Parker Guitars NiteFly

My dream guitar is a splendid sunburst. Mine is like no other I have read about; it is S/S/S configuration. Other than that, everything is the same. The body shape takes a little bit of getting used to, but is a work of art. Once you get used to it you don't even think about it.

I first run into a DOD FX 84 milkbox compressor, cry-baby wah, Ibanez CF7 chorus/flange, DOD FX 96 delay, Snarling Dog Very Tone, and Boss NS2 noise supressor. All of that feed into a Trace Elliot Super Tramp 4x12 tube half stack with 3 channels and spring reverb.
I was running a Jackson ps4 with demarzio paf humbuckers, and this setup sounded really good. But if I plugged directly in, it was "okay". When I first bought the Parker Nitefly, I plugged it first directly into my amp--the best sound I have ever heard. Warm, crisp, full-bodied, unreal sustain. The sound is just what I have been looking for. When I run it through my effects, I can do just about anything. Thanks to the Snarling Dog Very Tone, I can get about ANY sound I want.
The acoustic side of the Nitefly is very warm and realistic through a crate or similar acoustic amp. I can combine the piezo and magnetic pickups and make heavenly tones.
I play blues, heavy metal, classical. This guitar can do them all.

The action is one of the main reasons I bought this guitar. The neck is like silk. The frets are PERFECTLY placed and shaped. The bridge is very well designed and extremely versitile. The guitar is comfortable and light. The finish is perfectly beautiful. Every detail is immaculate on this guitar.

I only play this guitar. At one time I had two backups for gigs, now I only carry the Nitefly--no other guitar feels right to me. It has never failed me in any way. Everything is VERY solid. Very well put together. If I were to design and build a guitar, this would be very close to what I would build.

Have never needed. 1 year.

This is as close to perfect that I have heard and seen. If it were stolen I would hunt the thief like an animal and.....
I chose this over Strat, Fly Deluxe, PRS, and Godin. If you can buy one, you should.
A supreme guitar.

American Made Parker Nitefly Version 4. The version 4 comes with a solid maple body, a really nice bolt on 22 fret neck with tangless stainless steel frets, dimarzio pickups that sound great in the configuration single/single/humbucker, locking sperzel tuners, active electronix, and a fishman piezo transducer. It has an onboard preamp, which the older models lacked....Also (THIS IS IMPORTANT) if you have read any other reviews, you might find that they dislike the way you need to use the stereo cable in order to mix the magnetic and piezo pickup sounds....the version 3 and 4 niteflys can mix both through a standard mono cable!

The sound of this instrument is absolutely awesome! I play all kinds of music (Modern Rock, Rap, R&B, Folk, Alternative...No Country) and this is one of the most versatile instruments that I have ever played. Due to the magnetic pickup configuration, you can achieve a multitude of power tones....the piezo can give a nice acustic tone, but you can't really alter the tone of the piezo too much. When the two tones are mixed, you can get a really rich clean sound and it's a really sweet tone. I play this guitar through a Fender Hot Rod Deluxe and I find that the magnetic pickups can get a little noisy in the neck and middle positions, but other than that are silent. I think that this is one of the best sounding and most versatile guitars on the market, you can get so many tones it's ridiculous....especially if you play a lot of different music styles.

I've heard of people having difficulties with the action and fret buzzing from the factory, but mine was absolutely perfect. Everything was set ideally. I think the frets were the best part about the fit...they are incredible. I got the transparent red color....it looks nice, but I've seen much nicer finishes on gibsons and other instruments of this much $$$ The bridge is the best bridge I have ever played. It just won't come out of tune. I have dive bombed the whammy bar during solos and it just pops right back to the original position in perfect tune!

I've only had the guitar for a couple of months. Due to the stainless steel frets, I imagine that this guitar will last about a million years. The hardware is all really sturdy and the finish still looks great. You can definitely depend on this guitar, but I've heard of people having problems with the piezo transducer...NEVER HAPPENED TO ME! I would definitely gig with this guitar, but it's always a good idea to have a backup (Even though I doubt this thing would ever have a problem)

Before I bought the guitar, I had to make some calls to the Parker factory. I couldn't beleive it, but they actually pulled one of the luthiers off of the floor to speak with me on the phone to answer technical questions. Their service was impeccable. They are distributed by Korg International and they were also very helpful on the phone.

I have been playing guitar for four years. I am a big technical guy and I love this guitar because it integrates all kinds of neat gadgets in a trully practical manner and it just works...plain and simple. This is an incredibly innovative guitar and I would recommend it over the Fly Deluxe and Fly Classic for the reasons that it is much more affordable and it is just as competent as its bigger more expensive brothers. I might stay away from the Nitefly Versions 1 & 2 though....they lack the active electronics and the new mixing system.

