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What is it?
There is something very satisfying about finding the right tool for the right job, but sometimes that tool is not the obvious choice, especially when it comes to guitar.
Phoebe Bridgers was looking for an electric guitar for playing indie-folk and settled on a B.C. Rich Warlock more commonly associated with Max Cavalera circa Sepultura’s Arise. Even then, that was a little milquetoast. She anted up with a Warbeast for Coachella. It works the other way around, too.
And not every metal guitarist needs to string a piece of medieval weaponry up with a set of D’Addario 9s to have a good time. Lee Malia doesn’t. When the Bring Me The Horizon guitarist signed up with Jackson, he wanted a signature guitar with a more classic vibe, and he ended with a guitar with no sharp edges, the LM-87.
“I’ve always been into quite classic stuff,” says Malia. “When you think of Jackson, you think of the Rhoads, and the Dinky shape – I love them all – but then I thought if I am going to make a signature guitar I might as well try and do something a bit different. They have so many of those shapes already, so it would just be another color variant.”
If the LM-87 looks familiar it is because it has the body and headstock shape from an early ‘90s Charvel/Jackson Surfcaster, a cult semi-hollow electric with lipstick single-coils to court surf rock and country guitar players.
Back in the day, Anthrax’s Scott Ian had one, beefed up for metal with a bridge humbucker. But Malia – initially unaware of Ian’s model – wanted it beefed up some more. He got it. For starters, the LM-87 is a solidbody, with a glued-in neck (the Surfcaster is a bolt-on), and it comes with custom-wound humbucker at the bridge, and a P-90 at the neck.
Jackson has built a brand upon the weaponization of the guitar, so this might seem like a change of pace. But looks can be deceiving. Think of the demands Bring Me The Horizon’s music places on Malia’s instrument. The LM-87 ships with a set of 10s but Malia uses super-heavy strings for super-low tunings.
That’s why he prefers the set neck – and why there’s a tailpiece with fine-tuners. Those demands shape almost every aspect of the LM-87s design, except, perhaps for the aesthetic. We like this quasi-vintage look (Phoebe Bridgers probably won’t) but how does Malia’s signature model feel and sound?
Specs
- Launch price: $899/£849/€999
- Made: China
- Type: Six-string electric guitar
- Body: Okoume
- Neck: Okoume / Glued-in, 3-piece with graphite reinforcement, Fast D profile
- Fingerboard: Amaranth, 12″-16″ compound radius with Shark-Eye block inlays
- Scale length: 25.5″/658mm
- Nut/width: Plastic / 42.86mm
- Frets: 22, jumbo
- Hardware: Jackson die-cast locking tuners, TOM-style bridge with anchored tailpiece and fine-tuners
- Electrics: Custom-wound LM-87 humbucker (bridge), P-90 (neck), three-way selector switch, volume with push/pull coil-split, tone
- Weight: 7.5lb/3.4kg
- Left-handed options: No
- Finishes: Open-pore Black
- Cases: Jackson gig bag
- Contact: Jackson Guitars
Build quality
Build quality rating: ★★★★½
From the pictures, the LM-87 looks like a baritone guitar, a lot of neck. But it’s much more conventional when you pick it out of the gig bag. Malia’s choice of okoume makes sense, too, particularly as he wanted a lighter instrument that’s kinder on his lower back. This is well under 8lbs and nicely balanced.
The Black open-pore finish reveals all the grain underneath and although listed as gloss it doesn’t catch the light in the same fashion. And with time Malia promises that the new guitar shine should wear off.
“I wanted a finish that I know is going to wear, and relic over time,” he says. “This is why I went with this finish because my ones that I have been touring with already, the prototypes, they’re already starting to wear away where I sweat, and I think it will be cool in a few years everyone’s will look different. I really like relic’d guitars and wanted them to relic a bit faster.”
Those black ‘witch hat’ amp knobs seated on a brushed aluminum plate look more Leo than Grover. And I can’t help thinking of B.B. King’s Lucille when considering that TOM-style bridge and the fine-tuners on the tailpiece, much like a Gibson TP6.
But if that makes it sound like a hybrid drawing from the Big Two of US guitar design, the 12” to 16” fingerboard radius, the jumbo frets, the practical heel-mounted truss rod adjustment wheel and “Fast” D profile neck return us to more familiar territory for Jackson.
That tailpiece has been set up at a very slight angle towards the bridge, which on some guitars can suggest the holes aren’t big enough for the tailpiece, but we have seen a few of these LM-87s set up like this and it gives the strings a nice break angle. The factory setup, the intonation, fretwork, build, et cetera, is tidy.
Malia wanted to make this as affordable as possible, so we have some concessions to economic reality. Where you might find Luminlay side dot inlays on some Pro Series models, such as Diamond Rowe’s signature model, we have simple over-sized side dot markers on cream binding. But the pickups are Jackson’s own, custom-wound for the LM-87.
It’s belt and braces as far as the hardware goes; Malia complements that heavy-duty bridge/tailpiece ordnance with a set of die-cast locking tuners, which have a nice enough action as it goes.
Playability
Playability rating: ★★★★★
Once they started playing longer sets, Malia warmed to the proposition of a lighter instrument
Lee Malia has had a conversion in recent years. His previous artist models with Epiphone went with rounded ‘50s-style neck profiles. The LM-87 has what Jackson calls a “Fast” D, and what Malia calls a “good comfy medium between a shred guitar and a bit of chonk”. If you’ve ever played an American Series Soloist and wished for just a little more to hang onto, this might well be the Goldilocks profile.
