Steinberger Spirit GU Standard

I got this guitar from music-yo in feb 2005, right out of the box the thing was intune and i was completly blown away by this. At first i thought music-yo was a small company and they hand picked the guitar i was sent, i have since realized they arnt small at all and this guitar must have been shipped from korea this way. I was so impressed i bought 7 more. Mine is the maple body black standard, its the cheapest model they have. The pickups are the H/S/S configuration. It has 24 frets and there is a serial number stamped into the back of the neck near the heel. The stock selects i have since replaced with duncan live wires. I also got the frets trued and redressed. This guitar smokes, its one of the best guitars ive ever played and ive been playing for 15 years atleast.

When i first looked into the steinbergers i was a little disapointed in the wood choices. The ash models i didnt care for the paint jobs and the maple were all solid colors. The ash sounded good, i felt i would like the ash better. Maple just didnt sound very appealing as a body wood. I must admit this guitar sounds nice. My favorite wod type for necks is maple but i figured maple would be to hard for a body. Man it sounds great! the maple has a crispness the ash just doesnt have. I have 5 maple and 5 ash and i have to say the maple is the better of the 2. The stock selects are not bad stock pickups they have AWSOME clean sounds but they just dont get crunchy enough for me. If you like jazz or a 70s rock tone these are fine. I usualy replaced the bridge pickup and left everything else.

This guitar was better then i expected. It was intune right out of the box and played so well i decided to dump money in it replacing the pickups and had a fret level and true to make play better. It was good before but now its perfect. Thats why im takign the time today to post all this wich i never do. The finish is flawless not a mark on it. It was well packed in double boxes from music-yo.

I would recomend this guitar to anyone new player or the seasoned professional. IF you have never used a tremolo guitar before this one makes it so easy its allmost funny. THe hardware on this guitar is top notch its well crafted and looks well built. The guitar is a tank very solid. Every time i pull it from the gig bag i know its going to be intune its that reliable.

Music-yo is a great place to deal with, they are very helpful in returning e-mails and they go above and beyond to make things right.

Ive been playing since the early 80s off and on and this is by far one of the best guitars bang for buck you can get. I think they look awsome but some people dont care for the futureistic look. I prefer the GU strat style to the broom stick even thought they both sound good i like the traditional style of the body.

There is nothing i would change about this guitar. It is such a great design i sold all the other guitars i had and bought more of the spirit GU style.

I have no idea when this guitar was made, but the Fireburst GU-Standard I received was purchased online as new from MusicYo on 02/23/05. The guitar was made very poorly in Korea. It arrived at my home with the r-trem munched into its cavity and there was no damage on the box. So, this is clearly a substantial quality control problem at the factory. Upon further inspection, I discovered that the r-trem knife edges were in such poor condition that the r-trem was useless. And, the r-trem tuning knob just spun without tuning the r-trem. The only way to tune the r-trem was with a screw driver. To complicate matters even further, the screw that holds the knob is of such poor quality and is so soft, a Stanley Phillips screw driver ate right through the head of the screw. The "precision 40-1 tuners", NO WAY! Out of the box, the tuners performed worse than regular tuners on a cheap $100.00 guitar. No kidding. To ad insult to injury, the MusicYo Web site descriptions states "solid wood construction". But the guitar I got has at least 4 pieces of wood that were very sloppily glued together. You can clearly see the sloppy seams via the gloss finish. The high "e" string broke the first time I tried to tune the guitar. Bottom line, the guitar arrived from MusicYo in USELESS and HORRIBLE condition. Clearly, the MusicYo description is very misleading. The whole process says a lot about the lack of character of the people in charge at MusicYo. BUYER BEWARE! You've been warned! I believe this company should be shut down until their products match their ads.

