Monday, 23 January 2017

Review of Indie IPR Hollow - Hollowbody electric guitar




I found this guitar quite a number of years ago now in a pawn shop.  It gets used mainly at home rather than out and about, though it has done a few gigs.

I remember looking at these new in a local guitar shop when they first came out, and they seemed to get some favourable, if rather a limited number of reviews.  The retail price was quite high, around £6-700 if I remember correctly.  However, as with a lot of lesser known brands, when music shops failed to shift all the stock, prices dropped dramatically.

Indie was an innovative company concept that others have since followed: coming up with ideas for  guitars in this country and then producing them in Korea, where building standard and quality control is relatively high, but costs low in comparison to making things here.  It is of course a model of business that companies like Ibanez have followed for years.

Indie produced a number of original models, but also sold a number of guitars that owe a huge design debt to existing brands.  I still regret not buying an Indie Rickenbacker copy from the same pawn shop at a silly low price.

The IPR pays homage to a PRS, sharing many design features with that brand.  I bought this one because it only cost me £140, I passed it by at full retail value because it wasn't quite what I was looking for, but if the price is right...

The guitar body appears to be constructed from a hollowed out piece of solid mahogany capped with another piece of mahogany, with single binding, topped with a thin veneer of very nicely figured quilted maple - not nearly as high quality as my Ibanez in the previous review, but still a joy to behold.  The hollowing leaves a centre block on which is fitted the hardware.  Personally I don't like the PRS style wrap around bridge.  This guitar came with one compensated for a wound g-string, and so I have replaced it with a new one compensated for a plain string.  Adjusting for intonation on these bridges is limited and a bit fiddly and annoying, I've never understood why PRS uses this system.

The pickups are very good quality Indie own brand 'GR8's (see what they did there?) I don't see any need to change them as they sound good to me.  The neck is of rock maple according to the spec sheets, with a very nice ebony fretboard, again single bound.  Unusually for a guitar of this design the scale length is 24 3/4" rather than 25".  The fret work (24 frets in total) is of very high standard with the fret ends all nicely rounded and smooth.  The fretboard is set with abalone dot fret markers.  The nut looks like bone to me and is very well cut.  The tuners are mini genuine grovers and very smooth and responsive.  The guitar is relatively lightweight.

I have not been able to find another IPR quite like mine.  The black headstock carries the Indie logo in abalone inlay which I have never seen before and I wonder if this one was an early issue/prototype model.

The finish is of high standard, and I can see why Indie were trying to position this guitar in the £600 price bracket when it came out.  Overall I really like this guitar and the sound it makes but I do have some criticisms.  Firstly the bridge which I have already mentioned, and which I have at its lowest setting - giving no room to manoeuvre if I wanted the action any lower.  Secondly the pickups don't sit totally parallel to the strings and this always annoys me, as it betrays sloppy workmanship.  The guitar is rather neck heavy so does neck dive if you are not careful.  The controls are nicely set into the body but because the veneer is so thin, the indentations show the mahogany body under the veneer.  The body of the guitar is beautifully carved on the top, but the back is not body contoured at all, making it rather less comfortable to play than the Ibanez in the last review.


I'd recommend this as a well made, nice sounding guitar, but with enough little niggles to stop it being absolutely first class.

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