eastman sb56/n-GD4 &
Ruokangas unicorn supersonic
choice is one thing the modern guitar market gives us in spades. Or at least that’s the way it seems. Recently, looking for a dual-soapbar P-90-style guitar, we were surprised by the lack of new guitar choice. Even Gibson’s 2019 range packs just one dual-P-90 guitar, the SG Special. Reverend flies the flag, Epiphone, too, in the lower end, but looking for a more serious electric we’re all too soon into custom-shop level ‘historic’ or reissue cost-a-lot-territory.
Eastman’s hollow TV64 was one of our favourite guitars of 2018, and launched during that year was the SB56, a single solidbody model loaded with Lollar soapbars. Meanwhile, looking further afield led us to an unusual choice, perhaps, from Finland’s Ruokangas. Its Les Paul-inspired Unicorn Classic will relieve you of £5k-plus,
but a somewhat relative bargain lies in its more stripped-down Unicorn Supersonic. Job done: two serious soapbar-loaded solidbodies… that couldn’t be more different from each other!
Eastman’s vintage-aimed SB56 not only offers a period-accurate specification, but its new low-gloss ‘vintage nitro’ finish, paired with aged-looking hardware, creates quite the vintage-style piece that’s clearly inspired by the pre-humbucking Les Paul. “Two coats of sealer are applied and then sanded flat in preparation for the matt nitrocellulose lacquer: our vintage nitro,” explains Eastman’s Pepijn’t Hart. “The vintage nitro is exactly the same as our gloss nitro but with the addition of a binding agent [this just means it loses a little transparency]. We feel this process provides the best combination of sound, durability, vintage finish lustre and feel.”
Ruokangas’ Unicorn Supersonic might take its style from the pre-’59 single-cut Les Paul Special, but outwardly, at least, it applies an altogether more modern boutique build in a very different dress. Called Bare Bone, it feels very textural, almost unfinished as if it’s missed out on final sanding. “The texture comes from a special treatment we do for the wood before applying any finish on it,” explains Juha Ruokangas. “It’s not sandblasting or anything as ‘violent’ as that; the texture is the actual grain pattern, not scratches or anything else artificial. The Faded Cherry Red guitar you have uses our own secret mixture of hard wax rubbed on the Bare Bone treated and stained wood.”
Yet despite their very different styles, both single-cuts – which nicely avoid copy status with different, more rounded treble horns – do share the commonality of dual-soapbar single coils, modelled after Gibson’s classic P-90, and made by two premier pickup winders: Jason Lollar (Eastman) and Harry Häussel (Ruokangas).
If you have a taste for vintage and don’t enjoy or want to pay the prices of Gibson old or new, then Eastman will be on your radar. All that we’ve seen and played has been nothing short of exceptional for the money. This SB56 is no different with a beautiful vintage-style build: one-piece mahogany neck and back, for example, a lovely big neck, extremely tidy fretwork, 17-degree headstock rake, an excellent setup and a near perfect weight. Add in that low-gloss finish and the aged hardware and you feel completely drawn in to its vintage-like vibe.
The Unicorn Supersonic, in comparison, is a more creative take on a classic. It displays typical Ruokangas ingredients
such as Spanish cedar, used for the neck and body, which Juha Ruokangas adopted early in his career. “It’s neither Spanish nor a true cedar,” we’re told. The Latin name Cedrela Odorata means, literally, ‘smells like cedar’. Spanish cedar, or cedro, grows in South America, and it is a close relative to Honduran mahogany. The body is topped with a thin cap of Arctic birch (the ‘Arctic’ is an invented trade name by Ruokangas for this Finnish figured birch) with an Indian rosewood fingerboard and beautifully fettled stainless steel frets, and a similarly raked headstock angle. Closer inspection reveals a three-piece neck lamination and a head splice. The headstock shapes on both are classic; the Ruokangas’ has some relief carving and an uncovered truss-rod access, again perfectly suiting its vintage-informedbut-far-from-vintage-clone design.
The Ruokangas’ intonatable wrapover bridge, made from lightweight aluminium with custom-made saddles, uses Schroeder locking posts that actually connect to rearloaded Lock-Thru-Body studs. Tuners are the increasingly common Gotoh openbacked style along with the company’s lesser known strap locks. Gotoh’s more classic parts are used, in relic finish, on our Eastman, too, along with small strap buttons and Kluson-style tuners. It’s exactly what you’d expect and of a very good quality, too.
You could play both for hours and still find subtleties you hadn’t discovered before
Feel & sounds
With superb-feeling weights, there’s nothing remotely boat anchor about either of these builds. Necks are intelligently done, too, falling into what most would feel is late-50s spec. The Ruokangas feels slightly bigger (23mm at the 1st fret, 25.3mm at the 12th, as opposed to Eastman’s 22mm deep neck at the 1st, filling out to 24.5mm by the 12th), but how much of that is down to the more textural feel of the Unicorn, as opposed to the satin smoothness of the Eastman, is anyone’s guess. If the Eastman with its slightly smaller fretwire gauge feels very mainstream and perfectly good, the Ruokangas, by comparison, feels a level up, as it should. There is silky smooth fretwork – beautifully rounded with perfectly domed ends. Quite superb.
The acoustic response of the Ruokangas is nothing short of exceptional, too, with a sustaining resonance that seems to hang around for days. The Eastman isn’t far behind, with a more vintage-y, perhaps very slightly tamed response – firmer, stronger and more fundamental.
You could probably play both of these guitars for a considerable amount of hours and still find subtleties and shades that you hadn’t discovered before. The Eastman initially sounds a little polite and a little brighter at bridge compared with our reference ’57 Les Paul Jr and, with it, a little less punky. It’s a single-cut for those who like cleaner voicings, but they’re not sterile in the least. The neck pickup has a soupy fullness that doesn’t dominate and begins to work those volume and tones. There are also a host of colours: pull the volume down and find the sweet spot on the tone above, which it thickens, below, it thins – this is just one example. Dial in a taut Marshall crunch and climb into a jumpsuit and Doc Martins and, oh dear, this writer might just have found his alter ego. Yet it recalls so much more from surprisingly jazz-like thrum: some snappy funk and sophisticated soul to nasally cocked-wah classic rock. But we’ve got another one to plug in…
It’s like we’ve put on our 3D glasses. The Unicorn is, indeed, a more mystical beast with quite a different and more complex