The Select EMG humbucker in the bridge is OK. It certainly sounds nothing like a Gibson humbucker or any other quality humbucker. But, I've heard worse. The two Select EMG single space pickups that are single space humbuckers and are mounted in a stationary position with no adjustment possible unless you shim the pickups, both single space pickups are set too far below the strings. Consequently, since the output and sound quality of the Select EMG single space humbuckers are very weak, they don?t do too well in the positions I got them in. I play many different styles. I use a digital processor for amp modeling, cabinet modeling, and effects. As far as the wood goes, it's tight grain, heavy swamp ash poorly glued together so it does not sustain very well and it has a lackluster bright character. The overall sound qualities of the Select EMGs are poor because you have to juice up the effects beyond reason in order to hear the strings. It becomes a trade-off between unwanted noise and sound in the middle and neck positions and it gets raunchy in the bridge. In conjunction with the pickups, you?ll be fighting an uphill battle for playable sounds of any style, unless of course, somebody makes crap music popular, in which case?this setup would do nicely.

At this point, look further down and please read my Customer Support reply before you read from this point on so that you'll understand the rest of my review betterer. (Restart reading here after you read the Customer Support review)>>> The action on the first guitar was OK. The action on the second guitar sucked. The neck on the first guitar was really nice. The neck on the second guitar was crap. It had a visible pit in it, it was not carved well to the head, it had nasty jagged edges on it (ouch), and the Zero fret on both necks have rough spots on them causing string bends to faulter, pop, and click. And, the strings on the first guitar were seated at an angle that was way off-kilter due to the r-trem being munched into the cavity wall. blah. Really. BLAH.

I have no idea about how well a MusicYo guitar will hold up under heavy playing. I don't think I'd ever play a MusicYo guitar in front of any audience as I'd be promoting a poor quality product and lousy customer service. I do not want to do that. I'd be doing a disservice to my fellow human beings.

When I contacted MusicYo about the first guitar, I insisted that they send me a working, high performance guitar as described on their Web site. Very long story short: The replacement guitar they sent, which was hand picked by them, it arrived with another substantial set of defects. The r-trem rattled badly in the stationary position and the neck has serious problems. Initially, MusicYo refused to repair or replace the second defective guitar. So, I had to contact Gibson to lodge a very serious complaint against MusicYo in order to get MusicYo to provide me with a working guitar. Initially, the underlings at Gibson were unable to help. So, I contacted somebody in a position of power at Gibson. The person in the position of power at Gibson launched right into action to get the problem solved. GO GIBSON! Finally, I got a guitar back from the MusicYo repair department, but the repair guy missed one critical point, the Zero fret of the neck has rough edges that catch the high strings when bending notes. Whew. What an experience thus far. Two out of two guitars arrived in seriously defective conditions and the MusicYo repair department didn't catch a critical issue on a guitar they said would be handled as ?their own?. Anyways, what I ended up with after approximately 6-weeks of wrangling with emails is one guitar that is almost playable and one guitar MusicYo allowed me to keep for "scrap". If Gibson hadn't stepped in to correct this problem, I'd have lost faith in the Gibson name because they do license MusicYo to manufacture and distribute their Steinberger brand. And, MusicYo would have blown me off, obviously, without hesitation. Ultimately and fortunately, Gibson is responsible for this problem. So, Gibson, please compel MusicYo to correct the MusicYo quality control problems or please find another company to keep the Steinberger guitar alive. The Steinberger is a great design when done properly. MusicYo could cost Gibson a lot of future business if this problem isn't corrected, immediately! On the bright side, I discovered Ed Roman guitars during the whole process and I may plunk my next pile of cash on one of his Steinberger guitars or I?ll have a guitar custom built by Ed Roman?s people, unless of course I?ve got concrete and specific information from Gibson and MusicYo that these serious quality control problems are duly noted, immediately corrected and will not *ever* happen again, in which case I?ll buy from MusicYo and, I?ll have one high performance rock guitar with precision tuners in my nimble hands. I?m the forgiving type. I?ve made mistakes. BIG ONES. But, when I realized what I was doing wrong was wrong, I fixed it. And to me, that?s the difference between success and failure, i.e., one?s willingness to do the right thing, espeically in the face adversity, in this case, losing some money. Again, thank you Gibson for doing the right thing by immediately launching into action to make good on these serious defects. Now, MusicYo, it?s your turn. Step up and fix the problem or be gone!