Transparent Blue 1997 Parker NiteFly S/S/H Pickup configuration. Passive electronics Locking Tuners Piezo Acoustic Pickup Bought used, so it came with nothing but guitar

I have always played strats but I got a little tired of the twangy sound so I tried this guitar. It feels alot like a Strat but sounds better. This is a very quiet guitar when used with my Fender practice amp and sounds even better through the PA. I use a older Korg A-4 multi-effects pedal which the guitar gets along with quite well. I would have to say this guitar has a bright sound but is quite capable of a warm sound by turning down the tone control. I really like adding in some of the acoustic sound to the over-all sound. But the acoustic sound is a bit weak by itself. Best guitar I have ever played for the money. An absolute BEST BUY!

The guitar came set up teribbly because the kid I bought it from didn't have a clue. It took me a few days to get the neck and bridge back to the proper positions. Now the action is still a bit high but very acceptable. Be carefull if you adjust the neck bowing. A little turn goes a long way. High E string will slip off the neck if you are not careful so the nut could have been cut a bit better. The finish on the guitar is beautifull.

This guitar has been dependable for me for the last 6 months. No problems so far.

No customer support yet needed.

I have been playing now for 35 years off and on and this is a fine guitar. Well made, with very few comprimises. I would replace this guitar if lost. Like I said before, this is the best guitar on the market for the money. Bar none.

Maple body with a basswood neck encased in a composite material. H/S/S pick-up configuration. Has a nice see thru blue finish. Has all the hardware my strat should have had. Piezo pick-up and electric on the same guitar.

Alot better then my strat. Im not thrilled with the bridge humbucker but in no hurry to change it. Havent had any probs described by others and im glad I didnt read the other reviews because I may have not bought it. I HATE the stereo chord! The music store gave me a chord that was 3' feet long. I asked if I jhad to kneel in front of my pedal board all night to play. You can use a mono chord and just pull it out half way to use the piezo but am not sure if it will wear the output jack out. Over all im really happy with the sound.

Its perfect. Its a used guitar and didnt have any flaws.

So far so good ( famous last words?)

N/A

I traded a 94 american strat for it and this eats it alive. I've always had a love/ hate relationship with strats and maybe this will cure it. I want a fly classic but money stops me from getting it ;o) If anyone has any comments or suggestions for this guitar, please contact me. Im always willing to learn something new.

The Nitefly features a maple body, basswood/carbon-fiber neck and fretboard, stainless steel frets, Sperzel locking tuners, etc.. Mine came with a S/S/H configuration. All Nitefly guitars have a Passive Piezo acoustic pickup in the bridge, but the new Nitefly has an active system. The body style is very original, but I find that the upper horn tends to jab you in the ribs sometimes while you're playing and sitting down.
A lot of thought went into designing this guitar. Like it's bigger brother the Fly, you can get acoustic or electric tones out of it at the flick of a switch. Unfortunately it uses a silly stereo output which required that you use an insert cable to connect to your amp or mixing board. The Godin LGX, for comparison, is a three output guitar.

Great electric sound from the Dimarzio pickups. Very little noise, as the Nitefly has good shielding. The Acoustic pickup is decent and certainly useable, especially in a live situation. My only gripe is that the acoustic pickup is a bit harsh and picks up a lot of finger/string noise.

The action is very poor on the Nitefly when compared to the Fly. I've never played a Nitefly that had the super-smooth action that the Fly has. The action on every Nitefly I've played has been high. When you lower the action, you get a lot of fret buzz. It's a trade-off. The fret buzz isn't very noticeable on the electric side so if you play electric mostly, you'll be ok if you lower the action. However, the acoustic side demands that there be no fret buzz as the piezo pickup is very sensitive to buzz. If you pirmarily play acoustic, you'll have to live with high action. The best alternative that I've found after much experimenting is to flatten the neck (very little relief) and put the sting height to where only a very small amount of buzz on the low-E string is present. This gets you medium action, but decent acoustic sound.
If you really need low/smooth action with no fret buzz, get a Fly Deluxe.
Also, don't even think about using anything but 9's on the Nitefly. The action will go sky high with 10's and I haven't been able to figure out how to get to a playable level with 10's or heavier. The guitar simply isn't designed to handle 10's.

Seems very durable. You should opt for an older Nitefly with Passive acoustic pickup if you're going to play live. I've heard that the active systems on both the Fly and the Nitefly can be problematic at times. I've even witnessed it myself at a concert.

