Review

When Rusty Cooley describes his Dean signature as “the Lamborghini of 7-strings”, he means it’s fast, not expensive (although it’s that too). “The neck is really thin so you can do maximum shredding,” says the Outworld wizard. “Also, the frets are, like, the biggest frets on the planet, so your fingers never drag across the fretboard or get slowed down…”

Whether by accident or design, Cooley has eased one of the perennial headaches of the 7-string - that most necks are so thick it’s like playing a lute. The maple bolt-on is still fat but it’s manageable; you can happily wallow around with drop-tuned textures and still fill out your sound with bassy notes while pulling out the fireworks.

Cooley should have included more dials (it’s useful to tweak your tone when you drop tune) but these EMGs are magic, sounding seriously ballsy due to the midrange punch of the alder body. This couldn’t be further from the nu-metal stereotype.

Next: Dean RC7X verdict