I've been dabbling in guitars since 1964. I studied music in Junior College. I've owned Hagstroms, Ibanezes, Gibsons, a Yamahas, various off brands like a Sears Silvertone (knarley little guitar, wish I still had it), I've got a couple of Esteban guitars for the fun of it, I've had a couple of custom built guitars, and I've plaid several Fenders. If the guitar I have now were to get the zero fret finished correctly, and then if this guitar were lost or stolen, I'd hunt down the thief, get my guitar back, and then have the thief prosecuted. Bottom line, the two guitars I got could have been *masterpieces* had MusicYo been concerned about their customers by taking the time and effort to supervise their overseas staff, but they clearly did nothing about this sort of quality control issue because they are either ignorant and, or they simply didn't care. I'd compare the quality of the two guitars I got out of the box to broom sticks slapped on to wash tubs with old piano wire for strings. By the way, in my humble opinion, the MusicYo strings are horrible. Not only do they sound dull, but again, the high "e" string broke the first time I tried to tune it and its replacment out of the pack when I tried to tune it, and then two more "e" strings broke, one on the second new guitar and another out of another MusicYo string pack. I've had no such probelems with La Bellas and other name brand double ball end strings.

The i bought has a sticker that it was made in Korea. It's a honeyburst color. It has a control for volume, tone and five position pickup selector. R-Trem tremolo but i don't use the tremolo (never use a tremolo). The finish is very well done, beautifull color!

I play rock and blues most of the time, and for this, the guitar is very good. I play it over a tube-amp. Most of the time i use a little (not too much!) overdrive and it sounds fantastic. Especially when playing chords (i'm not a lead-player). I also have an Epiphone LP100 and a Kramer Strat-copy but i like this one best. Nice and full sound.

The guitar needed hardly any adjusting. Well done job. I didn't find any flaws/problems.

The guitar is perfect for playing at home, in my home-studio, and i think it will survive live performing also very well. I'm always very carefull with my guitars, but it seems to be solid.

I bought it at MusicYo - and have bought other guitars there in the past. Customer service is okay! Hey, i'm a returning customer, that says it all :-)

I have been a guitar player for allmost 20 year (hobby). I now have 5 different guitars (spanis/ac., western/ac., Epiphone LP100, Kramer FatBoy and the Steinberger Spirit GU. I think the Spirit GU is the best i've ever bought, especially since it came for that price! Dollar is very low and i live in Holland (EU) so buying from the US is very cheap at this moment!

I chose the GU for it's great looks (!) and expected it to be at least as good as the Kramer but it outperforms it many times!! I love it and will never sell it i think!

This guitar has two dual coil (single space) and one humbuker emg select (passive) pick ups. The steinberer legacy is kept with a locking R trem and headless neck. I bought the courdura bag (with the steinberger sound logo) which is much nicer than the supplied one and I like the single strap which is very nice when you have a shoulder bag.

I play classical, jazz ,prog and avant free rock (here in nyc) . The sound is good and the pick ups are quiet. I set my amp with a lot of bass, a lot of treble with not much mid and tthe guitar gets pretty hot.

It takes about halph an hour to get used to this guitar and I must say I have played a newberg era L guitar (my teachers) and I like the shallower neck on the spirit. The cherry burst dose not look like the one in the picture in fact it looks 10 times better and the neck feels excellent.

Very Reliable

I replaced the string with la bella non calibrated strings and the guitar functions allot better. I love how small the guitar is I can take it on the bus and go up state to the caskills to record and not bother any of the other new yorkers heading up to their country homes ;^). I also think i might replace the metal knobs with the classic white dot black plastic knobs but thats just a knit picky little detail.

