I saw this pop up for sale on Christmas Eve and even though I’m trying to reduce my spending, I couldn’t help but get myself a little gift. I have really grown to love these early Ibanez 540 series guitars, but I was missing two things - a 540P, or “Power” model, and one with the exceedingly rare maple fretboard. Well, I checked two things off of my list with one purchase with this guitar!
It arrived just before New Year’s and I was thrilled - it’s a great player, sounds good, and in overall pretty good condition. The body shape is very interesting, and it looks much more rounded on the back. It suffers from the same problem as a Tele when playing it seated, it does dig into your chest just a little bit but it does have a cutout so it’s perfectly comfortable when standing. The contouring around the body is truly inspired and unique - this is a model I wish they had continued making.
The maple fretboard is of course, everything I dreamed it would be. The back of the neck is extremely smooth, there is some very pretty quartersawn grain, and the board itself is nice and smooth without being too glossy.
As with any guitar this great though, now I want another one! That will be a tall order though, there can’t be many 540P’s with maple fretboards around!