Ibanez George Benson Signature GB10EM - Antique Amber Review

A great guitar.

I don't have all the words to describe how great this guitar is, but it's got a great woody tone and what I would call some snap. I mostly play it unplugged, and it's got pretty nice volume that way (floating pickups mean that the solid top is free to vibrate). I think it sounds close to a classical guitar unplugged. The pickups also sound great when it's plugged in. I actually… read more really like the wood bridge. I feel like it cuts out the overtones, so I get right to the tone I want, and it still has a surprising amount of definition. The neck is perfect in my book. Nice and slim, easy to get around. The body is smaller than most jazz boxes, so it's really comfortable to hold and has more modern looking proportions than other jazz boxes.

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My First Archtop and It's Gorgeous!

Never owned a "jazz box" before. However, over the past 4 yrs I got very serious about upping my jazz soloing skills; includingre-engineering my picking technique. All that was done om my LP Classic. Come last Xmas, I saw the great GB10EM offering on S/W anddecided it was an opportunity too good to miss. It was time to reward myself. I wasn't disappointed.Since this is a fairly… read more inexpensive axe, my expectations weren't particularly high, despite all the good reviews on the Internet. At this price, I considered it an experiment. Normally, I would be very reluctant to buy online (sight unseen) but given the C19 pandemic and S/W's 55 point review, I felt it was worth the gamble. S/W didn't disappoint. The GB10 arrived in mint condition and, even though it's built in Indonesia, Ibanez QC holds there. The workmanship is absolutely impressive.Several features of the EM that sold me, over the (Chinese) SE, was the (1) color: I wasn't interested in yet more boring "burst" colors; especially blue, (2) body size and (3) shape: it's essentially a s Gibson LP shape with a 1.5" deeper body. The same applies to the neck dimensions. Most jazz boxes are much bigger and deeper. In fact, I would've paid the SE price for this color scheme if everything else were equal. My decision wasn't just based on price, per se. The EM is a complete bargain.All that said, my first attempts at playing it were a disaster. The feel and playability of the body with flatwouunds are so different from an LP that, at one point, I thought I'd made a huge mistake and eBay would be the next stop. I was so desparate that I even went down to a 0.43mm plectrum (paper thin). That did help and within a week it all started to come together and I was back to my usual medium 351 playing Benson's "Give Me the Night".Ever since then, I've completely fallen in love with this thing. I play it every day and I can't imagine a better new buy at this price. It's been incredibly helpful for my jazz guitar studies. Getting essentially the same sounds as Benson, or whoever, really helps make for faster progress.Something not addressed anywhere that I could find is, restringing with a moveable (free) bridge and that wooden tailpiece cover. Just last week I finally replaced the strings with D'Addario 11-50 flat chromes. And the answer is: the tailpiece is hinged and lifts up when all the strings are loosened or removed. The ball ends are slid in underneath. The bridge should be taped down so you don't lose the intonation.Another thing that bothered me a little bit when I first played it was, the frets felt a bit rough when bending the treble strings. Reading around the Internet, it seems this is just one of the hazards of buying a low-end guitar (labor costs of polishing?) but, it's easily fixed. In fact, it got better with playing but, noentheless, while replacing the strings, I took the opportunity to polish the frets with a Lizard Spit kit and F-ONE oiled the fretboard (all purchased via S/W). Easily fixed. So, don't fret. :)

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