What is the consensus on Kiesel Guitars? And just general help on selecting a guitar.

Always wanted a USA Strandberg but I don’t have 5K for a original transtrem. So like most here heard a issue or two on the net. Because no other manufacturers have any quality issues right 😂
So I picked up a used model off reverb.
Let’s just say I’m a fan. No other manufacturers will offer you the choices of colors woods etc.
I have several. No issues.
Quality builds with excellent wood choices. And you can send in pickups of your choice or go with their pickups.
 

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I'm on my third build with them. So far it's been great the only issue I had was the nut in my DC 600 and my guy took care of that and it's perfect. I have one in the works (SCB) so I'll post some pictures once I get it. I had musicmans (witch had some QC issues) , ibanez prestige and some other high-end guitars and for the money it's hard to beat kiesel.
 
braintheory said:
If there’s any advice I could give, it would be to avoid poly or oil finish and go for nitro if you value your guitar’s tone.
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You don’t like oil finish guitars? Or you don’t think they sound good? Just curious. I agree with you on Nitro finish but I have a mahog TMZ Natural that I think sounds great.
 
Gottem my vader 6 string during the height of the new vader line... selected an all mahogany and did an upgrade on the flame maple top and this guitar of mine looked sick... was the best top for the money i got... the woods look incredible and workmanship was good too except for some scuff along the edge of the fret edge as it could be due to sanding down the rough fret ends... but what took me to sell it off was the guitar just lack of balls... its clear and souless... i thought it could be the lithium pickups but slam in a set of standard duncan 59s and JB it still sound as bland and lifeless... couldnt stand it anymore and sold it locally in my country....
 
I have a mayones Regius and I love the neck. I wouldn't call it a baseball bat and it's not Jackson or Ibanez thick. It's a bit thicker than an ESP or Solar.

I avoid fat necks and I love my regius. I basically sold several of my cheaper guitars once I got it and ordered a Duvell which should be ready late 2022.

I have an Aviator on order that should ship next week. They were waiting on cases when I emailed them earlier this week. It wasn't too expensive. I think it ran me $2500. Hopefully I will like the way it plays but we will see. Below is the mock up vs the finished product.
 

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I've seen enough negative stuff from Kiesel to make me avoid them. I know customers are difficult especially when we are talking customs but he has handled stuff poorly enough that I don't want to take that chance. Every post has more luke warm or negative experiences than positive when it comes to them.
 
ItsRote said:
So what's up with Kiesel Guitars now? I know there was some drama with a customer and Jeff Kiesel and he did apologize, but if the quality is good I can look past that. I built my own guitar on the custom shop and its pretty nice, how is the quality standard on these guitars?
Also looked at some Suhr, Jackson, ESP, Ibanez, Schecter and Mayones Guitars, and just haven't found one I really like. I created a guitar in the Mayones custom shop but I'm just not sure about their necks, some people think they're quite thick and C shaped. Even saw someone even say their neck is like holding a box with sharp edges, which doesn't sound great.
The Suhr legacy standard with the EMG 85/SA/SA I looked at was pretty nice they just don't seem overly shreddy, not sure the pickups have enough output.
Anyone able to help?
Only issue with ESP and Jackson is I have not found a standard model with the specs and color scheme I would like, and their custom shop is likely $6000+ at least.
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I heard some good stuff about Kiesel. I ordered a guitar, a super Strat. I think all in it was like $1600. For the money it was good. But, it’s could not hang with a Suhr, Anderson, Charvel, etc.
 
ClintN667 said:
I have a mayones Regius and I love the neck. I wouldn't call it a baseball bat and it's not Jackson or Ibanez thick. It's a bit thicker than an ESP or Solar.

I avoid fat necks and I love my regius. I basically sold several of my cheaper guitars once I got it and ordered a Duvell which should be ready late 2022.

I have an Aviator on order that should ship next week. They were waiting on cases when I emailed them earlier this week. It wasn't too expensive. I think it ran me $2500. Hopefully I will like the way it plays but we will see. Below is the mock up vs the finished product.
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That Aviator looks cool. What’s the story with them?
 
