The build quality is great, there was no sprouting on the neck, the fretboard feels nice and smooth, and the pickups are solid (for a beginners ears like mine anyway).
There are however a couple downsides that are important to point out.
First off:
Neck dive - The guitar suffers from pretty bad neck dive, it's nearly impossible to play it standing up without it sinking. Three solutions though, press your forearm down on the body of the explorer while playing, this will stop the guitar from rotating because you're grounding it. Or, get a strap that will stick better to your clothing. Or tie something around your leg and behind the base of the guitar strap (I use a silk sash, but this solution does put some stress on my shoulder, get a comfortable strap for this).
Another issue to be aware of:
Tuners - At least my tuners struggle to keep the strings in tune even after a short session. It could be a default string problem and how they're not secured properly around the tuners. But at the end of the day, they are just standard tuners, not locking, so I can't be too picky.
But other than these things, this is a really good guitar for the price. I was considering a Yamaha 120H before this one, as it is basically the same price. But I figured the default pickups on the explorer was hotter and better made for heavier stuff. If you want a cold looking guitar for a fair price and good performance, you've probably found it, as long as you're willing to put up with the neck dive and standard tuners. Shred on.
