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Ibanez SZ 320

 

Ibanez SZ 320 Electric Guitar reviewed by The Man in the Jar

I chose the Gold-Top model for this review because I'm a bit flash...

Features of the Ibanez SZ 320

Tuners - Sealed chrome unbranded minis with large knobs. Very smooth and chillingly accurate.

Headstock - Compact 3-a-side with Ibanez logo and antiqued binding. I like this style of headstock which can also be found on the Godin range. It gives the guitar a contemporary, business-like feel.

Nut - Black plastic, accurate and perfectly finished.

Neck - The black lacquered 3-piece mahogany neck is quite chunky but not quite of Les Paul proportions. The antiqued binding adds a nice touch of class.

Fretboard - The short scale of the fretboard combined with the slightly chunky neck make for a different and very satisfying playing experience. The rosewood is smooth with lovely abalone dot-markers. The abalone markers do tend to blend in with the rosewood from the players' point of view, but abalone markers in the side binding come to the rescue.  

Frets - Medium frets, nicely polished and well finished.

Action - Great straight from the box. Together with the short scale, the good action makes for excellent playability.

Body - A thick slab of mahogany in a double cutaway "Stratoid" shape. This supports a carved maple top. The body is contoured at the back for playing comfort and although the body is quite thick it is not uncomfortably heavy on the strap. The gorgeous gold top is accentuated by shiny black lacquered back and sides. What at first glance looks like binding between the two is actually the edge grain of the maple top showing through clear lacquer. Very nice touch!

Bridge - New smoother take on good old tune-o-matic. The rounded tops to the saddles are very comfortable under the palm of your hand when muting. There's no tailpiece as the strings dive through staggered ferrules to be anchored in the back of the body. 

Pickups - Two Duncan-Ibanez open-coil humbucking pickups are set in chrome pickup mounts that reflect the glorious gold top really nicely.

Controls - Two volume, one tone and a three way selector. The middle position taps both pickups and engages two single-coils, one from each pickup.

Pickguard - None fitted.

Strap-buttons - Good and secure.

Output Jack - On lower edge in oval plate.

Finish - The finish on this guitar is excellent. Ibanez have made it difficult for themselves with the gold/maple/black arrangement on the body's edge but even here the finish is sharp and clean.

 

Sound of the Ibanez SZ 320

On the face of it the pickup selection seems limited. You can have one humbucker at either bridge or neck position, or you can have two single coils. No other variation is possible, even with the two single coils engaged I found that both volume controls acted as master. With this in mind I was very interested in the tone and the quality of the pickups, so I plumped for the clean channel on a Line 6.

The bridge humbucker is nice and bright with a forthright voicing. The neck humbucker delivered a terrific growl with even tone across the strings. Both pickups have a high quality distinctive voice which shone through on the clean setting. Running the two single-coils on clean was a revelation. They delivered a lovely breadth of tone that offered a swathe of great clean sounds dependent on where you strike the strings.

On the heavier, overdriven amp models the humbuckers really showed their form. The bridge is brash and full for attacking rhythms and lead. The neck position lends added depth to overdriven lead guitar runs.    

 

Overall Impressions of the Ibanez SZ 320

This instrument oozes class. It looks great, it plays like butter and it has three distinctive voices. The quality of the sound that comes from mid-range Ibanez pickups always amazes me. Here they've enhanced this quality with the clever switching they've employed, giving you the chance to own a guitar which covers all the bases with style at around £300.

Buy the Ibanez SZ 320 Gold-top 

Also available in black or brown sunburst

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