VINCENT INCIONG | Teacher, Music, Food, Media

Always loved Alter Bringe from their first single “Open Your Eyes” the the most recent, “Wouldn’t You Rather”! I was a Creed fan back in the day for the guitar work when “My Own Prison” came out. I know Creed gets a lot of hate, even from the guitar community, which is strange because they forget that when Creed came out, guitar driven rock music was kinda out of the picture. I remember when I first heard Creed on the radio, I said to myself, “Wait...heavy guitar in the mix?”, “Guitar solos?” etc. Manson and Rob Zombie where kinda the thing back then, which I loved too, but I missed guitar heavy music. Creed helped bring it back.

Anyway, definitely check out the new song if you haven’t yet. It has brutal riffs and killer vocal work. So far, it’s your typical Alter Bridge tune which is cool. They do claim that the music will be surprising so hopefully this is just a quick familiar appetizer and that the full album (coming out in October 2019) will deliver new sonic flavor!!

I’ve been playing my Washburn Idol for over 10 years, have four other models in my collection, and have bought a small army of their acoustic guitars for my high school since 2001. As far as quality and value go, Washburn is excellent. I have never felt slighted by their Korean, Indonesian, and Chinese manufacturing because the guitars I ordered were mostly solid workhorses. My issue was never with quality, though when you buy over 2 dozen of them over a period of time, you do get the occasional dud. My issue came about a few years ago when I noticed the customer care start to slip. I didn’t think much of it at the time because my experience showed that Washburn stood behind their products. One year, they even took in an acoustic with an expired warranty and did some major work on it for free! Sure, you’d let things slide if you are confident with a company and after they did you a solid like that!

However, in 2016, I ordered a Washburn Priestess (PXZ200B). It took a while to get it because it was a new-ish model at the time that wasn’t (and never became) regularly stocked at local music stores. When I called about a case for the axe, they admitted that they did not have a case available. They didn’t have solid information on if they ever would make one either. Even the rep thought it was insane that a guitar would be made and sold without a case available. How would a musician gig with it? However, he did suggest a few brands that made cases he felt would fit. Luckily I found one and have taken the axe on dozens of gigs since. The question burning in my head was, “why wouldn’t you make a case for a guitar that you designed?....especially since the guitar has an acquired shape?”. If I were to ask this question to a Washburn executive (if I could ever get one on the phone or if they ever responded to emails), I’m sure I’d get a runaround with figures, percentages, and other overthought data as to why they didn’t make one. However, the obvious reason why you WOULD make a case is so your customer could safely and proudly take your instrument to a show with your logo on it. This is when I started to become suspicious.

In the next few years, Ola Englund left Washburn, along with his Solar line, along with the Idols, along with a few other electric lines, and along with dozens of other players I remember from reading their annual catalogs. The only artists left are Nuno Bettencourt, Marzi Montazeri, and Michael Sweet with signature lines in electrics. With the exodus of electric guitars, I noticed a small addition of electric models and a surge of new acoustics. It’s almost stupid, the amount of new acoustics there are now, but I understand that there are aspects to their business that only they should know about. But as a fan of their guitars, artists, and history? This move made my suspicion grow.

A year or so later, I decided that I wanted to re-stock my guitar room at school with Washburn guitars again. There was a time (circa 2009) when Washburn’s entry level guitars (D9C) started to get really expensive and I couldn’t afford them for my school anymore. This was when I switched to Yamaha and have been very satisfied with them since. However, as my own personal love for Washburn grew along with my personal collection, I thought about giving Washburn another go. I have noticed that their acoustic line has expanded A LOT offering new and functional designs that were also aesthetically pleasing!! However, mostly made in China now, I wanted to at least have a conversation with their Artist Accommodations person to perhaps talk shop, talk about quality, and talk about ways to buy guitars in bulk. Maybe have a conversation about how me and my school could always push Washburn to parents, students, and audiences to help spread the word. Now, this could be a very naive pipe dream of mine, to have a working relationship with a guitar company, but at least I made the move to ask.

After multiple attempts to contact their Artist Accommodations person via email over the next few months, no response. Their customer service guy, who I always found to be helpful and friendly, even assured me to keep trying because Washburn was always accommodating of their long time customers. Now, I’m not calling this gentleman a liar, but the company sure did make a liar out of him by never responding. I’d rather a nasty email telling me to piss off because I’m a nobody than being simply ignored. I’m sure these suits are busy with their prized artists but what about the little guys? If you look up Washburn PXZ200B on YouTube, my review will likely be the only one that pops up with over 5k views. Now by YouTube standards, yes, I’m a pissant but that’s 5k people (likely all guitar players) who now know of the PXZ200B. I feature my Washburn’s a few times on my gear channel too, even to this day! With all the Washburn’s I have bought over the years for my school, myself, and the YouTube vids, I think I should at least be granted a conversation.

