ĒMI 7 // MASTER SERIES // FROST

I literally just got the guitar out of the box a couple of hours ago, and I can already tell there is a lot of sloppiness and bad craftsmanship going on. Whoever is in charge of quality control needs to up their game a bit, because for a guitar THIS expensive, everything should be on point, NO excuses. First things worth mentioning, the paintjob (or whatever it is) on the neck is just straight up bad. You can see along the edges of the neck that there aren’t any coating there, which gives it a rougher feel compared to the actual fretboard and back of the neck. The neck also straight up has scratches on it???? One would think I bought this guitar used. Second, there are some worrying signs of rough handling. The wood is somewhat splintered and badly treated where the trus rod is supposed to be, and there are a few (though admittedly minor) scratches on the finish already. Also, for some reason the first fret is much lighter in color compared to the others, I don’t know if this is due to the wood itself or not, but to me this just looks like they didn’t put enough coating in that particular area… Also, the 5-way switch looks cheap compared to the rest of the guitar, and is kind of just an eyesore, and the knobs don’t feel particularly smooth. The backplates are made of plastic and feel somewhat cheap, though i’ll admit this wouldn’t bother me if not for the other issues seeing it as you rarely interact or look at the backplates in general.

All in all, when comparing this guitar to my ernie ball music man jp15, I just keep seeing a lot of shortcuts being made by the manufacturers. For example: i’ve owned my jp15 for about 5 years now, and I am still to this day, yet to find a single flaw on the guitar. The craftsmanship is just simply flawless and you can tell a lot of love went into it! No sloppy finishes, the wood is treated nicely, no rough edges, there are small details like metal backplates, smoother knobs, and nice looking switches, AND amazing playability. The worst part is? I PAID LESS for my music man. About 1000 dollars less, believe it or not.

Now before I wrap this up, i’d like to point out some of the positives.

The pickups sound great, no doubt about it, and I don’t really need to go into further detail there.

The neck feels a bit… dry? If that makes sense? And I mean that in a bad way, I think it could use some oil treatment like other guitar manufacturers do to make it feel more smooth. I feel more in control when playing my music man than the abasi, but overall it’s a good neck that allows for super fast speed and precision.

The ideas of this guitar are pretty cool and appreciated, the way the guitar rests on my leg when playing, and the cutaways allows for great access.

The guitar just «feels» ergonomic if that makes sense. Even though I feel like very little LOVE and care went into this particular instrument, I still recognize the thoughts and ideas going on here. The guitar feels FAST to say the least, and I am having fun with it as of right now. But seeing as there are so many things wrong with it, I am very much tempted to send it back. I’ll add some pictures down below in case you are curious. I AM NOT here to bash on Tosin or anyone else associated with the brand, and I personally have high hopes for these guitars, but as of right now, I’m left disapointed. And I am sorry if I seem a little harsh but guitars in this sort of price range have NO room for errors, there are simply NO excuses, no matter what anyone tells you.

I ALSO WANT TO CLARIFY that I highly doubt any of this happened during shipping. The box the guitar came in was pretty much in perfect shape, not a scratch or hole in sight, and to me it looks like they did a good job, so this is most likely issues with the manufacturing.