Schecter Damien Special - Crimson Red

I'm a real guitar freak, I've owned at least 100 guitars (PRS, Fender, Gibson, Ibanez, Schecter, Kramer, Samick, Agile, Jackson ... just about every brand you can think of) in 12 years, and although I may not be the best player in the world, I know my fair share when it comes to what makes a good guitar. And this is a REALLY good guitar. First I'd like to go over the looks. The guitar looks great, the finish is amazing; a very gorgeous quilted maple accents the beatiful crimson red color (wich is slightly lighter than schecter's black cherry wich can be seen on the Damien Elite for example, but it's not too light either) and the body showed no scratches, dings or cracks wich is always a good thing (Yes even a brand new $3k Gibson can have a small crack somewhere in the body, it already happened to me). The hardware: the cosmo black, gun metal gray, charcoal gray or whatever color you want to call it, looks perfect on this guitar as it gives it kind of a cool, smooth vibe that is a mix between elegance and metal \m/. It matches perfectly for this guitar's finish. The NECK and FRETBOARD: The neck looks great and the maple is perfect, not too yellow and not too white so again it fits great with the whole concept of the guitar. As does the Headstock wich looks oretty good and the Smoke inlay ... The INLAY: let's talk about this. I'm not 100% if the inlay is supposed to be flames or smoke but due to it being black pearloid instead of mother of pearl or abalone then I have to believe it is in fact smoke. The inlay might put some people off BECAUSE it is really dark and you can barely see it, however that is a matter of opinion, to me the inlay defines the guitar perfectly and it goes perfect with the whole cool, subtle, elegant heavy metal look (if that makes any sense) and i strongly believe that if the inlay was MOP or Abalone it would ruin the concept of the guitar and it would not look as good as it does now. As far as LOOKS go, the guitar gets 10/10 THE PICTURES DO NOT DO IT JUSTICE. FEAUTURES: The guitar features a bound mahogany body, string thru construction, Active EMG pickups, Grover 18:1 ratio tuners, a maple neck and rosewood fretboard with a black pearl smoke inlay. For the price, the guitar gets a 10/10 on features. SOUND AND PLAYABILITY. The guitar features EMG pickups, wich are tight, responsive and incredibly loud and mix that up with a mahogany body so in terms of sound, i'm sure most of you know what to expect, this is a guitar that excels is made primarily for Metal, however it is quite versatile and you could play most genres with it such as Jazz, Blues, Pop, etc. But because the pickups are so fierce you might want to dial down the gain a bit for softer music types. But other than that they work and sound great. Tuning is great on the guitar, thanks to the Grover Tuners that always do a pretty decent job of keeping your guitar in tune. In terms of SOUND this guitar get an 8.5/10. PLAYABILITY: here's the BUT, this guitar came with a TERRIBLE setup, the worst setup I've seen in years, to the point of it beibg completely unplayable due to the neck needing some major relief (there was a very strong and very annoying fret buzz in the first 7 frets) Luckily for me I know my way around a guitar and was able to fix it by setting up the guitar and adding some relief to the neck, but it was obvious to me that when i got this guitar it was one that had been returned as it was very dusty and had the terrible buzz. Regardless, despite the fact that i was able to fix the buzz the guitar is still not quite as comfortable as I'd like it to be and that is because i need to file some of the frets. So PLAYABILITY gets a 7/10 (after the set-up). Overall AMAZON experience: I got this guitar reasonably quick, amazon's service was great providing me all the information i needed for tracking my package and they were always keeping me up to date on my order. The item was as described (used like new) but my only beef was that as I stated before, the guitar was obviously a return due to the major fret buzz.so the AMAZON experience gets an 8.5/10. Still for the money it was a really good buy and if you're thinking about purchasing, don't delay and buy it before they're gone, because for the money you'll have tough luck finding a better axe with these looks and features.

