I dare to agree on many things that Jon says. I love Emerald guitars, and I still have an X20 with the Parker fretboard, 11/16 neck width and center sound hole, purchased over 15 years ago ! And two years ago I purchased a super nice X7 in black. But it seems to me too that some (not all, for sure !) members of this forum belong to a sort of "Emerald Fan Club", like when you always support a soccer team.
A few weeks ago there was a post about a new Emerald archtop, with a video from Emerald of a guy playing it plugged in. Very nice guitar, it seems, so one comment was that it sounded like a million bucks, which, even if I am not american, I know does not mean literally that it plays like a guitar costing one million dollar, but still, it was a great appreciation of the sound. I dared, poor me, to comment that today with amps and controls and effects you can make any archtop sound like the Emerald one, and suggested that it would have been nice to get a video of the guitar also played unplugged. Yes I know that most archtops are played amplified, but being the Emerald archtop a real deep hollow body, I believe that to judge its tonal qualities a video of the guitar played unplugged seems a good idea.
I regret having posted that comment. It was taken like I was "doubting" the quality of the Emerald archtop sound. I was bashed. In summary, there is a lot of love for this brand in this forum, mostly very well deserved, but it is obvious that if a customer decides to spend several hundreds dollars more for the same guitar model, only in order to get it with a beautiful wood veneer under the finish instead of the standard carbon fiber weave,this customer gives great importance to the looks of the instrument, it appreciates not only the sound but also the beauty of the form. It should be respected, not mocked with sentences like "looking at the guitar with an electronic microscope"... there are players who only give importance to tone and playability, others that give importance also to cosmetics. There is room for everybody in this forum, including members who love carbon fiber guitars but do not belong to any specific fan base.
