Michael Kelly Hybrid Special Review
Topic: Guitar Gear Reviews

I recently gave a Michael Kelly Hybrid Special acoustic/electric a test drive thanks to the good folks at Firehouse Guitars in Conyers, GA. The one they had in stock was a very attractive Quilt Honey Burst finish and it was priced at $599, which is the common street price of this guitar. I'll give you a quick run through on the specs: Set mahogany 24 ?? scale 22 fret neck with abalone block inlay in a rosewood fretboard, a carved and chambered mahogany body with a maple top, 2 Rockfield humbuckers and a Fishman active Powerchip.

The name of the game with this guitar is versitility. It's designed to give you just about every tone you want out of one guitar. In theory, at least, you should be able to get both great electric tones and great acoustic tones and even blend them to get unique mixed electric and acoustic tones. I plugged it into a Line6 Spider III to see what it could do.

The guitar felt like it was strung with very light strings, probably 9's. This kind of hampered the acoustic sound somewhat, making it come across as thin sounding. I think 10's or even 11's would have gotten a better sound. The medium-jumbo frets were good with no problems noted, the nut seemed OK, and the action was low but not buzzy. It played comfortably.

The Fishman unit sounded a lot like other Fishman's I've heard, nothing too different or special there. After trying out the acoustic side I switched over to the electric side. The Rockfield pickups were good, kind of middle of the road PAF type, pickups. I was hoping for a little bit richer, warmer, sound out of the neck pickup for my attempt at a jazzy riff or two but it seemed to come off a little brittle for my taste. I didn't really care for either pickup when split.

I found the knobs a bit confusing. I'm sure that this would improve if I played the guitar regularly. However, I could see this guitar being rather tricky to use at a live gig where you wanted to avoid futzing around with your guitar. You might be better to have two guitars because it might be faster and cleaner just to swap. I also could see this guitar working well for a singing guitar playing frontman in a band since it is a stunningly attractive guitar and they could switch, with a little practice, from acoustic strumming to a backing electric rhythm or lead.

All in all, I thought it was a very nice guitar although one I don't think would match my tastes and playing that well. I had considered the similar Carvin AE-185 a while ago and decided against it. However, if you're in the market for a hybrid acoustic/electric you should give this one a look.