Steve Vai Acrylic guitar - Ibanez Jem

(Video below - www.guitarheroesgear.com)

Steve Vai's Ibanez Jems have become one of the iconic guitars in history. It's based on the RG series shape but has so much more. The "monkey grip" on the guitar at first seemed like a joke and would never catch on, and it hasn't for other guitars, but for Steve Vai's Ibanez Jem somehow it just fits.

Steve Vai being the showman that he is introduced a new guitar to the Jem series, with the Ibanez Jem 20th Steve Vai signature guitar. This guitar is made of ACRYLIC!!! Steve probably only wanted this guitar cause, as it was made of clear acrylic, he could make it light up. This guitar has a switch to light up to luminous green.

I've recently gotten into tonewoods and different tones from acoustics, and then researched about tonewoods of electrics. Everyone is ranting and raving about this and that tone from a certain wood, and how vintage guitars are better because of how the wood ages. It led me to wonder, what about acrylic guitars?

Steve Vai's Ibanez 20th aniversary acrylic guitar seems to hold up on his live performaces, and it sounds great to me. So how much does the tone of the wood even matter, and what tones could acrylic guitars produce if someone put their mind to it. Also how will acrylic guitars age?

Vintage guitars are said to increase sustain, warmth, and character as they age, and theirs no doubt this is true, if you've ever played a vintage guitar you can feel something special in it. Vintage lovers always say something like "the wood has adjusted to the vibration of the strings and resonate better" or "vintage wood has stretched and contricted enough times and has settled into a stable state", something like that. Could this be the same for acrylic guitars?