I don't know about you guys but I personally would love to be able to get a guitar that's under a grand with a different wood than Basswood that isn't a BOLT-ON. I would much rather have a Mahogany or Alder body guitar over a Basswood body guitar anyday. There are guitars under a grand with better wood in the MG series but they are Bolt-ons. Basswood isn't a bad wood in some cases but they should use it for the JS series Jacksons and then guitars that are $500 and up have either Alder or Mahogany. As much as I'm loving the new X series and especially the fact that they are all Neck-thru bodies, I'm not too keen on them having Basswood bodies. A Basswood body with a rock maple neck is not a good combination because Maple is heavier than Basswood and can cause the guitars to be Neck-heavy. I have a KVX10 King V that has this issue. Guitars around this price a couple to 3 years ago were said to have Alder bodies. Even Fender's guitars in the same price range of the new X series have Alder bodies. That's pretty unfair considering that Fender currently owns Jackson as far as I know. Come on Jackson, your guitars have the best playability out of any guitar on the market. You guys deserve to have better wood than Basswood put into your guitars. I understand that it may be money issues because the Economy sucks nowadays but Jackson guitars are worthy enough to have better wood on the bodies. What do you guys think?

Tell this to Steve Vai, John Petrucci, and Edward Van Halen. Their guitars are Basswood bolt-ons... John Suhr claims his holy grail of wood combinations is a Basswood body with Maple cap and Maple neck...

Basswood is not a lesser wood then Alder or Mahogany. It's just another choice.

I have neck thru, set neck, and bolt on guitars and My go to instruments are my Peavey Wolfgang, and my Jackson PC-1. Both Bolt -On instruments.

There is no best. Only different choices...

Wood density, were in the world it comes from, how it's processed, shape of the body.....all factors. Basewood and mahogany are the typical economical choices. Someones got to make a profit. I could argue a little and believe that wood make a big difference. However, I don't get paid to endorse products.

That's all fine and good and I like all three of those guitar players but the mass majority of people aren't into a Basswood and Bolt-On combination. That may work for some guitarists but I'm not a huge fan. Plus you have to think about this also, Those Three guitarists with the exception of Joe Satriani, all use effects as much as they need air to breathe. Not that it's a bad thing because effects can really bring good dynamics but at the same time, they can flood a guitar's actual tone no matter what wood they use. So to them, Basswood doesn't have any effect on the sound of the guitar. It's all mostly coming from effects pedals and presets despite the amp they use.

The amount of or use of effects does not mask the tone of a guitar. I have a pretty involved pedal board and every single one of my guitars sounds different. My personal favorite is my Basswood/Maple made Wolfgang...

I think some people may prefer basswood because of the interesting mid range characteristics but with a little EQ work Alder can sound pretty damn close. Personally Alder seems to have a better bass range response.