Great innovative guitar with poor action. I don't know if I'd buy this guitar again. Having to do it all over again, I'd probably save up enough cash for a Fly Deluxe. First, I really like guitars with smooth action and I don't think that the Nitefly is capable of this. Second, I'd rather have a twin-humbucker guitar. Third, the acoustic pickup on the Fly Deluxe is noticeably better.

I have a blue s/s/h model. I won't bother repeating the features as they're already listed in previous posts. Highlights are the nice neck/fretwork, great tone ( and great range of tones), wonderful vibrato system and excellent Sperzel tuners.

All the single coil settings are strat/tele derivitives - all very convincing to my ear. This thing sounds more like a vintage strat than most current Fender models. Everything from sweet to biting to twangy - it's all right there. The bridge humbucker has reasonably high output and good distortion tone. It's a tad muddy and no good for clean settings. The piezo system cannot really duplicate an acoustic, but it can do a suprisingly good simulation if you tweek your amps tone controls enough.

Here's where things start getting tragic. It took me 3 tries to find one without sme sort of defect. I experiended the "high E slipping off the neck" on 2 of the 3 I tried, but it's not a problem on the one I have now, so it's apparently a fairly common problem, but not a design flaw (poor qc on the nuts). On one of them the nut was cut too low on the g string. Otherwise I have to say overall fit/finish/construction is extremely good.

Simple - everything EXCEPT the piezo pickup system gets a "10". On 2 of the 3 Niteflys I've tried, the piezo system had problems within the first couple days of use. This is a design flaw that I hope they have improved on newer models. Carefully check each string with the piezo selected, and also hammer the vibrato a few times to make sure they don't cut in and out. Continue checking it for a couple weeks if you don't use it regularly, otherwise you'll go to use it someday and find out it doesn't work.

I just kept returning these to Guitar Center until I found one that worked.

I give the thing a 10 assuming we're talking about a model that doesn't suffer from the problems I mentioned. If you can find one that works it is an amazing value at any price under $1000. At $699 it is a joke how bad it blows away the current Fender/Gibson/Ibanez/Charvel etc... junk.

See the ads and other write-ups for the many features of the Nitefly.
I have the 3 single coil (a la Strat configuration)
The only real draw backs feature wise are...
- a lack of an active pre-amp for the piezo acoustic bridge pickup. However, this has been addressed in the new Nitefly (see ads). - the requirement to use a stereo cable to allow signal access to the piezo acoustic pickup. This too has been addressed in the new model. - the whammy bar does not have a lock of any kind to keep it in place and if you're crazy it could potentially come out. You may have to resort to the knurl via vise-grip or plier method to keep it in place if you fall into this category.
Some of the features I bought for are...
- Nice tremelo system (tremelo/lubricated nut/Sperzel tuners) - Piezo system (now I don't care) - Neck/playability - Resonant sound when not plugged in - Unique look

Speaking for the 3 single coil model, it gets all the typical Strat type sounds--great for Hendrix and SRV tones and it does these well. I did raise the pickups to get a little bit hotter sound.
Through a Pandora PX-2 it sounds very thin and noisy when played on any of distorted settings. For clean sounds, it works well with the PX-2. The following PX-2 settings provide nice SRV (neck pickup), single coil Led Zepplin (bridge pickup, i.e. Bring it on Home) and Hendrix (neck pickup, i.e. Wind Cries Mary) tones. DRIVE VALVE=1/TONE L=9 H=12/MOD CHORUS1=1/AMB ECHO2=14/COMBO1=1/NR=23/LEVEL=25/VOLUME=25.
Through a Marshall JCM 900 Hi-Gain Dual Reverb 50 Watt 2-12 Combo (1990 Model 4502 with EL-34s) it sounds great on all settings. Excluding the noise added by effects, this combination of guitar and amp is incredibly quiet. I was also very suprised at how heavy (high distortion/fat) a sound could be obtained with this single coil configuration.
The piezo/acoustic feature sounds o.k. as is for toying around, but really requires a proper piezo/acoustic pre-amp. Again this has been addressed in the latest Nitefly model.

Overall, the setup on mine was good--low action, good intonation. My only complaint is that the low E string is close to the edge of the fret board and is easily pushed off by accident. I think the nut slot for this string might be off a little. I have gotten used to this, but occasionally it happens when I get carried away.
The finish/craftsmanship is very nice for the price--especially when compared to your typically mass produced guitars (i.e. Fender/Epiphone, etc). Before purchasing the Nitefly I played many different guitars to backup my decision. I played about 20 Fender Strats and every one was setup differently and played differently. All of the 8 Parkers I played were very close to the same.

