RIP: The Ernie Ball Music Man - ARMADA model

[tbonesullivan]

I also kinda liked the pizza slice. However I'm definitely not in the market for any new guitars, amps, basses, etc, so I'll have to live vicariously through youtube videos until I sell off a bunch of guitars I don't play.

[Tortious]

So this showed up yesterday.

 

The MF 'sale' plus some points I had made it attractive enough to try. They have a 6 month return policy now. Seems a bit much. Anyway, I quite like it.

I understand now why they slimmed down the neck. It's large. They have a long way to go before Ibanez territory. Seems very well made, like everything I've tried of theirs, though I've never bought one before. Axii & similar always seemed to just not suit me, nice as they are.

The new ones have okoume body wings versus mahogany for this. I have no clue which should sound 'better'. Suhr uses okoume for the Aura LP type guitar, other makers use it too. The TGP crowd likes to argue about it. And who would possibly know more than them? 🙃

Not a big fan of top-wrapping the tailpiece, that's how it came. Will correct that when I change the strings.

It feels and sounds quite 'LP Custom-like' to me. The big neck is at the limit of how much neck I can tolerate. It seems a bit larger than my R8. No, I'm not getting out my calipers. It's really nice overall. Keeper for what I have into it.

Things I dislike. The backplate is large. I was curious as to why they felt compelled to make such a cavern. My only guess is weight relief. There's some kind of circuit board-like thing on the pickup switch. Is that really necessary? That's the kinda shit that breaks on me. Also, that large back plate isn't set in to the body with a little shelf, it just sticks out. Somewhat annoying. On a guitar of this price, they could at least set it in like an LP or PRS style. The goth-ish logo on the headstock doesn't do much for me either.

Still, it's pretty cool and different.

Nice touch on the case, now I don't have to make a laminated luggage tag to pick it out of a row of cases.

Most importantly for this crowd, the acoustic voice 🤩 is surprisingly loud. 

[tbonesullivan]

They used to call Okoume "African Mahogany". I'm not sure they were ever using Honduras Mahogany with the Armada. That is one sharp looking instrument. They have nice cases too, though my only beef is that they are kinda thick, and won't fit in my guitar case rack. Yes, I'm being petty, but I can't put my Steve Morse of my Luke III in the rack.