1998, Japan
24 frets
volume, tone, 5-way selector.
H/S/H
EMG pickups
Passive electronics

Awesome for Metal And Blues. Not so much for solos.
Using a Peavey 158 Rage Transtube amp. Rich Sound.
It's not so easy tapping(better with a strat!!!!)

No problems!

7 years and no scratches. it seems unbreakable!

Never needed

Everything ok. it's everything ok but not for beginners!

See below for details

Well i must have got a good one. The build and setup were spot-on. Flimsy strings apart everything works fine. The EMG selects are characterless but silent and will be replaced soon by a Kent Armstrong HP01 full sized humbucker and two cool rails. Great out-of-phase sounds without the noise and the bridge HB is meaty enough but i look forward to the KA's

Excellent. NO FLAWS but i got plain white as i didn't want to see the bits of wood joined together under a doubtful stain.

Wait and see but it is robust enough. I don't chuck guitars around.

Err....what?

The dollar is weak at the moment. That price includes shipping!!

the features are all covered in the previouis reviews

The pups are shrill, abrasive, and overly bright the overall sound of the guitar is skanky

The guitar arrived with lots of buffing compound on it and it looked like some very unskilled worker went wild on the fretboard with a grinding wheel, one of the fretboard position markers was chipped and there appeared to be water damage on the rosewood.

The paint was very imperfect.

The R-trem was a joke. It would not stay in tune and was difficult to use, creaked like crazy, and would not return to zero.

Horrible overall.

I have no idea. I wouldn't put this guitar in the hands of even a beginner and I wouln't even dream of taking this guitar to a gig.

We'll see.

Not at all worth even the sub 300 price tag.

Don't buy this guitar thinking you'll get something that comes close to a real steinberger because you won't. You get what you pay for.

The "gig bag" is really more like a dust bag. You wouln't want to take your guitar anywhere in that thin piece of crap.

I think musicyo, gibson, and steinberger are doing their "real" guitars a disservice by issuing these crappy Spirit models. It can only drag down the image and reputation of the very fine american made models.

Save your money for a real steiny

Bought this guitar new from Musicyo.com came with gigbag, and alen wrenches.

The guitar came with EMG select pickups (two single coils and one humbucker). These pickups are pure garbage. I was quick to replace them with 3 stock strat pickups and was able to use the stock controls and switch (5-way). As soon as this modification was done...."BAM", instant tone. The stock select pickups are all mud with no definition at all. Replacing the pickups made this thing come alive. I have no idea why they would use the Select pickups, or why EMG would lend thier name to such an awful sounding product.

The action was the lowest possible, meaning the strings were laying aginst the frets. This is possibly due to the fact that I live in Nevada where there is almost no humidity. A few tweaks of the trusrod, and they came into place nicely. The finish is black, clean and haven't had any real trouble from it yet. The trem works great, no problem there. I got the string adapter so that I could put standard strings on it. This also works great. The 5-way switch tends to cut in and out and I will also be replacing that soon. The other controls all work quietly and smoothly.

As far as if it will stand up during a performance, this has yet to be seen, Just made most of the modifications and am looking forward to taking it out now. I wouldn't have used it as a doorstop the way it came to me, but with a little work, it seems suprisingly sound.

Have never had a problem with music yo as of yet and they almost always answer my emails. The shipping is the best on the planet, very fast.

I currently have about 50 guitars and have owned in the neighborhood of 300. The spirit guitars would be great if not for the pickups.
I would get anotherone if this one somehow got lost. It is a very comfortable guitar to play sitting or standing. The neck feels awesome. The zero fret is a great addition because people tend to overlook the fack that you want the same tone from an open string as you do from the fretted notes, so why have a brass, plastic, or bone nut when it will sound differently than the alloy that the frets are made of, good call on that aspect.

