It's one of these made in Mexico Charvels, I bought this thing used for like $600.

The last time we saw this guitar, I had decided that I was going to take the stock pickups out.

So I will link to a video below the initial sort of review video that I made with this guitar in its stock form, at least for pickups.

In that video, I talked about maybe wanting to swap the pickups out.

So we are now two pickup swaps later, and I love the way this thing plays and feels So I initially took the stock pickups out, which are Seymour Duncan pickups.

These things come with like high-end pickups already installed, stock.

I took those out because I felt like the neck and the middle positions were a little flat feeling or dull for my preference.

I didn't mind the bridge pickup at all, but I just thought, I think this thing, at least for the type of things I wanted to do with it, could be better.

So I actually bought a set of Fralin pickups.

I bought a set of Fralin, like a modern overwound PAF bridge, and then Fralin Hot Strat middle and neck pickups.

I emailed Fralin.

They said, yeah, those should like pair well, pair nicely together.

So I put the Fralins in and left the wiring stock, and I wasn't super happy with the Fralins either.

The Fralin pickups, I felt like the neck and the middle were a little bit unbalanced with the bridge.

And, again, this is all personal preference stuff.

I might have handed you the guitar with the Fralins in it, and you might have thought it sounded fantastic.

So all of it is just, you know, what are you using it with?

What are your preferences?

But for me, when I got the bridge sounding nice, and it did sound really good, the neck and the middle were a little bit shrill, a little spiky.

And if I would EQ things for the neck and middle, the bridge would feel a little bit dull or wooly, that kind of a thing.

So I called my good friend Curtis Lamberton, because Curtis sent me a guitar that had a set of his brand new pickups, the Red Eye pickups.

So the Red Eye bridge, their Humbucker pickups, there's a Red Eye set that's a bridge and neck HH set.

And he sent me a guitar with the Red Eye bridge in it.

I played it a handful of times, and I really liked it.

So the Red Eye from the Lambertones set is more of a, I guess you could call it a modern sounding Humbucker, but it's a higher output, a little more aggressive Humbucker.

Curtis actually texted me, he's like, I think this is the pickup for you.

And turns out it is.

So I said, Curtis, I want to build a set of pickups for the Charvel.

And he said, no problem.

I will build some custom triple shot pickups to match with the Red Eye.

So what we have in this guitar currently is the Red Eye bridge, and then a triple shot neck and middle, but he calls these the triple shot unleaded set.

So they are overwhelmed, they're higher output, there's a little bit of an EQ tweak.

He told me that he used some different materials to build these from his standard triple shot set.

His standard triple shot set is going after like a vintage Fender Strat tone.

So he said, you're going to want something different to match with this Red Eye bridge.

And I love the way it sounds.

So the other thing I did to this guitar is swap out the wiring, and there's really one reason I did that.

Initially, I bought this guitar used, so it wasn't new from the factory.

But the switch in the stock setup didn't feel right.

Like maybe it got bumped somewhere along the way, maybe something banged into it.

But it just, it didn't, especially when you went to the neck position, you had to go to the neck and then push it forward, and it would kind of like barely click into the neck.

And I did not like that, it just didn't feel very good.

So I put a Gun Street wiring harness in here that was made for Ibanez guitars, I think.

I emailed them and they were like, yeah, it'll work great in the Charvel.

So the only difference in the wiring is there's a treble bleed in here now.

And then of course the pots and the switch are all new, and the wire is all new.

But it sort of functions like a traditional three pickup strat style guitar.

So you've got bridge, you've got bridge and middle, you've got just the middle in the three position, the four position is neck and middle, and then of course just the neck.

So stock, the Charvel, I think in the three position it gives you a split humbucker with the neck pickup, which is really cool.

But you know, I'm going with just the standard five way strat type of a setup.

So throughout this video you're hearing some playing samples that Sean and I did of what we're calling the Rev Rig over here.

So we had Derek from Rev in the house not too long ago, and we just left it set up.

So we've got a Generator 120 on the green channel.

So 120 watt, super modern high gain amp, but it does like edge of breakup and clean tones really well too.

So the Generator 120 paired with the Lowley D25 combo down here, which is sort of a vintage voiced, you know, like a Fender type, you know, low watt.

Think of it like their take on a Deluxe Reverb or maybe like a Princeton meets a Deluxe.

