Excerpted from March 1999

Washburn WI 64 Idol

It's not too often you get the opportunity to play an instrument with a traditional sound and feel that can also make a visual statement; Washburn's brand new Idol solidbody electric is just such a guitar. With a mahogany body and neck, rosewood fingerboard, and a pair of humbuckers, the Idol offers the tone and basic layout of some very famous riff machines of yore, like the Gibson SG. But the Washburn is no mere vintage retread. Its innovative shape not only looks cool, but makes the guitar easy to hold and play and helps give the Idol the kind of upper-fret access you need for serious wailing. The body is surprisingly heavy, but balances the neck better than some other similar guitars that tend to feel neck heavy when strapped on.

The 24 3/4"-scale neck is very comfortable to hold. It's moderately thick -- fatter than most shred-machines, but not as thick as the baseball bat-fat necks found on some "vintage"-style axes. I was really impressed with the quality of workmanship on the Idol. The frets were well seated and filed at the edges, the nut was cut neatly, and the hardware, including the Grover tuning machines, all performed the way it was supposed to. The action was comfort- ably low without buzzing, and I found that the Idol let me play fast when T wanted to, but also let me dig into some heavy bending when the urge arose. The Washburn-designed pickups capture a very wide range of tones. With the Peavey and the Korg AX1G, I was able to get good blues, country, jazz, and metal sounds with a minimum of fuss, One of the coolest things you can do with a guitar like the Idol is capture Eric Clapton's Cream-era "woman tone." With both pickups on, drive your amp to medium distortion, then roll off the tone control for the treble pickup, with the neck pickup tone on all the way. The resultant sweet and round sound is perfect for expressive blues rock. Try it with a phrase like the one in Fig. 3.

Good sound, easy playability, and distinctive good looks that straddle the line between vintage appeal and innovation all add up to make the WI 64 Idol a very impressive package for its $699 price. --EDM