1 volume, 2 tone, stopbar tailpiece, Dimarzio Chopper, Super Distortion, D Activator pickups, locking tuners.
The toggles allow for coil tapping and more flex to change pickups to active to make for more combination of sounds.
Sound
The term of ''Jack of all trades master of none'' is so not this guitar it really is the ''Jack of all trades and mastered them all''. There is usually no comparison of a custom made guitar to your exact specs to a stock off the shelf guitar. This guitar is a Strat, Tele, Les Paul, Sg, Firebird, Jackson, Esp, all wrapped up into a ball of fury that when I first plugged it in took flight over my soul. The ability to combine subtract and use the pickups in any configuration buckered or singled out really gives this guitar such a unfair advantage over any guitar I have ever played. When I use the Chopper (Bumblefoot's favorite pickup) and turn the tone way down I get the sweetest smoothest cleans I have ever heard and add some sweet tube infused distortion and the leads I get are articulate, brilliant, smooth and robust. The Super Distortion has graced more guitars then a buffets have rednecks so it really was a no brainer to add this pickup to the center to give me that classic rock of the Ace Frehley. I really had to think long and hard about the bridge pickup and what to use (I am a metal player by trade) I was a bit nervous not have really used Dimarzio's before but wanted to go all in and take a chance and after being on the Dimarzio website looking at all the high output pickups I knew I had to go with the D activator. I know Dimarzio makes higher output pickups then this but you can also get to much of a good thing and I was worried it would way over power the other two pickups but it is magically delicious. This guitar is quiet, loud, soft, brutal, heavy, coarse, classic and is a fire breathing guitar like nothing in the universe!!!!! This guitar is tonally the full package in every way shape and form and I would trade half my collection before I would even think of parting with this musical masterpiece.
My Opinion
VG Guitar is not a household name in the guitar world chances are this is the very first time you have heard of them. Way over in Woodstock VA is a one man guitar maker that does not do this for money or fame or fortune he does it cause he honestly loves guitars, music and people. In a world that is over run by imports from places I cannot even pronounce, it is so refreshing that someone does this still the old fashion way of hand tools, love, blood, sweat and tears!! This V is raw and straight from the hip no flashy binding or pretty add ons it is a natural wood lovers paradise. I do have to confess this guitar is not 100% VG the neck was made by my good friends at Carvin Guitars and also there tuners and stop bar and tailpiece. The use of Carvin parts or hybrid was because of me I love the neck on my Carvin V and wanted a neck that was similar to it and I love there locking tuners but this write up is not about Carvin. I am not total savy with how guys like Chris work there magic but he took this neck and made it feel like silk or felt on a pool table it is smooth as a babies butt. I usually am not a huge fan of bolt on necks but after this guitar I will take a much closer look and not be so prejudice against them. I wanted to add also that originally this guitar was going to have a custom air brushed paint job of massive rolling flames like of a explosion but after I seen the grain of the mahogany I could not do it I felt it would have been a crime against nature. I have so much love for this company and what Chris does check them out for your classic guitar or something different.
Contact
https://www.facebook.com/VGGuitars
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