They are a Czech company that a buddy of mine has several of. He recommended them after I got my Mayones but I wanted basically a strat with ss frets and bkp. They let me pick the flame maple top and sent a bunch of pics along the way. I have 3 more builds mocked up that I may go with after a chubtone.
 
thenine said:
You don’t like oil finish guitars? Or you don’t think they sound good? Just curious. I agree with you on Nitro finish but I have a mahog TMZ Natural that I think sounds great.
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Some of the oil finish guitars I've had sounded good, but all of them I found to have a much drier sounding than my Nitro guitars and comparatively lacking harmonics and if you play more single note heavy or melodic type stuff the notes don't connect or sing as nicely. I found the oil finish guitars to sound often more open and woody, which can be nice, but they always seemed lacking tone to me overall compared to my good nitro guitars. With the good nitro guitars, like 2 of my Charvel's, there's just a magic to them and nuance, expressiveness when playing them that's comparatively very lacking in any poly or oil guitars I've had, even my '84 Charvel San Dimas, which is still a killer guitar, but has that homogeneous poly tone and lack of dynamics that I don't like. I've even thought about maybe eventually having it re-finished to Nitro if it ends up being a keeper for maybe another year or 2 haha. The only oil finish guitar I'm keeping is my Barlow because of it's unique specs (all ebony neck and fb and paduak body, yellow heart top), so it sounds unique from it, but still hate it's dry tone from the oil finish haha
 
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Exo-metal said:
The consensus, firewood.
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Furniture with strings attached it seems like most high end “boutique” guitars today. Who cares about its tone as long as the fretwork and little aesthetic details are all just right and god forbid it’s a little neck heavy or the knobs aren’t placed just right. If I had a dollar for all the stupid non-tone related things guys judge guitars on these days
 
braintheory said:
Some of the oil finish guitars I've had sounded good, but all of them I found to have a much drier sounding than my Nitro guitars and comparatively lacking harmonics and if you play more single note heavy or melodic type stuff the notes don't connect or sing as nicely. I found the oil finish guitars to sound often more open and woody, which can be nice, but they always seemed lacking tone to me overall compared to my good nitro guitars. With the good nitro guitars, like 2 of my Charvel's, there's just a magic to them and nuance, expressiveness when playing them that's comparatively very lacking in any poly or oil guitars I've had, even my '84 Charvel San Dimas, which is still a killer guitar, but has that homogeneous poly tone and lack of dynamics that I don't like. I've even thought about maybe eventually having it re-finished to Nitro if it ends up being a keeper for maybe another year or 2 haha. The only oil finish guitar I'm keeping is my Barlow because of it's unique specs (all ebony neck and fb and paduak body, yellow heart top), so it sounds unique from it, but still hate it's dry tone from the oil finish haha
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Nitro finish just feels fucking right. The kxk i had had it. You cannot beat a nitro neck.
 
dawnofdreamx97 said:
Great guitars , features. Playability. I've had a few that were meh , and a few that were keepers that I will never sell. In particular my dc127 and a cs624.

As far as the company , I've had my issues. The last guitar I ordered from them was an scb6 and they sprayed the back gloss instead of satin and were like yea we can rebuild it but you gotta wait another 12 weeks or so. I ended up taking the guitar anyway , it was beautiful.

It also came with the pickup dangling out of the cavity , and the input jack totally loose, and when I got the guitar I realized it had the wrong fret markers on it as well.

In addition. I could not fit my normal string gauge setup through the low e tuning peg (.54 gauge) because of how thick the veneer was on the headstock.

Shit happens I get it , but it sort of came off like the company doesn't really give a crap quite frankly, Your just a number, and this is coming from me who ordered at least 5 or 6 really nice guitars from them over the years.

I'm pretty sure they lost me a customer forever, it's a shame because they do build some nice stuff. I'll always keep my dc127 and cs624
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Wow. Just Wow. What a shame.

General question - what is the desire/benefit of a headless guitar stock?
 
Headless. Well aside from the evertune system mine hardly go out of tune. Strats Les Pauls go out of tune regularly

They do make guitars with headstocks too.
 
Kiesel shouldn’t even be mention in the same sentence as suhr, Anderson or luxxtone(except for what I just wrote). I’ve owned a few and they are nice but out of the 5 I have owned, none was inspiring at all.
 
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