Charvel has added a premium and limited-edition electric guitar to its prized So Cal collection, and beyond its heavily relic’d finish is an instrument boasting “the authentic look and feel of a well-loved guitar” fresh out the box.
The Super-Stock So-Cal Style 1 HSH FR RW is offered in what’s left of an Arctic White colorway, which peels away to reveal an alder body as part of a bold (and incredibly likeable) heavy relic treatment.
“The distressed white body shows plenty of character with scrapes, dings, and worn finish that let you know this axe has been around the block a few times,” Charvel says, even though the guitar is, contrary to appearances, fresh from the factory.
Charvel’s SoCal series has often been lauded as the gold standard for Superstrats with a bevy of speed-inducing traits, and last year it added relic'd finishes to its Pro-Mod and standard ranges for the first time – a trend the firm is clearly eager to continue here.
Of course, with this being Charvel’s flagship shredder, its bolt-on maple neck has a serious need for speed. It is assisted by a smooth neck profile with rolled fingerboard edges and a broken-in feel courtesy of the relic finish.
It offers a “perfect for shredding” 12-16” radius rosewood board with 22 frets, and a heel-mounted truss rod-adjusting thumbwheel.
A tortioseshell pickguard backdrops the guitar's DiMarzio HSH pickups. There’s a Super Distortion in the bridge, a singe-coil Dark Matter 2 in the middle position, and a PAF Pro ’bucker in the neck.
They pride themselves on “ranking out rich, warm vintage tone with plenty of growl when you dig in”, and they’re wired up to two Gold speed knobs – one for Volume, one for Tone – for easy tweaking mid-shred. As expected from such a pickup configuration, a five-way switch offers unscrupulous tonal autonomy.
A Floyd Rose 100 series tremolo headlines its hardware, bringing dive bombs, whammy tricks, and plenty of fireworks to the instrument’s toy box, while the double-locking system looks to ensure reliable tuning. There are Charvel-branded die-cast tuners at the other end.
The new Charvel Super-Stock So-Cal Style 1 HSH FR RW comes loaded with light .009-.042 gauge strings and carries a $1,599.99 price tag.
Check out Charvel for more.
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