Welcome to Corky’s Corner…for Gearheads of all sorts.
Roseville, Calif.- Let’s start off by saying when I opened up the case I was shocked by the killer flame maple top and color of this ESP guitar. The body wood is Basswood and the neck is maple with a satin finish on the back and a gloss finish on the fingerboard. Twin custom wound Dimarzio humbuckers with coil tap’s, original chrome Floyd rose trem finish off this stunner.
I played it on a Mojave Scorpion head with a 2‐12″ speaker cab. The full humbucker tone was everything you would want in a shred type super strat but I did like the fact that these custom wound pickups have a nice smooth fat tone, never shrill or piercing. The coil tap tone is not perfect single coil sounds but very sweet and open with a warm mid voice. The coil tap with both pickups on pulled up some very convincing Tele type tones.
The guitar plays like ‘butta, even my hardest licks seemed to fly off the neck at speeds I long forgot I had. The balance and feel is of super high quality and when you add the good looks and you have a solid winner in that $1000 ‐ $2000 purchase price.
Score ESP EII ST2
On a scale of 1‐10, I would rate this guitar a perfect 9.
