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some visual mass to an already solid-feel-ing instrument. That’s not to say that this
guitar is heavy – it’s quite the opposite
– but rather that it feels significant in your
hands. The set neck gave it a feeling of
unity, and we hadn’t even plugged in yet.
This guitar has obviously been built by
people who recognize that good design
can stir up just as much excitement as a
good pair of pickups. The Ron Asheton
conjures both the Motor City’s heyday
and modern minimalism with its striking angular pickguard and three highly
chromed knobs. Asheton’s own signature
adorns the back of the headstock in a
nicely unobtrusive flourish, and the trio
of lightning bolts on the upper wing look
absolutely badass, a touch that could easily come across as over-the-top anywhere
else. The package is rounded out with a
Tune-o-matic bridge, stopbar tailpiece and
a set of Wilkinson EZ-Lock tuners.
Raw Power
Of course, as we here at Premier Guitar
can attest, it’s almost criminally easy to
create a gorgeous guitar that sounds and
plays terribly. Fortunately, Joe Naylor
has been at this far too long to let that
happen, and the Ron Asheton Signature
Model plays like a guitar easily costing
twice as much.
For those not familiar with Asheton’s playing, it’s the unmistakable sound of treble-edged pickups getting pumped through
a stack of speakers just on the verge of
exploding into shrapnel. Thus, it’s appropriate that Reverend left the humbuckers
behind and dropped in a trio of custom P-
90s with bite, although that’s probably not
strong enough of a word. The coupling of
the korina body with these pickups gives
the guitar all of the midrange you could
ask for, and the guitar manages to sound
both fat and crisp at the same time. The
neck pickup plays it safe and is wound a
bit cleaner; the bridge pickup played a
bit hotter than a vintage unit, partly due
to the pickup itself and partly due to the
guitar’s body naturally positioning my
hand right over the pickup.
The slickest part of this guitar lies unassumingly at number three on the pickguard – the battle-tested Bass Contour,
standard on all Reverends. Turning this
knob engages a sort of reverse Tone,
seamlessly adding or subtracting bass
from your sound. While I was skeptical at first, I quickly became floored at
its ability to morph the fullness of the
P-90s into the snap of a hot single coil.
We quickly became best of friends, as it
enabled me to play the thick, fuzzy strumming of “I Wanna Be Your Dog” and the
electric-wire riffs of “T.V. Eye” back-to-back. The only complaint I could level
with the Bass Contour is that I would like
to see more<I> bass removed from the
signal, as I felt the P-90s were capable of
going even further into single coil territory for those beefy Tele lovers out there.
Nevertheless, the Ron Asheton Signature
is a versatile guitar and could fit into a
variety of musical styles – a black finish is
available for those who need to be a bit
more discrete.
The Ron Asheton has a 24. 75” scale,
squaring it up with the classic Flying V
and making it extremely playable. Every
copped bend I threw at it came across
smoothly, and that’s saying a lot for my
technique – imagine what it could do in
the right hands. The setup was great right
from the factory, intonation and all, something you might not be used to in this
price point. The only nit I could pick was
in the neck shape; it was a bit too oval for
my tastes, but that’s in line with its classic
lineage and thus hardly a knock.
The Final Mojo
I’ll leave you simply with, what should be
in my opinion, this signature model’s new
tagline (Reverend, I am open to licensing):
You may think you know what rock n’
roll is. But you have not picked up this
guitar yet.
you’ve always wanted a Flying
V but have been waiting for the
right one
you need to have a baseball bat
in your hands while you’re playing
.0
Reverend Guitars
MSRP $839
reverendguitars.com
www.premierguitar.com
