Perhaps I need to elaborate on what gear I am using as a reference point. Perhaps the Brand name of instrument does not matter as long as the construction of the instrument is of good quality. This may make some cringe and others may appreciate what my preference is. Carin /Kiesel. I actuall do not have any guitars with the Kiesel name on them but same company as Carvin but they recently changed their name back to their roots.
Here is my run down on guitars:
Neck though instruments: 2 Walnut bodied with maple walnut neck and ebony boards (DC400W) 1 alder body with maple top and neck (DC400) and one with koa body and maple neck (DC200) with a Kahler bridge. All three are strat shaped instruments similar but not similar to the strat body shape. These guitars are now out of production since the active electronics are no longer available. Closest instrument still in production would be the DC127 as a point of reference. Metal covered pickups.
Set Neck instruments: 3 mahogany body and neck construction (metal covered pickups) , 1 solid maple (DC100 1982 double cut, Kahler bridge). All three have ebony boards (one has royal ebony). Maple cap (two quilted, one flame). 2 are CT models (CT6M 22 fret, CT624C 24 fret with Floyd Rose) these would be similar to a PRS at a quick glance. The last one is a Les Paul body shape. All three sound really good though the JP. My favorite would have to be the CT624C. I can do so much more with that one than the others. The solid maple DC100 I have yet to plug in since I do not use it all that much as it is the heaviest guitar I own.
Bolt on neck Instruments: 2 of these. Both have Floyd Rose and SSS pickguards, birds eye maple boards, each has a 1/4 inch maple cab but body woods are different. Both models are the "Bolt C". 1 is Alder and the other is Black Limba (aka Korena). Pups on these are of the Seymour Duncan variety. One has the "everything Axe" set (on the Alder body) and the other is a mix of the hot rails, cool rails and vintage rails. Both have a unique character. I just did not like the hum or noise I was getting with standard single coil pick ups. If one were to get one, check the pot values as they tend to use 500k pots, for singe coil and including the mini humbucker type, the 250k pot sounds the best.
I am really amazed how each guitar sounds thought he JP-2C. My favorite for all around would be the set neck mahogany guitars. Very nice warn tones but yet very aggressive when you want it to be. The bolt on neck variety with the single coils sounds really good on the clean channel. Somewhat bright with CH2 and CH3 but depends on amp settings. the hot rails on the one guitar is just sinister for a small humbucker. The Neck through guitars actually sound better though the JP than they do with the other amps. I did not expect the alder bodied guitar to really sing. The JP-2C really brings out the differences of the different tone woods and type of construction. I had thought the same about the Mark V but it is more notably appreciated though the JP. The Roadster almost does not matter what type of guitar you play though it except for the bolt on neck instruments as there is a definite tone and volume difference. You can hear the differences but the natural resonant frequency of the Roadster sits much lower on the spectrum than the JP or Mark V. Not sure how a semi-hollow or hollow body guitar would sound as I do not own one. Perhaps some day I will. No complaints on different guitars played though the JP-2C as they all sounded great with each having a different characteristic as I would expect. On the flip side, the Mark V took on a different character when it comes to tone woods and guitar construction. Walnut bodied guitars just sounded brittle, Maple bodied guitar was also very bright, Mahogany probably the best and the bolt styles were harder to adapt too. I will still stand strong on my comment that the JP-2C and Roadster make a great complement to each other. Still need to evaluate the RA100 relative to the JP but those two amps are so different from each other. Vintage voice vs something more modern and aggressive. Even if the JP and RA100 do not mix, I still love the RA's. Note that it is a hard sell to claim the RA would blend with the Roadster but depends on what settings are used with the Roadster. Now for the Mark V once again, been sitting silent for some time. I decided to give it another chance and I am waiting on arrival of a replacement speaker (MC90, have yet to have one in good condition to sue with the V, the original that was stock in my Mark IV was blown, the one that came with the combo shell was also damaged in one way or another also sounded blown it was used so no big deal since I only cared for the combo shell with reverb tank anyways). Hopefully the new speaker will change my mind. I have not given up on the Celestion Cream 90W speaker as I may install it in my 1x12 extension cab. It has not sounded the same since I channeled the JP though it as I believe I overheated the voice coil. Does not sound bad though just darker in tone.