The top 3/4 frets touch the strings when nothing is going on. I was playing rock smith and always wondered what the hissing sound was and thought "well that must just be how guitar's are" well, i was in one of the mini games requiring a lot of accurate play in the top 3/4 frets and was like "WTF why isn't it working, I'm hitting all the right fretts" Sat the guitar on the table and its easily identifiable that this guitar needs to be replaced/trashed. I expected better quality for $400.00. I've done a lot of buying on this website over the last 3 years, and this is the worst item I have ever purchased on Amazon thus far. Time to test out the customer service I guess. Not exactly sure how I'm going to send it back seeing as I bought the guitar little over a month ago, and obviously through away the box...

I've noticed that when playing there is a hollow sound with every pick, it's hard to describe but it's especially evident when double picking. I really noticed it when me and my drummer were messing around doing some recording and the double picking part just sounded horrible and we couldn't figure what was causing it. We tried different amps, different heads and different cabs but it would not go away.

The media could not be loaded. I hate to be the first not to give this guitar a 5 star rating but I can't get over the drop off on the 12th fret. I made a video so you can hear what I mean. Sorry about the pajama bottoms. That's just how I roll these days.I'm currently to ill to go to anywhere including a guitar shop (hence the pajamas). I don't expect to be better for a few more months. I'm perplexed as to what to do. It's not really a defective product... it works, it just works poorly in that 12th, 13th, & 14th fret area. The unacceptable region appears limited to that G string, though the B & E strings are nothing to write home about.I noticed it while playing with the factory setup. The action was really high and there was some fret buzz but I could live with it for now. But then I noticed that dead zone and I lowered the action to a more preferred height hoping it would fix the problem but of course it didn't. Just a little more fret buzz but at least the dead zone didn't get any worse. A straight edge revealed a little relief in the neck. There could be more but I'm not going to adjust the rod. I don't feel comfortable enough doing that on a new guitar I might return.The product information included with the guitar reads, "For warranty service the instrument must be returned to Shecter Guitar Research through an authorized dealer." I don't know what to do. I hate to return it. Everything else is great. I was surprised at how well those EMG's sound clean. Wish they would have left the neck blank but I don't see the inlay when I'm playing so, meh.One star off for the dead'ish zone but If I get it repaired or replaced it'll get that star back.***Update 1/7/2012***Amazon never ceases to amaze me. I did a text chat with a representative and Amazon next-day-air mailed me another Damien Special. A few hours after turning off my computer a replacement guitar was at my doorstep. Outstanding. I waited a couple hours before opening as so it could acclimate to the indoor temperature.Sadly the 2nd guitar suffers a similar problem, only this time on the G string 11th fret. It has a bit of a squeel and then a rather quick drop off as it rubs against a high fret. I'm going to have to buy some luthier tools (3 fret straight edge, fret file & crown). I should have those anyways.I tried to call the local corporate guitar retailer to get a quote on fret work but the gentleman was out for a few days and gave specific instructions not to give quotes on anything other than restringing. He'd probably tell me he'd have to see the guitar before he can give me a quote and I can't take it in so that's not going to work. I can't take it to my preferred local guitar shop because I didn't buy it from them. "I bought it online..." well those be fighting words around these parts. When the smoke settled they would sarcastically tell me to take it to Amazon and have them do the setup/fretwork.The guitar only has to last me until I'm healthy again. So it's acceptable for now. However the inability of the guitar/guitars to hold a note in an area or two no matter how high the action is set is worth noting.Amazon's service is 5 star, however the guitar holds at 4 stars.***Update 1/11/2012***I had some more time to spend with the guitar. The performance was unacceptable. I eyed the neck looking for high frets, not the best method but the most affordable. I didn't notice any high frets but I did notice the neck was warped. It has the appropriate concave bend on one side and a convex bend on the other. That's what is creating the dead zone. Also there was a buzz coming from the head that I believe was caused from the truss rod cover not resting flush against the headstock. This was only noticeable when I'd slack the strings but would be annoying when playing in a dropped tuning.I tried contacting Schecter via email but received no response. Amazon is shipping another one. Hopefully the third time is a charm.