Review of the ESP LTD EC-1000VB/Duncan Electric guitar. Where to buy it?

Bought this guitar to replace my 10+ year-old Ibanez S470 (the ZR Tremolo was giving me headache), and boy oh boy do I not regret it.

Always had an affinity towards Les Pauls so I gave it a go – I’ve wanted something that has the classic Les Paul "darker" sound but with playability of an Ibanez – that is exactly what this guitar is. The sustain this guitar gives beats both of the guitars I currently own.

Comparing it to Ibanez and my Epiphone Les Paul, ESP’s neck is not a Wizard neck, however, it is not a "baseball bat" either (which my Epiphone surely feels like) – it is a perfect blend of grippiness.

The guitar arrived with small cosmetic damage (the finish was scrapped on the front (and is very visible), but I am betting that the gorillas at my country’s customs are to blame for that. Even despite that eye-sear, it is simply a beautiful guitar. The guitar has PERFECT fretwork and the mahogany neck is a pure joy to play on. Its "matte" finish is simply the best for long sessions as the sweat will not cause your hand to slip all the time.

What surprised me was how well the guitar stays in tune, even after abusing the living hell out of the G string, it remained in tune (which cannot be said for most Les Paul-style guitars).

As a testament to how awesome this guitar is, the guitar was upheld by customs for 25 days (my country’s customs and paperwork bureaucracy is stuck in the 80s) – even after spending more than a month on the road, the guitar arrived with almost perfect intonation, perfect action and very minimal and acceptable fret buzz (you cannot hear it through the amp, it’s caused by the low action), there was no need to re-adjust the tross rod – I’ve even reserved a local guitar tech’s time to set it up upon arrival – he was also genuinely surprised, nothing needed to be done and only thing left to do was to change the strings.

With the guitar having so many pros, it would be ridiculous to list them all, but to mention some cons:
– The "gold" line that follows the neck is a bit more "yellowish" than gold (this is not visible to the audience)
– The "tune knob" is rather finicky and not "as tight" as the Volume knobs
– If you’ve been playing a Floyd Rose guitar, you will need to re-adjust your hand positioning for palm muting

EDIT: Unfortunately, the damage was too great as the finish started coming off and I had to return the guitar. (ordered an EC-1000 with EMG’s instead) – however, what must be commended was the way Thomann dealt with the entire situation as they were more than amazing throughout the whole ordeal.

After this, would I recommend this guitar? Hell yes – I assume I was severely unlucky with the mass produced product and it somehow slipped through Thomann’s hands (ordering this during the height of the pandemic did not help).

I bought an EC1000VB in 2006, and man, it was just superb. EMG pickups (that incidentally were the thing i liked the least about it, and i first swapped the 81 with an 85, then went passive with a set of Bareknuckles), Sperzel locking tuners, Earvana nut (not that it made any percievable difference, to be honest). Perfect finish. It just looked, sounded and felt like a guitar thrice its price.
Few years ago, for reasons that seemed good at the time, i sold it (along with an LTD MH417, but that’s another sad story). And regretted it ever since.

So at last i decided to buy it again, and thankfully LTD now is making an already passive version, loaded with Duncans (a pretty standard combination of a bridge JB and a neck 59).

Still made in Korea, despite the production has already partly shifted to Indonesia. Still looking as gorgeous as i remembered it, but with some difference (obviously apart from the pickups).
No more Sperzel hardware, the tuners are still locking but branded LTD. They work fine, anyway.
No more Earvana, just a generic nut (see above).
A push-pull tone know for coil splitting (and that’s a very welcome addiction)
A macassar ebony fretboard in place of the pitch black Madagascar ebony of the old model (and this is another change i’m really happy about, i never liked both the looks and feel of ebony, and macassar not only looks way more interesting, it could be me, but it’s apparently also less clangy and snappy on the strings)

I can’t be sure, but I suspect the body is no more made of a single piece of mahogany, because the acoustic tone has changed a bit.
It’s somewhat less resonant, less middy, brighter and more balanced – i was a bit perplexed about the choice of pickups on a guitar that i remembered being very warm sounding – but actually they complement very well the “new” acoustic properties.
The bridge JB is well balanced, not too aggressive but perfectly able to handle high gain in standard or drop tunings with ease, and its mid hump make it stand out of the mix in solos and melodic parts.
The neck 59 is not as muddy as i feared it to be, and they both sound very good when splitted.
I don’t think they’ll last long – but I’m a pickup nerd, there’s nothing wrong with them.

This said, the LTD EC1000 is still one of the best guitars you can find for less than 1000 €, but the quality gap with the ESP eclipse is slightly more pronounced (less inapparent, to be fair) than it used to be. I gave it four stars in the “quality” department exclusively because of this very reason. But in absolute terms it’s a five star instrument in all aspects.