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Flaxwood Liekki
 A revolution in guitar construction Built from a revolutionary wood composite material the Flaxwood Liekki is up there with the PRS hollow bodies and the 335s, but delivering a wider range of sounds and flexibility for the guitar player. Our reviewer, Clive Warner has fallen in love with this guitar. Here's what he thought... Think Finland and you think 'land of the midnight sun', Hanoi rocks and perhaps some rather lamentable entries to the Eurovision song contest. However, somewhere up in those misty mountains bordering Sweden and Russia a new force is stirring that is taking the world of boutique guitars by storm. I have in my hands a Flaxwood Liekki which, if your Finnish is as bad as mine, stands for 'Flame'. This burnished gold hollow body is literally brimming with 'best in class' hardware from the 2 Seymour Duncan P90 soapbars to the Schaller tremolo system. It could easily be mistaken for a PRS hollow body, but this is about where the similarity ends because, rather than being made from exotic mahogany and carved maple, it is made from flaxwood - a revolutionary kind of wood-based composite material! The theory is that removing the grain "lines" that bias the direction the wood resonates in and removing the knots and peculiarities, make for a new, uniformly and richly-resonant artificial tonewood. Guitars with little or none of the traditional materials you'd associate with their construction - notably tonewoods - are not new. Dan Armstrong made some fine Plexiglass guitars in the 1970s (that are now trading hands for many hundreds of pounds) meanwhile top record producer Nile Rogers (of Chic fame among others) was rarely seen without his trademark perspex Fender Stratocaster. What makes Flaxwood guitars stand out from the crowd is that they produce a whole range of high-end guitars using a composite material that hold their own when compared to the best tonewood guitars on the market. This may be a response to the increasing scarcity and soaring cost of quality tonewoods like Mahogany and Maple, maybe a response to demands from more environmentally aware consumers, but at the end of the day does it affect the feel and sound of the instrument itself? In my opinion the answer to both these questions is a resounding yes! The Leikki in my hands feels light, much lighter than I'd expected, which for me is a bonus. As for the sound, well I hooked it up to a 15W Orange transistor combo and it literally sparkled. Loved it, with tone to die for! Through a transistor amp at low volumes it sounded a lot crisper than my Les Paul (fitted with stock P90s and weighing in at a thumping 10 pounds in weight), but not exactly as mellow as my 335 (fitted with stock humbuckers and much easier on the shoulder). Although I have actually gigged with the 15W Orange combo (try one - you WILL be impressed) I normally only use it for practicing. I'm more likely to gig with a 65W Marshall valve combo or 100W valve half-stack, so the acid test for my money is how well a guitar sounds through either of these beasts using varying amounts of gain. Through a valve amp with varying amounts of gain the Leikki sounded superb with a tonal range far exceeding that of my Les Paul - making it a lot more versatile - but being a hollow body composite guitar it lacked some of the balls and sustain that are characteristic of solid tonewood guitars (perhaps the solid body models sound more akin) - Les Pauls in particular! Much fairer then to compare the Liekki to my 335 - which for my money has to be the industry benchmark for semi hollow body guitars (until such times as a generous benefactor donates a PRS hollow body for my inspection and edification)! Even against my 335 the Leikki proved to be the more versatile instrument, and certainly the more comfortable to play, but differences in pickups (P90s on the Liekki v humbuckers on the 335) and construction (composite in the case of the Liekki v tonewoods for the 335) were too significant for this to be a meaningful comparison. However this is an important point, because Flaxwood guitars like the Liekki shouldn't be regarded as 'sound-alikes' for more traditional guitars, but should be judged in their own light. In this respect the flawless build quality and unique voice - which can in part be attributed to the composite construction - set these guitars apart (not to mention the Liekki is fitted with a resonator back plate)! This in itself is enough to make them interesting to anyone who is looking to expand their sonic horizons. Quite apart from the sound possibilities, a nice feature of composite construction is that it opens up some interesting possibilities for changing the appearance of the guitar. I love book-matched AAA grade wood grain appearance on traditional guitars, but I also love the marble affect on some of the composite guitars in the Flaxwood range. In conclusion I think Flaxwood really have done their homework - on those long cold arctic nights! While their guitars do not look too startling different, which will please a very conservative guitar buying public, the construction materials and process are potentially years ahead of the competition. UK pricing for the range of models starts at around £990 up to £1800. The Liekki shown retails at an RRP of £1432 + VAT (£1682.60). You can view the full range of Flaxwood guitars at www.flaxwood.com Since this articel Falxwwod has appointed BlackHawk Music (UK) as their UK distributor. You can try out hte range of Flaxwood Guitars at the forthcoming London International Music Show (12-15 June 08) at stand C3 in the London Guitar Show Hall. |
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UK Distributor Flaxwood guitars appoint BlackHawk Music as UK distributor. Click here for details... |
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