What are your thoughts on Premier Guitar's review? (2025)

Super Locrian said:

I think almost all of their reviews have 4 or 4.5 / 5 stars. Never seen anything get a 3 or less. I figure that if they really don't like a product, they will send it back without reviewing it, because they have no interest in publishing a negative review. They get their revenue from advertisers, not readers.

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Speaking for myself, and not the magazine at large: Yeah, I'm aware that highly negative reviews are rare. But my excuse is ... there's just a lot of really good stuff out there these days! I don't specifically cover high-end amps and boutique stompboxes, but those seem to be the two things I get assigned most often. In those areas, it's unusual to come across something that's truly awful. Yeah, I do have to take the widest possible view, and I often give favorable ratings to stuff that I don't personally dig, taste-wise, because I know it's likely to be useful for other players in other styles.

Head honcho Shawn Hammond and gear editor Charlie Saufely are exceedingly honest and ethical guys. (I'm more of a sleazeball myself, but fortunately, they call the final shots.) They are deeply committed to doing right by the readers.

BadHiwatt said:

Companies don't pay to get bad reviews.

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They don't get paid to get good reviews either, at least not at PG. Compare the products reviewed to the products whose manufacturers pay for ads. You'll find zillions of reviews for products whose manufacturers gave nothing to PG beyond a review model (and these get returned). There are no quid pro quos — Charlie and Shawn assign reviews of products they find interesting and which they believe might be meaningful to readers. If anything, there's a bias toward rad new products from small manufacturers. It's tempting to be cynical about this stuff — it's certainly my nature to think that way! But it's as simple as "write about stuff we think is cool and that readers might dig." There's a firewall between advertising at editorial. My understanding is that this in not universally true among the guitar mags. But it is at PG.

TheoDog said:

I view them more as extended ads.
Nice detail, but very much designed to sell products.

See Also

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this

Joe Gore said:

There's a firewall between advertising at editorial. My understanding is that this in not universally true among the guitar mags. But it is at PG.

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Good to hear that. I worked a few years on the advertising side of things, creating websites at an advertising agency, so I always expect the worst from advertisers and marketers.

sleewell said:

this

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Interesting. I've written many hundreds of published product reviews over the last few decades, and my motive was never anything other than to direct musicians to items that might help them realize their music. I often report with great enthusiasm, and I suppose that sells products. But my allegiance has always been to musicians, not the manufacturers or even the magazines that hire me. And many reviewers I know feel the same.

kor said:

I don't care for their video demos and I watch demos far more often than I read an article. Because of that I don't pay much attention to them.

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Sometimes it pays to read the articles. Though I'm biased.

Joe Gore said:

They don't pay to get good reviews either, at least not at PG. Compare the products reviewed to the products whose manufacturers pay for ads. You'll find zillions of reviews for products whose manufacturers gave nothing to PG beyond a review model (and these get returned). There are no quid pro quos — Charlie and Shawn assign reviews of products they find interesting and which they believe might be meaningful to readers. If anything, there's a bias toward rad new products from small manufacturers. It's tempting to be cynical about this stuff — it's certainly my nature to think that way! But it's as simple as "write about stuff we think is cool and that readers might dig." There's a firewall between advertising at editorial. My understanding is that this in not universally true among the guitar mags. But it is at PG.

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The faiolure of PG to comment on the fake NKT 275 in the Morgan NKT275 fuzz review is enough reason for my cynicism to flare.

8len8 said:

Agreed, if all of the comments are only positive there's no way of knowing what to believe.

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why would anyone maintain regular & high expectations from written reviews of instruments, instruments whose physical qualities require ------ one way or another --- your very own experience?
there're always ways to know what to believe, when it comes to instrumental gear: playing and listening..... and there are boatloads of opportunities, these days, to engage in at least one of those activities.

ya know, we can follow writers with whose playing we are familiar and whose insights we learned to trust, no matter where their reviews and clips appear.

splatt said:

why would anyone maintain regular & high expectations from written reviews of instruments, instruments whose physical qualities require ------ one way or another --- your very own experience?
there're always ways to know what to believe, when it comes to instrumental gear: playing and listening..... and there are boatloads of opportunities, these days, to engage in at least one of those activities.

ya know, we can follow writers with whose playing we are familiar and whose insights we learned to trust, no matter where their reviews and clips appear.

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What is the purpose of a review? To give others insight into the gear. If the reviews are always positive and the reviewer's motives are then questionable, the review isn't worth the paper it's printed on. I'm glad you don't require magazine gear reviews. Some of us like to utilize what they have to offer.

I am telling you there is no way they could have reviewed the Blackstar and given it high marks. I don't have the best ears but even I could pick up on the obvious flaw in this pedal. I ended up with a great deal on two of them and made the mistake. Both sound the same.

Part of the issue is me. When something stinks, I want to hear it in those terms and not have it buried in some half hidden language or by intentionally leaving something out with the hope the reader can read through what is hinted at or left out.

8len8 said:

What is the purpose of a review? To give others insight into the gear. If the reviews are always positive and the reviewer's motives are then questionable, the review isn't worth the paper it's printed on. I'm glad you don't require magazine gear reviews. Some of us like to utilize what they have to offer.

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I see a review having a description with a rating. Much like a review of a movie.

BadHiwatt said:

The faiolure of PG to comment on the fake NKT 275 in the Morgan NKT275 fuzz review is enough reason for my cynicism to flare.

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The mag is aware of the claims.

[REMOVING MY EDITORIAL HAT AND JUST SPEAKING LIKE A PLAIN OLD LOUDMOUTH MUSICIAN.] I know this opinion conflicts sharply with that of people I respect, like Analog Mike. But my own experience is that any two properly function germanium transistors of the equal hFE sound about the same. (Yes, there's variation from unit to unit, and the simple DMMs most of us use to measure hFE are notoriously inaccurate.)

The real test would NOT be to compare, say, an AC128 Fuzz Face with an NKT75 one — they might sound different for many reasons, starting with the fact that every component has potentially wide tolerance variations. A better test would be a double-blind listening setup using a single circuitboard with replaceable transistors. And not comparing only two transistors sets, but, say, five sets each of NKT275 and AC128. Sure, you'd hear variation, but could anyone consistently identify which five have the rare transistor and which five have the bog standard one? I'm exceedingly skeptical, though if someone can provide repeatable audio evidence to the contrary, I'll freely admit I'm wrong.

This I swear to: A couple of years ago, in a studio/sound lab situation, I got to compare a British Fuzz Face clone with real NKT75s and a generic $80 BYOC Fuzz Face with AC128s. (I don't remember the name of the British pedal, and probably wouldn't ID it here if I did. But it cost US$600 new.) The pedals were sonically IDENTICAL. No one I know could pass a blind listening test. IMHO there are properly functioning Ge transistors and improperly functioning ones, and hFE varies greatly. But I long since stopped believing in magic transistors.

This, of course, is a very different issue from misinformation about what's inside a pedal. But sonically — it just doesn't matter much.

Now, don't get me started on magic tone caps, or I'll be here through 2018.

8len8 said:

If the reviews are always positive and the reviewer's motives are then questionable, the review isn't worth the paper it's printed on.

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What is this "paper" thing of which you speak?

Artie Fisk said:

In particular, I find that Charles Sauffley and Joe Gore's reviews are good indicators for me, and very clear and informative. I'm not the biggest fan of their video reviews, but ymmv.

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+1 on Sauffley, and anything by Alex Maiolo is good.-E