S By Solar: The Best Value Metal Guitars?
When it comes to metal, some things are essential to guitarists: huge sounding pickups with a tight low end, big frets and definitely some pointy bits on the body.
Don’t you think so? I’d say there’s more openness to things like offsets and Tele shapes these days, but the mighty metal masses still enjoy their guitars to be at least vaguely vampire-bat-shaped.
I want to show you a new sub brand that has impressed me in the mosh-stakes. They are loud, they are pointy and they are better than their very agreeable price point might suggest. Let me introduce you to S by Solar guitars.
Contents
Features of the S By Solar Range
How Do S By Solar Guitars Compare?
Who is the S By Solar Range For?
Solar Guitars
Ola Englund knows a thing or two about metal. If you’re not familiar with him, then you’re reading the wrong blog. Sorry, I mean, if you’re not familiar with him, he's the guitarist with Swedish metal bands The Haunted and Feared, as well as being owner of Solar guitars.
Busy chap!
Solar guitars were designed by Ola to allow all metalheads to enjoy a decent quality axe at a great price. The body shapes are familiar yet original; the hardware is impressive - including special Seymour Duncan collaborative pickups - and each Solar guitar has that authentic feel of a guitar just built to perform.
They’ve proven to be a huge hit, partly because they are original and partly because they are on the affordable side of things. Players can spend a reasonable sum of cash and get a more-than-decent guitar in return, all primed and ready to unleash some savage metal fury.
So, that’s the Solar backstory, but what’s the deal with S by Solar?
What are S By Solar?
S By Solar is an even more affordable series of guitars, based on top Solar models. Despite Solar already being a good value choice, Ola and his team wanted to corner the ultra-popular sub £400 market: that fertile ground that exists between beginner instruments and ‘mid-priced’ ones. This is a tricky area, because these have to be a noticeable step up from beginner guitars, but still have to come in at a low price point.
This is exactly what S By Solar are all about. Taking a handful of top-selling Solar body shapes, S By Solar are designed to offer guitarists on a budget a slice of proper hard rock action. It’s an enticing idea for sure, but do they measure up? Let’s take a look at the range itself…
The S By Solar Range
So, what types of guitar will we be seeing in the S By Solar lineup? Here’s a handy visual reference…
S By Solar AB4 - Sleek superstrat design with one or two humbuckers and a hard tail that strings through the body. Also available as a seven string.
S By Solar TB4 - Exaggerated Tele-style, with an extreme single cutaway, single humbucker and single volume control!
S By Solar EB4 - Explorer-shaped guitar with two humbuckers and string-through-body bridge.
S By Solar VB4 - V shaped axe with two humbuckers and string-through bridge.
S By Solar Naming Conventions
All S By Solar guitars so far share a naming convention, and I’ll explain that to you now:
The first part of the model name is the shape, eg AB4 for the Superstrat style. See above for each of these.
Then comes a full stop, followed by a number (number of strings) and a letter for the colour. Here’s what they mean:
- 6 = 6 strings
- 7 = 7 strings
- 61 = 6 strings and a single pickup
- C = Carbon Black
- W = White Matte
Let’s try these in action: for example, an S by Solar TB4.61W is a Tele-style with one pickup, 6 strings and a white finish. Here’s another: the S by Solar EB4.6C is a black Explorer-style model with two pickups and 6 strings.
This also means that the bass model -which has a Superstrat body shape - is also known as an AB4. You can tell it’s a bass due to the numeric: it’s called the S By Solar AB4.4C.
Features of the S By Solar Range
Lots of features are shared by the entire range of instruments, so here they are in one place for your reference:
- Poplar body
- Maple neck with a C Solar profile
- 24 frets
- 14” fingerboard radius
- Specially made high output ceramic humbuckers
You’ll find this stuff on every S by Solar guitar. Other features, such as control knobs and scale length, change for model to model. There are no huge surprises here for me. Poplar is gaining popularity as a budget tone wood, and a couple with high gain pickups, will do just fine. The C Solar profile is, to my hands, not a million miles from the sort of neck you’d find on an LTD guitar. Definitely, it’s got more heft than an Ibanez Wizard neck for sure. Whether that’s better or worse is a matter of taste, but I’m into it!
How Do S By Solar Guitars Compare?
If you are in the market for a metal guitar and money’s tight for you, I think you’ll be more than happy with an S by Solar guitar. The workmanship is of a satisfying standard, and the guitars feel reassuringly solid, particularly for what are - to call a spade a spade - budget instruments. The pickups sound fine: hot and tight in the low end, though I can definitely see lots of players replacing them with active units such as EMGs. Also, the tuners do a perfectly fine job, but a small investment in locking tuners would be an excellent, cost-effective upgrade, too.
Overall, performance is good on the examples I checked out, and I’m once again impressed at just how much guitar you can get for a couple of hundred quid these days!
So, what else is out there to compare? At this price, not tons of things. Jackson’s JS range is the obvious one, and that’s some stiff competition, though I feel like S By Solar are definitely punching at a similar weight. The same goes for Gio Series Ibanez guitars, but they have a more 80s slant to their vibe than the modernity of the S By Solar designs.
Brands like LTD and Schecter have recently put out extremely affordable ranges, so do compare these to the LTD MT-130 (and the 200 series if you can spend a little more) and the Schecter Standard line, if you’re weighing up your options.
Who is the S By Solar Range For?
- Hard rockers on a budget
- Guitarists looking to try something different
- Gigging players who need a solid second guitar
It’s pretty clear: S By Solar are metal, through and through. These are obviously designed from the ground up to blast out chunky riffs and liquid shred solos. At these tasks they are absolutely fit for the task, and in fact very impressive for the money. Considering how little cash you need to snare one of these, I’d call them a bit of a bargain for the metal guitarist on a budget. They look the part and feel like ‘proper’ instruments, which are not things I take for granted!
Obviously, at this price, there are concessions. Body and fingerboard woods are not A-list, and there isn’t really anything decorative to speak of. I’m happy to report though, that the essential stuff is very much here: the pickups are not branded but they sound good for their primary task; there are no decorative inlays or bindings, but how many metal players even want that stuff? As a genre, the stripped back look particularly suits metal, and that’s partly why these guitars are a success.
For a number of reasons, I recommend adding these metal maniacs to your ‘next guitar’ longlist without hesitation.
Click to View our S By Solar Guitars