The LM-87 is still quick by anyone’s standards. The jumbo frets, the compound radius ‘board, it feels just like a Jackson, i.e. shreddable, like a contemporary metal guitar, with little to get in the way of accessing all of the fingerboard (besides ability).
All that fingerboard exposed to the elements can play tricks on the mind. When staring out of the window wondering when the neighbors were going to knock at the door to enquire whether I was in Drop C or in C Standard, the LM-87 almost felt like some radical, modern take on a Gibson SG.
Offsets are not for everyone. But what is? Personally, a Jazzmaster can often feel like too much body – and it’s not the balance, more to do with the shape being just too much. This feels much more user-friendly. Sometimes that can be a function of just how playable the neck and fingerboard are – it takes your mind off it, pulls all focus.
Jackson’s judicious contouring helps. There is a generous forearm bevel. Timber has been excised to make room for your gut. That, allied to the okoume, makes its presence felt when you put the LM-87 on the scales.
We have Bring Me the Horizon’s commercial success to thank for this. Once they started playing longer sets, Malia warmed to the proposition of a lighter instrument.
Sounds
Sounds rating: ★★★★½
It’s hard to recall another production line Jackson with a P-90/humbucker pairing but this is par of the course for Malia’s signature models through the years. It was the same with his Epiphone guitars. He has never been one for high-gain leads on the neck pickup – the “cow tone,” as Ozzy calls it – but he does like the options. And we have options here from these newly wound pickups from Jackson.
The bridge humbucker is going to do the heavy lifting here. Some players would have gone with an active design, especially if tuning down to G, but really, at full bore, with a Blackstar tube amp dimed, an Fulltone OCD in front – not a million miles away from Malia’s desert island rig, a Marshall JCM800 plus a Klon – there’s ample heat for the gnarliest metal riffs, with that kind of ragged quality at the extremes making it sound more aggressive.
Full disclosure, Drop C was as low as I wanted to go, certainly with a set of 10s, but that bridge humbucker sounded nasty in all the right ways. It would be interesting to see how Malia’s tech sets up this guitar for tuning down to G, whether that low sixth string requires some filing of the saddle (Malia reportedly uses a .80 for that G!).
The coil split is useful in the sense that it is there, and it’s another core voicing, but, as is often the case on mid-priced instruments, it is a little bit weak
The coil split is useful in the sense that it is there, and it’s another core voicing, but, as is often the case on mid-priced instruments, it is a little bit weak. There’s a bit of a volume drop off. Nobody is mistaking it for a vintage Strat.
But there is nothing weak about the P-90. It’s the kind of pickup we’d be happy to find at the bridge, too. Like all good P-90s, it can do sweet cleans, but has the personality to give the humbucker at run for its money. Give it some fuzz, EQ it just right, and it’s gnarly punk sound.
Okay, some stray observations on tone to finish up. The LM-87, on the bridge pickup, volume rolled back, super-clean with some reverb, is hard to quit. This could be a sleeper hit for jazz players. Loud, bold, interesting with chords, mix position deserves some attention too.
Verdict
The LM-87 has caught the imagination ever since Malia started using that Mike Shannon Custom Shop model then proceeded to debut the prototypes for this Chinese-made Pro Series model onstage with BMTH. Everyone – BMTH superfan and Jackson aficionado alike – has been wondering when they’d get their hands on one.
It might have Surfcaster DNA but it has mutated sufficiently to be considered in league with the apex predators under the surf – the Shark’s Eye block inlays suggest a thematic kinship with the teeth of the sea. Many will pick this up and love it because it puts Malia’s signature tones within reach. But perhaps just as many players will pick this and love it because they can find their own sound.
Everyone will love the convenience of fine-tuners at the bridge, especially when low tunings ask tougher questions of your instrument
Everyone will love the convenience of fine-tuners at the bridge, especially when low tunings ask tougher questions of your instrument, requiring even more fastidiousness over tuning and setup.
You could, of course, mod the LM-87 over time, upgrade the pickups. Those who really need that sort of mechanized ruthlessness of today’s progressive metal tones might choose to put something more brutal in there. But sold as seen it is a square deal.
Guitar World verdict: It might not look über metal but then looks can be deceiving. It’s 2025. You can play folk on a Warlock. You can play blues on a Soloist. You can shred metal on an offset that looks like a prototype from the ‘70s that’s been in storage just waiting for its moment. That moment has arrived.
|
Test |
Results |
Score |
|---|---|---|
|
Build quality |
The LM-87 lacks some of the premium appointments of its Pro Series siblings but that keeps the price comfortably under a grand. |
★★★★½ |
|
Playability |
With a slightly more grown-up neck than some high-performance guitars, it strikes the balance between comfort and speed. |
★★★★★ |
|
Sounds |
Sure, tune it down to C for anti-social rhythm guitar, but it has some very respectable blues, jazz and indie tones, and lends further credence to the idea that the P-90 plus bridge humbucker is the acme of pickup configurations. Coil-split tones lack oomph. |
★★★★½ |
|
Overall |
Imaginatively spec’d, very agreeably priced, and worthy of the hype. It’s probably this year’s greatest metal guitar so far, even if it lacks the pointy edges to prove it. |
★★★★½ |
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Jackson with Lee Malia
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