Chapman ML1 Modern V2 Electric Guitar Abyss

I actually purchased this guitar on a whim. I'm mostly a Fender fan but wasn't finding the tone that I was looking for in a Fender guitar. My goal was to find a guitar that could give me a great overdriven tone for rock music, but also a good clean tone. Most fenders that I have played have a chiming, bell-like tone. But I was looking for something less sharp or nasal and more throaty. As soon as I plugged this guitar in, I as thrilled with the tone. It's not for everyone, but it is for me. The tone is a very vocal and throaty midrange. It helps to articulate the highs from the mids with an overdriven amp. However they designed these pickups, the coil-split ones sound like great vintage single coils. There is so much character to these pickups, I don't ever think I've played a guitar at this price that gives tones with this kind of character. I normally play rock and dirty blues and this guitar just sounds more like the sound in my head than any other guitar I can remember playing for a long time. I purchased this as a fun experiment and a back-up guitar. I've had it for a few months and have barely even touched my other guitars. My only problem with this guitar is the tone pot. It is the push/pull coil-splitting pot. The push/pull works fine but, when you turn the tone down, it doesn't do anything for the first 3/4's of a turn. When you get to the last 1/4, it totally numbs the tone. I'm sure that is a QC issue on my model and not normal. I use the volume knob all of the time and it works great, but I am not using the tone knob at all due to this issue. I should also point out that the pictures on the Guitar Center site do not do this guitar justice. I have the Black Blood model and it looks so much better in person that on the site. There are better pictures online if you look for them.

Handles well and looks really slick. Could have more tone control but action and feel are nice and solid. Definitely a good guitar for that different sound and has well balanced weight.

I've had this guitar for 2 months and it has quickly become my favorite. I thought it was a risk ordering a guitar from a relatively small brand based on liking the owner on youtube but I was blown away. Starting off, the finish on these are beautiful, the fade blue to purple is extremely unique and looks amazing. The construction feels solid and the neck has a satin finish so its very comfortable to play. The tuners are fine and hold tune without issues so far. The jumbo frets are fantastic and make me wish I had them on all my guitars. The pickups are what impress me the most. Both pickups sound great and the coil tap/split works better than any of the others I have in my < $1000 guitars collection. The clean sounds are nice and the pickups have enough output to sound great with distortion. In general I am extremely happy with this guitar, based on the fun I have had with it so far I will absolutely be buying more chapman guitars in the future and if you are on the fence like I was this; is not a guitar that will disappoint once you play it for the first time.

For the price, this guitar is awesome. The overall feel and look is outstanding, and the bridge pickup is clear and articulate (the neck is ok). The split coil sounds are chimey but not harsh and brittle which was surprising. No high frets, the nut is cut well for the strings, the tuners are pretty stable. Cosmetically the finish and general build quality is very good with some exceptions. Mine came with a crack in the veneer at the heel of the neck near the pickup. There are some pretty gnarly tool marks on the fret board and frets, but mostly on the higher ones which is pretty typical on something at this price point. there are some chips and what looks to be excess glue to where the nut is installed. Cosmetic stuff isn't THAT important to me, especially for lower priced instruments, although the crack in the veneer bummed me out so that contributes to taking away one star. What also is keeping it from being 5/5 is that the saddles could be a little more rounded off because the low E saddle has it's corner digging into your palm when muting, not painful just uncomfortable. Then finally I needed to add a shim because the angle of the neck was far too steep for me to get the action I wanted

I started on a cheap strat clone and bought this as my second and new main guitar. It's much easier to play than my old one, has a good feel to it and is fun to play. It has an annoying fret buzz that needs to be fixed because the strings are really close to the lower frets and aren't so close to the higher frets. Other than that, it's a good guitar.

I bought this roughly 3 weeks ago and was very excited to finally pickup one. When i demoed the floor model (the ONLY one they had) it had some pretty bad fret buzz, usually no big deal because they take care of it in store before you buy it. When i mentioned it to the sales associate he tried his best to adjust the truss rod and then said "I think the truss rod is spinning loose in the neck". To that i said "uh oh", but the manager came over and informed him that its a british guitar (made in indonisia) so it uses a metric size. The sales associate then took the guitar to one of there techs who was able to adjust it just enough to get SOME of the buzz out and i was happen enough with it thinking "the website says it comes with a truss rod allen key so no biggy!". Turns out, since it was a demo/floor model it comes with LITERALLY NOTHING at FULL PRICE. Again i though, "no big deal i guess, its just an allen key i can buy for like $3". I final order the proper size key from a uk based hardware store and find out that THE TRUSS ROD WAS ENTIRELY STRIPPED. Now my only choice is to put the stock pickups back in and return this defective instrument. VERY, VERY dissapointing purchase. I will not be buying from GC or Chapman guitars again. I only give it 2 stars because besides the glairing lack of craftmanship, it actually was a nice feeling guitar and sounded nice with new pickups. BE CAREFUL AND THOROUGHLY TEST EVERY PIECE OF HARDWARE ON YOUR GUITAR BEFORE YOU BUY IT! Regardless if its new, used, demo/floor model or whatever. If they tell you you can't test things like the truss rod quality and electronic quality before buying ANY instrument, leave and go to another music store.