Aside from breaking strings (which I have not done with this guitar, but is possible with any guitar), this guitar is solid, reliable and could be depended upon without a backup.
I think Mr. Ken Parker designed this guitar knowing that it could become a classic like the Strat and therefore, built it to last.
Even though Parker has addressed this issue, there is only one thing that concerns me in the very long run and that is the frets. They are made of spring tempered stainless steel and are designed to last a long time. The reason for this?? The frets are glued to the fret board and can be replaced by the factory. I have not asked the question, but how long will they really last under hard playing conditions? After 4 months of playing, I have not notice any fret wear yet!

The neck pickup died after 1.5 months--I don't blame Parker for this, but Dimarzio. However, I called Korg, they handle distribution/service for Parker, and they where very helpful. I had the guitar at a service center an hour after calling. The tech verified that the pickup was bad, ordered a new one and I had my guitar back in a little over a week.
My problem was electrical and I was told that if there was a finish or a fret problem, the guitar would require shipment to the central service center. I don't like shipping guitars--hopefully I won't have any problems which require it.

I would definitely buy this guitar again. I was looking for a Strat to complement my dual humbucker configured guitar, but for the value (features/quality/cost) they just could not compare.
The neck is fast, the sound and the modern tremelo/nut/sperzel tuners are great.
As mentioned before, the piezo system/cable access needed help and Parker addressed these issues with the latest model Nitefly.

This guitar sports a similar basic shape to the Fly Classic, but is slightly less radical in its contouring. The body is made from solid Canadian Soft Maple, whixh has a certain amount of "bite". This axe is quite heavy, in stark contrast to the Fly Classic. The bolt-on neck is made from basswood/carbon fibre and sports a 22 fret, 251/2 in scale composite fingerboard. The medium jumbo frets are stainless steel (they don't require polishing!) and the fretwork is immaculate (the frets are guled on). The neck is a comfortable "C" shape, and a little thicker than on the Fly Classic. The neck is pretty fast, and the compound radius fingerboard enables easy string bends whilst allowing for a low action - the best of both worlds! The back of the neck is finished in black lacquer. String tuning is taken care of by a uniqe Fly bridge and Sperzel locking tuners. Tuning is maintained even after fairly radical whammy-bar action. You can select whether the bridge is "floating" or "down-only". The bridge has a built in piezo-accoustic pickup, for acousitc guitar sounds. A "Y" lead is supplied to take advantage of both magnetic and piezo sounds. For the magnetic sounds, the guitar also has three Dimarzio pickups mounted into the scratch-plate, comprising a humbucker at the bridge and two single coils.

I play mostly hard-rock/industrial. My guitar tones tend to be either heavily overdriven or crystal clean. The single coil tones a very useable. They provide clear, bell-like stratty tones and I find them good for SRV/Hendrixy type work. They are true single coils, so some hum is evident in positions 1 and 3. I was disappointed in the humbucker. The stock humbucker was, to my ears, a little nasally and mid-rangey with medium output. It is a custom Dimarzio pickup and is part part of their regular range (I think it's probably similar to a Fred). I have subsequently tried a Dimarzio Air Zone (which sounded great in my Ibanez FGM!) but that didn't work too well either. So I'm still looking for a good humbucker. Sustain is good, probably comparable to that of a Strat. The piezo sounds are OK, but a decent electric-acoustic sounds a lot better. They are there more for convenience that anything else, as far as I'm converned.

The craftsmanship on this guitar is excellent. The bridge/loking tuners combination ensure excellent tuning stability. My guitar is finished in Tobacco Sunburst which looks great. The finish is top class and the soft maple looks quite attractive. There are no dead spots anywhere along the neck and the action is easy to adjust. The fretwork is also fisrt class, as is the neck joint. The only flaw was in the nut. The groove for the B string was not cut properly which meant the string sounded dead. This was easily fixed (free of charge) by a luthier.

The guitar is very well made. It will stay in tune even if you drop it and I've never snapped a string. The finish is superb and all joints etc are of top quality. All electircs/pots/switches are reliable and noise-free. This is a very well put together axe which should stand the test of time.

I have owned this guitar for about 1 year and I really, really like this guitar. If I could find a really decent bridge pickup I would love this guitar. It's finish and build quality is better than ANYTHING else in its price range. It is very comfortable to play (although it is quite heavy) with a neck/fingerboard that could appeal equally to shredders or blues-benders. I wouldn't buy this guitar solely for the piezo sounds...I almost never use them.