- New from Musicyo
-Swamp Ash body, fireburst finish, S/S/H EMG Select, R-Trem

These EMG Select pickups sound pretty good, nice range, kinda hot. I was thinking about replacing them before i plugged in but now i'm gunna hold onto em a little longer

Heres where I had some problems. It arrived tuned down to D. I started tuning it to E and almost immediately the high E string broke at the ball. Luckily I had ordered some D'Addarios but they didnt arrive until a couple of days later. Ok, got the strings. I loosen the housing for the high e string and the ball drops down below the housing, getting stuck underneath. I had to pry it out with a tiny screwdriver, scratching the area. Finally replace the string and start playing. Not 30 minutes later it breaks again. I call Musicyo and explain whats happening, they offer to send out a set of double ball strings. A couple days later the strings arrive, but they're not double ball, theyre regular strings! Called back, they're going to send out the right strings and they told me i can keep the other ones.

There was some buzzing around the 13th and 15th fret on the D string. After looking at it, I could see that those frets were raised more than the others. I took a small hammer to it and hammered it down. no more buzz

Now about the finish. I ordered the fireburst thinking that that was the one pictured on the website. I got it and it wasnt the one pictured - that is the cherryburst even though that finish wasnt listed for that model. Whatever, i'll live with it. The finish looks great all around, no defects.

Don't know if I'd use this live due to the string breaking problem, i've only had it a week so the jurys still out on that. Everything else seems sturdy enough. I can't imagine using this as a main guitar. But what can you expect for the price?

Service was great, even with the problems I had. Got an email after my guitar was shipped letting me know when it would arrive. I had to contact them twice, once by phone and once by email. Email response came within hours, and phone support was excellent.

- I've been playing for over 20 years, first 10 constantly, last 10 off and on
- I wish I had called about the finishes instead of assuming I ordered the right one
- I'd probably order another one if it was stolen. It's a pretty good guitar for the price
- I love how fast you can change strings on it. I have it in the locked position and it stays in tune. I havent used the whammy yet but I'm hoping it'll stay in tune also
- I own a Les Paul, an Esp strat and have owned a Les Paul Deluxe, 3 different SGs, Gibson Flying V, Ibanez, Melody Maker. This guitar is quite a deal, it should sell for more than it does
- I'm thinking about buying the Maple body H/S/H model to get a different sound, and maybe replacing the pickups on one of them. You really cant go wrong getting this guitar for the price offered.

Swamp ash honey-burst body, maple neck, rosewood fingerboard. S/S/HB EMG Selects. Purchased from MusicYo.com. Nice fatter neck contour. Headless guitar, balances very well for seated playing. Fit, finish and playability very good out of the box.

Have had previous experience with EMG Selects. Didn't like'em and still don't. Too muddy and undefined. Replaced with SA/SA/EMG60 active system, then replaced the tone control with an EMG SPC active EQ circuit. WOW.
Run guitar through Roland VG-88 into Mackie board - QSC 1650 amp - 482 Sonic Maximizer - Yamaha 15" speaker cabinets. Great sound. Give it a 9 with EMG active system, a 4 with the stock EMG Selects

Guitar finish and setup was just fine. Very impressive, actually for a $259 guitar. I've seen $1000+ guitars that weren't set up this well. Minor intonation adjustments were required, that's it. Pickup adjustment? Didn't matter since I ditched 'em.

Just got it so can't tell. Seems to be built very well, neck pocket nice 'n tight.

Ordered the guitar Thursday night, priority mail, arrived Saturday morning. It doesn't get much easier than that. Haven't had any need for help from MusicYo

Playing for over thirty years, make my own midi hybrid guitars. I've played and owned strats, pauls, Taylors, etc. Play finger-style jazz/blues/rock as a solo performer. I REALLY like this guitar. Its'well-balanced, ergonomic, stays tuned and sounds GREAT with the EMG Active system. I think the Steinberger design is a "better mouse-trap". I play seated alot and noticed how much more relaxed and natural my playing position is with this guitar. A great value. If it were stolen I would certainly purchase another. Now, if I could figure out how to retrofit an LR Baggs piezo system into that S-Trem bridge, I have what I want.