First Act Studio For Artists

ME-201 guy again

checked this posting a year later. Still playing, and yes still cherish my LP clone me-201. Nice to see some positive postings about first act. Ive noticed a lot of guys like me, buying the electric as a tear-down or project, but being surprised at the quality and playability.

LP ME-201 clone Guy:
checking my posting a year later. Still playing, and yes still cherish my LP clone me-201. Dadrios strings / 9s or 10's seem to suit it best. Still got that nice low action. Aqquired an Ibenez xseries to my collection, still this durn 201 gets the most of my time.

When you buy it, QC it out of box, and just check for defects before taking your new baby home. . When you get it home, obviously adjust it to suit your needs. From what i see here its not taking these guys much to "bring it into the zone" either. Great buy

Who cares ? its a 100 dollar guitar. Just make sure it's straight b4 you take it home. Strip it the p-90s and tune a-matic and potz and recover it yourself . Jeeze.

I have since watched First Act grow. Saw Al Jorgenson (Ministry) playing one. These (F.Act) guys are starting to get recognized .Studio for artists program starting to get attention. Check their site, although not all models listed there..First Act is the manufacturer, Wal Mart is only the distributor. Coulda bought the guitar off of Wilfried Brimley's horse via E-bay couldn't care less. Very Experienced friends have tried it out and i just watch them knod their head and smile as they play tells it all. (My manufacturer logo on the headstock is removed )

This is just in response to the above posting.
I have played MANY First Act guitars, and it is obvious why this guy above my post did so without placing his name in the review.
The First Act guitars that I own, and I have TWO are amazing. I have a three P 90 equiped custom made guitar that is incredible and a three Filtertron equiped semi hollow body that sounds and plays very well.

The First Act Tubes amps were designed by boutique amp great George Alessandro and are second to none. The pedals in question are V Stack pedals that are being used by numerous pro's on tour and are the finest modeling devices on the planet.
The amps sound like a cross between the best tweed fender and a 60's Marshall.
The pedals emulate a Marshall tone, a Vox (The BHM) pedal and a 50's Tweed fender (the Tweedy).

The action fit and finish on my two guitars is perfect. The guitars are as well crafted as any custom shop Gibson or Fender. Perhaps better.
Is it possible that the person posting before me didn't actually play any of this gear and actually has it out for First Act for some reason?
I would buy the Lola, the Sheena or the Delia over ANY Gibson custom shop piece any day of the week.

I have used my First Act guitars on the road, as well as V Stack pedals and they stand up to the rigors or touring with no problems whatsoever.

The customer service at First Act is second to none. I would feel completely comfortable sending my guitars or pedals to them for repair but I sincerely doubt that will be an issue as this stuff is bullet proof.

It is incredible to me how some people will use a public forum to shoot down a line of products based on some childish grudge, or just plain lack of knowledge of tone or gear. I would love to hear this person play who seems to think so little of this wonderful gear....If he or she can even do so at all....

Numerous instruments ranging form spins on vintage designs, to new designs never done before as far as shapes go. Lots of experimenting with inlay work and pickup placement. They LOOK very cool. Parts from Hipshot, Schaller, Gotoh, and some others can be found on the guitars as well. Guitars custom built by First Act range anywhere from $2000 to $8000

First Act's Boston, MA showroom is only stocked with the new First Act class A (and very retro looking) amplifiers. They are also stocked with some expensive LOOKING stompboxes, which although labeled differently, sound the same. That being said, let's talk about the guitars:

They've been experimenting with on pickup placement, and types of pickups. I played numerous guitars, including a 24 fret Koa topped Telecaster with two lipstick pickups, bridge and neck. The amps are garbage, as are the pedals, and the guitar sounded like mud through them. All the guitars in the showroom pretty much sound like that, most likely not just through those amps either, but I only played them through those amps.

Also a note: they had a very metal looking guitar, with one pickup in the bridge, and a floyd, (judging by the glossed appearance of the pickup it was probably a Semen Crapcan (Seymour Duncan), and as metal as this guitar looked is how whimpy and ball-less it sounded.

Setups are apparently not done well, at all. Action was higher than should be on some models. And some had completely out of whack heights between strings. Frets are not exactly custom material either, dressings are generally post-1998 Ibanez quality at best. And most of the guitars have far too small of a fret gauge, pretty much clipping the wings of anyone who likes a shreddable/actually playable fretboard. That obviously caters well to older clean-tone loving fake jazz/blues loving rich **** who would spend this kind of money on this. Inlays, although ambitious, are definitely not worth the money, as they sometimes don't even look real, however imperfections in the inlay work will prove they are. I played a upwards of $7000 archtop guitar, which was quite impressive LOOKING. Honestly, if you actually care about how guitars sound and play, don't look at these guitars. And not to mention EVERY guitar was out of tune, some by as much as a whole step, upward, I might add. I found it hard to believe that a company selling crap beginner gear at Wal-Mart could pull this off, they can't.

Guitars probably won't withstand live playing. Hardware will last, because it's not made by them. Build quality/finish seems satisfactory at best. Strap buttons are the extremely small Schaller locking type, nubs, hand me my DiMarzio cliplocks or my Dunlop straplocks please. As someone who has played many a Suhr, Vigier, and others, I cannot depend on any of these First Act custom guitars. I wouldn't use it on a gig without backup because I wouldn't use it on a gig.

They are nice people, I'll give them that.

overall? spend your money on sound and quality, not flash.