Quality Would you consider this product to be made well? How dependable? Reliability How has it stood up over time? Overall Your general opinion of this product. Playability and Feel How does it feel, Heavy, Fast, Chunky? How was the neck? Are the controls easy to get to while playing? Tone Bright and snappy? Dark and smooth? Were the pickups hot, mellow, thick, thin? Finish How did the stain or paint job look? Action How was the action out of the box?

Quality Would you consider this product to be made well? How dependable? Quality is fantastic. Case is wonderfully built. One minor complaint is having to remove the plastic protective layer off the pickguard...which is totally nit picking. The other potential concern is a hair triggered pickup switch. Occasionally it has slipped of it's own accord back into the mid position without touching it.. Reliability How has it stood up over time? This question is funny to me...because almost all people that I know want to review a product shortly after they receive it, myself included. AMS doesn't allow for follow up reviews. So, I can only really guess that it's reliability should equal my other gibsons, and that should not be a problem. I've never had a gibson fail in any way over time. Overall Your general opinion of this product. Let me first state that my experience with Gibson is having owned many, starting with a flying v in high school. Les paul custom, a les paul axcess with floyd rose, also many premium fenders. This is my first explorer. It is up to what gibson's quality is known for. excellence. you will not be disappointed. Obviously it's closest in tone and construction to the flying v. My first impression is that the red color is darker and deeper than what comes across on the AMS website. Go to the red rocker website and there is a picture with Sammy Hagar on it with this model that much more closely represents what the actual color looks like. It's not as orangy looking. You have to fish around a bit on the site to find it. Playability and Feel How does it feel, Heavy, Fast, Chunky? How was the neck? Are the controls easy to get to while playing? Explorers IMHO are initially difficult to strap up to the right height. Once locked in, it's well balanced, weight is light...and the neck is nice and thin. Tone Bright and snappy? Dark and smooth? Were the pickups hot, mellow, thick, thin? See above section entitled: Sound. IN SHORT, if you are in the market for an explorer, this is a great value for the money. For instance the x factor guitars are 1400, but for 1850, you can get something much more elegant and collectable. I was stingy with the star ratings due to my using my base comparison to the les pauls. Many people simply use 5 stars up and down...but to be fair, this is a way above average explorer..beautiful, functional and great tone. Good job gibson and sammy in putting this one out there.. Finish How did the stain or paint job look? as stated above the red color is less orangy than the AMS photos. the finish is impeccable. Though the zebra pickups are cool, personally I think this would have looked even better with fully covered chrome pickups. The binding on the neck was great and all in all a very well done guitar worth the money. The chickenfoot logo on the back is really cool..but I didn't buy this guitar because of it's signature status. in fact, i'm not a huge fan of Sammy Hagar. Though he's great and rocks, the guitar was purchased on it's aesthetic and hardware merits, not his name. Action How was the action out of the box? Out of the box, the guitar was expectedly out of tune. Once fully tuned up, the action was good. I like it low and it might be 1 mm too high for me but for now I will leave it. The neck is wonderfully thin.