Raven RM-3000

First, I must say that I am not an employee or associate of Raven or Ravenwest guitars, but I am a personal friend of Eric Bergquist who now runs the company. I like to think that I am objective about the guitars despite my warm personal feelings toward Eric. But I am only human and it's possible that my feelings about the guitars may be colored by my personal relationship. You might want to take that into consideration when you read the rest of this review.

Some of you already know that the original Raven company went out of business when Ray Hefforn, the original owner and Eric's business partner and stepfather murdered his wife (Eric's mother) and then killed himself. Eric has resurrected the company under the name Ravenwest. The guitars have the letters R W G on the headstock inlayed in abalone.

Because Eric and I are friends he invited me over to see the new Ravens, (which are actually called RWG now.) These guitars, which are still being made in Korea, are even better than the original ones. For starts, they have bound fretboards, Grover tuning keys and real abalone inlay.

The first guitar I looked at was the Ricky knock off, (called RM3000) and I was afraid that it would have that microscopic Ricky neck that so many (including me) find so uncomfortable, but to my relief, the neck was the standard size, 1 & 11/16 inch width at the nut.

The Ricky is only available with 6 strings. I hope they come out with a 12 string version.

Next I looked at the RG 660, which is designed for metal shredders and is not my kind of guitar. This guitar has a H-S-H configuration, with a coil tap, a 5 position switch, and a battery powered bright boost, together which gives 14 different positions and sounds, 8 humbucking and 6 single coil, without ever touching the tone control. This guitar comes with a whammy bar and a locking nut.

Like I said, this is not my kind of guitar, but I may pick up on one of these just for the sheer number of different tones it has.

Next I looked the RG 1000, another H-S-H guitar. This one doesn't have the active treble boost or the coil tap. But it does have a Floyd Rose tremolo. The entire body of this guitar is carved from a single piece of flamed alder. Again, this is a metal players guitar, and not my style.

Then I saw the new 350 and 450. These 24 fret dual humbucker set neck hard tail PRS copies, (the 350 is solid, the 450 is hollow) are in my opinion, the hottest guitars coming out of Korea today. I have 2 of the older 450s and see no reason to get a third, but I'm definitely going to get a new 350 as soon as the ebony fretboard models become available.

I have a Chinese made PRS copy that I paid 81 bucks for at the NAMM show a couple of years ago. This is the same shape as the new 350, and I brought it with me to compare the 2. There is no comparison. The new 350 is 100 times better than the other one.

Next I saw the RG 2000, which is a Les Paul Double cutaway. This is basically the same guitar as the 350, only a slightly different shape, and only has 22 frets. Like the 350 and 450, it is made of solid mahogany with a 3/16 inch maple cap. Not a veneer. The quality is the same as the 350, but personally I'd rather have the 2 extra frets.

Finally I saw the RM 465, which I think is based on Brian May's guitar. It's made of solid mahogany, with 3 single coil pickups like a strat, and a floating tremolo they call the VIBRO-T. The tremolo action reminds me of a Bigsby. Again, not my style, but the quality is there.

The one drawback of all these guitars is that the pickups are rather nondescript, They're not bad, but the guitars are improved immeasurably by replacing them, as I have done on all on mine.

For practical purposes, this is a brand new company, but they are off to a great start. These guitars are going to be serious competition for companies like Agile and Dillion. I think that anybody looking to spend between $3 and 400 on a guitar ought to seriously consider