reverend Jetstream 390 & Tricky Gomez RT
Original design, keen pricing and stage ready. What’s not to like about Reverend guitars? Very little. Let’s take a look…
Despite a reasonably low profile in the UK, Revered is far from a new brand and the company celebrates its 20th anniversary this year. Originally conceived by Joe Naylor (who still provides the designs), the guitars used alternative materials and were made in the US. They’ve been made in Korea’s Mirr Music factory for some time now, but are QC’d and set up in the US (head tech Zach Green signs each one). The brand has attracted numerous names (Reeves Gabrels and Billy Corgan), and the guitars are available from a small number of UK dealers, not through a distribution chain, which all adds up to an attractive proposition both in style and price.
One obvious thing about Reverend’s designs is that they don’t simply clone someone else’s body shape and call it their own. However, our models here do have plenty of familiarity about them: the bolt-on Jetstream has its Strat credentials in place with a Fender scale, three pickups, vibrato and five-way pickup selector, but its outline blends a little of a Jazzmaster’s top horn and offset curved lower bout with a more modernist pointed treble horn, plus we
have a forearm contour and a shallow rib-cage cutaway. While the entire top edge is cleanly bound, the back has a simple radius. Another difference is the korina body, used throughout the range, and while it has little figure through the Three-Tone Burst gloss, it actually appears to be a one-piece body – we can’t see any joins.
While the neck is more Fender-like, it’s fixed with six screws (another two smaller screws simply hold the plate in place); the neck profile is good, if a little slim (approximately 20mm at the 12st fret; 21.7mm at the 12th) with a Gibson-like ‘flat’ fingerboard camber of 305mm (12 inches). Hardware is nicely spec’d, too, with a modern Wilkinson vibrato, rearlock tuners and a graphite ‘Boneite’ nut with a roller string tree on the top two strings.
Electronically, we have three soapbar single coils, the bridge slightly hotter than the neck and middle. Interestingly, the bridge unit is some way from the bridge (51mm from the central poles to the top E string saddle break point), in theory avoiding a spikier tonality. Controls include master volume (with treble bleed capacitor) and tone, plus a Bass Contour Control (BCC) – a passive high-pass filter.
As per its set neck, the Tricky Gomez (a pun on Trini Lopez, not a signature artist!) uses the
The Tricky Gomez is a leaner, cleaner, brighter take on a centre-blocked semi
shorter ‘Gibson’ scale length, but angles back the distinct six-in-a-line headstock, binds the fingerboard edge and adds block inlays and a little extra meat to the neck depth. The body is the same ‘solidbody’ thickness of 44mm, but the Korina back is routed out to leave a centre block and hollow sides and capped with a bound-edge maple top. It’s based on Reverend’s Manta Ray outline, just over 356mm (14 inches) wide: more compact than an ES-335 and a good weight, too.
While the same tuners and nut are retained here, the vibrato switches to a licensed Bigsby with a roller-saddle tune-o-matic. The seemingly Gretsch-inspired and sized Alnico 5-loaded Revtron humbuckers sit in low profile rings with standard humbucking height adjustment and a double row of slothead polepieces. The bridge is a hotter wind and, aside from the three-way toggle, the control setup is the same as the Jetstream.
Feel & sounds
The Jetstream might not be the ringiest, brightest three-single-coil guitar we had to hand, but it’s a great platform for this trio of soapbar single coils. We’re immediately impressed by the Jetstream’s ‘Strat plus’ voicings: bigger and wider sounding yet still very Strat-y. The bridge is especially useful for anyone who finds a Strat’s back pickup just too spiky and thin. Here, the voicing and pickup placement produce a beefier, thinner tone that retains twang and a clean high-end. The neck pickup is almost too big and wide sounding, but if that’s a problem the BCC works very simply but effectively, attenuating the lower frequencies yet still keeping the upper portion (not dissimilar to Yamaha’s Dry Switch on its Revstar guitars). The combination of that and a standard tone means you can attack both high and low portions of your sound. Along with welcome hum-cancelling in the quacky mix positions, the feel is really good, too, with the exception of a rather flimsy feeling five-way switch – easily replaced – and what might be a too-thin feeling neck. But one man’s meat…
With a little more zing to its acoustic response, the Tricky Gomez doesn’t sound overly ‘hollow’ yet its compact size is a welcome change from an ES-335-alike centreblocked semi. The heel-placed strap button means the guitar leans forward a little, but it’s hardly alone there and sits perfectly well.
Sound-wise, we had no idea what to expect and it’s not particularly humbucking in terms of its low (coil-split-like) output with sounds to match. Compared with our reference Guild Starfire V, for example, it’s not only quieter but brighter, reminding us more of a Thinline Tele. But it’s an easy fit for funkier, pop and soul styles, though we found ourselves using the BCC less here than the Jetstream. That said, it does produce some stringy single-coil-like voices with a little roll-off that sounds more than usable with some dense modulation and reverb. Switch to some slapback and it’ll do rockabilly with ease – not quite a rubbery voiced Gretsch in the mix position, but good enough. On heavier gains it’s quite lively, a little more feedback-resistant than our Starfire, but less woody and more direct sounding.
verdict
At these direct-to-dealer prices, there’s very little wrong with either guitar and an awful lot that’s right. They have a refreshingly original design, sharp, competent build and perfectly usable sounds – the Jetstream being a beefier bigger ‘Strat’ if you like, the Tricky Gomez a leaner, cleaner, brighter take on a centreblocked semi. It’s precisely those hybrid sounds that appeal and could justify a place in your collection, and both are gig-ready but would also make great modding platforms for us tweakers.
If you can see beyond the classic designs but can’t afford a boutique build, we strongly suggest you check these out. There’s a big range and we’re sure you’d find a friend.