Now in 2019, the electric line is still weak with weak attempts at a revival. The new Idol series (my all time favorite) is a joke, nowhere near the visual or vibe appeal as the older line. The new version of my PXZ200B, now called Z260, is actually a downgrade from the original with no new finishes. The Nuno 4N is a bit of a reach too. Even when Nuno talks about it, he stumbles explaining the differences between it and his N4’s. 6,000 new acoustics tho so China’s economy will improve, but still no responses to new emails I send. Even general emails to customer service get ignored. I actually just called them and the voicemail loops once you try to connect to string department. WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON OVER THERE?!

I just read Austin Kleon’s “Steal Like An Artist” for the 5th time and I’m feeling inspired to take my place in the internet again. Lots has happened since my last post so here’s the quick version

My band Remember Yesterday is still around, this time with an additional singer and former student, Dana. We have a new dog now named Ella, I still struggle with my weight tho my blood is literally perfect, still have a love/hate with myself, still love to cook, wife is awesome, kid is awesome, I have a ton more guitar stuff, beard is going grey, back sucks, got a new car, and going thru midlife crisis but finding joy in it.

Oh...and this blog is now called ico-vince instead of ico-media. Haha.

Will share more soon!

Tho it isn’t very new, I have a new band called, Remember Yesterday made up of all former students of mine from Middlesex High School. My other band, Taylor Road, has been on a bit of a hiatus but we will try to pick up some bassless acoustic gigs here and there when we get around to it.

So far, Remember Yesterday has been doing real well! We have played enough gigs to know the chemistry is there and have been packing some local places too which always helps. The toughest part is getting practices figured out since we are all over the place with schedules. Zack (guitar) is a freelance musician, Jesse (drums) is a full time students at WPU, Tom (bass) is a building and grounds dude at Rutgers and is a NEW DAD, and I’m always busy with school stuff. However, hen we do get together it’s always fun and productive (usually cramming for a gig in a few days) and we make some money and entertain people along the way.

You know whats better than gear? More gear!!! Haha. Just messing around with my amps to start planning for another comparison video. This time I’m comparing my Peavey VKii and Fender Hot Rod Deluxe. Two totally different amps for different applications but that will make the video fun!!

As I have been messing around with the Fender (my most recent acquisition), I noticed much more clearly that every one of my guitars has its own sound and vibe. It’s an undeniable fact amongst guitar players for sure but maybe it’s because the amp is so good that I heard all the little nuances that make each guitar unique.

SCHECTER FASTBACK REVIEW

This guitar is awesome! It has a classic Telecaster vibe with modern features and added versatility with the coil splitting push/pulls. I have an older version with a white nut (not black like in this model) but otherwise, all the specs are identical. This guitar is on the heavy side, as expected, but it is real comfortable to play mostly due to the full and fat neck. The neck has a light gloss - a little thinner than the gloss on the fingerboard but neither leave anything to be desired. The black block inlays are a nice added touch as well.

The bridge pickup isn’t quite as hot as you’d expect from a Schecter. Schecters are usually associated with metal, this guitar isn’t like that. The bridge pickup definitley has a Tele vibe and thinness/twang but it is versatile enough to sound like whatever you want with the right pedals and dialing in. The neck pickup is the star for me. It goes from a thick brightness to all out hot fudge. It almost seems louder than the bridge pickup which is interesting.

With the coil splitting, you lose a lilttle bit of volume but gain some more tight/brighter/chimey tones. No stock pickups are coil tapped well enough to really capture an exceptional single coil sound but this guitar is the best of many worlds with what it is able to push out.

So things are going real well for my rock band, Sonic Solstice. For right now, we are a cover band but we will get into writing originals soon. We mostly cover 90′s rock, some classic rock, and some pop/rock here and there.  Basically all the music I love!!

We have had 3 gigs already and we are now adding more songs to our set list with hopes of getting more gigs/paying gigs.  We are going to concentrate on the New Brunswick scene since two of the guys are Rutgers professors and New Bruns is where I cut my teeth as a new singer/songwriter around 2005.

I never planned or even wanted to play in a cover band and now, I am fronting one which ‘m still trying to wrap my head around.  Cool thing is that I get to learn awesome songs, learn new guitar licks, and apply all that into my own songwriting!

One of the best things about playing in this band is my rekindled love for the electric guitar.  Just a month or two before we started in August, I was seriously contemplating selling all of my electric gear.  Good thing I didn’t. I have since added to it , modified it, and now can’t get my head away from thinking of new things to buy!! Sorry, wife :)

So I have installed new pups into both my electrics, bought a new amp head, blew the dust off my old 2x12 cabinet, upgraded its speakers, re-connected my old guitar effect pedals...all good stuff.  I’ll post some pictured of my rig next time I have it all set up.