Really good sounding amplifier.

Both of them take pedals well, and we put them in stereo just for fun, and it sounds awesome.

So it's not like a pair that you might think would go together if you think of like high gain, you know, modern high wattage amp with vintage low wattage amp, but it works.

And both of them are using the two notes output with Worship Tutorials IRs.

We'll link to all this stuff below if you want to grab this stuff, running the pedal board into it in stereo.

So all the effects going into the amplifier.

So you're hearing that throughout this video as well with these Lambert tones pickups, which I absolutely love in this guitar.

This can kind of function as a longer term review of this guitar, so I've had it for a while now.

I've had a handful of friends that have been able to come over and play it.

Like I said, I got this used from my local guitar center for about $600.

I did get a really good deal, but you can get these for like $650 all day long used.

They come in different configurations.

You can get an HSS like this, you can get an HH, you can get an HSH, different colors, but I think the spec of the guitar kind of stays consistent between all those, the Pro Mod 24s.

So you can reference back to that initial review video, but this is a modern, sort of a modern take on the Strat.

I guess you could say it's a very modern take on a Strat style guitar, but I wouldn't call it like super modern.

It's got a pretty traditional style bridge.

The neck is really comfortable.

It's kind of thin, but not too thin.

It just feels really good.

It's roasted maple.

It has like a satin finish on the back of the neck.

This guitar has a satin finish overall.

It's really starting to wear a lot more.

It didn't help that Bradford came over and dropped it, so it's got a bunch of dings from that, but I like the way it's relicking, actually, and I look forward to having more playwear on it.

I think that'll look cool.

You've got locking, you know, Charvel locking tuners, which I think are very similar to like, you know, Charvel is a Fender brand at this point, so, you know, that's why it has a Fender headstock.

So same as the Fender locking tuners.

They work really well.

This guitar stays in tune extremely well.

This is the stock bridge, stock tuners.

This is a Godot 510 bridge that comes stock on these.

So it's sort of like if you took a budget level guitar and upgraded it, like you kind of get it with all the upgrades already in it.

Like I said, it comes with Seymour Duncan pickups, so, you know, it's sort of like they took a guitar and put all the upgrades in it for you already stock.

And then they also make good modding platforms, which is what I've done to it.

New wiring harness, new pickups to sort of suit what you want to do with it.

But all in all, I really love playing this guitar.

It plays really well.

It's a resonant guitar, you know, when you're just playing it.

The neck feels great.

You can get the setup, you know, if you like to do your own setups, you can get this thing playing really, really good.

So you know, as an HSS strat, I've really grown to love this guitar now, especially with the Lambertones pickups.

Curtis is a master over there building pickups at Lambertones.

I will link to all this stuff below if you want to check all of it out.

Finally, we do want to show you a comparison of this guitar in its current state with the Lambertones compared to its stock state with the stock pickups.

So in the original video, you can go back and check it out, I did like, I put together a little song and I kept all of the settings.

So I used the Line 6 Helix, I kept the patch.

So the patch is going to be the same.

I'm going to record that same song using the guitar with the Lambertones pickups and the new wiring harness in it.

So you can kind of compare the two sets of pickups with a pretty standardized test and let us know if you think there's an improvement.

You've also been hearing Sean play this guitar and he plays it a little better than I do.

By a little, I mean a lot, plus you get to hear more of a modern rock metal type of a take using this through the rev rig again.

And Sean has told me over and over, this is one of his favorite guitars to grab.

Sean is a huge fan of HSS Strat style guitars and he really likes picking this up.

In fact, today, he looked at it and he was like, oh, this thing is made in Mexico?

He's like, man, this thing plays great for an import type guitar.

So Sean and I both have a lot of experience playing high end, boutique type guitars.

And I think both of us would agree that this thing hangs with guitars that cost two or three or more times its price.

And it really does have sort of its own personality, its own voice.

It's a lot of fun to pick up and play.

So if you're in the market for something like this, if you want like a more of a modern take on a Fender Strat style guitar.

So new, these things are, I think, a little over $1,000, right around that $1,000 price point, maybe $1,200.

But like I said, used, you can find them pretty consistently in the $650, $700, $600 to $700 range, which I think is a really good deal for a guitar like this.

Hey, thank you so much for watching.

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