Aria are best known for their budget guitars, but the Aria Pro II Series, made in the mid-1980's at the famous Matsumoka factory in Japan, are superb, professional quality electric guitars - this model was a favourite of Andy Summers (ex. The Police). Made from all-solid timbers, with a precision bolt-on neck and top-notch DiMarzzio pickups, this guitar has great tone and sustain. It is also very versatile as its pickups can be switched between single coil and humbucker, meaning that it can produce both clear, bright tones, reminiscent of a Fender and the more "meaty" sound of a Gibson. The guitar was recorded by DI to preserve the unprocessed sound. This ensures that the soundfonts play correctly through proprietary amp/speaker simulations.
There are 6 presets, making full use of the pickup switching. File sizes quoted are for the 16 bit versions - 48kHz/32 bit guitars are just over twice the size:
Aria Pro II A (96MB) - single coil neck pickup.
Aria Pro II B (92MB) - single coil neck/bridge pickups.
Aria Pro II C (82MB) - single coil bridge pickup.
Aria Pro II D (97MB) - humbucker neck pickup.
Aria Pro II E (88MB) - humbucker neck/bridge pickups.
Aria Pro II F (87MB) - humbucker bridge pickup.
A decent amp/speaker simulation plugin is essential for these electric guitar presets to work correctly. You will find links to some excellent free plugins amongst the software links.
Arpeggio Style - I have used the same MIDI file to demonstrate the different sound produced by each pickup preset. As these presets require an amp simulation to play correctly, I have added an AC30 Topboost simulation from Amplitube - this is not necessarily appropriate for all presets but does allow direct comparison of the sounds. Please note that in some ways preset E (humbucker neck & bridge pickups) actually sounds brighter than preset F (bridge pickup alone).
Preset A (Single coil neck) Preset B (Single coil neck/bridge)
Preset C (Single coil bridge)
Preset D (Humbucker neck) Preset E (Humbucker neck/bridge)
Preset F (Humbucker bridge)
Other Demos:
Coolrock - Aria Pro II B (single coil) plus Amplitube, compressor and reverb.
Rockriffs1 - Aria Pro II B (single coil) plus Amplitube AC30 crunch.
Rockriffs2 - Aria Pro II F (humbucker) plus Amplitube AC30 crunch.
Rockriff3 - Aria Pro II F (humbucker) plus Amplitube twin AC30's with high gain.
Ariastrum - Aria Pro II A (single coil) plus free "Rednef Twin" plugin.
Band-in-a Box Demo Songs - these demonstrate some of the many uses for the electric guitar presets:
Rokblus - Lead guitar is Aria Pro II F with compressor, Amplitube and effects.
Castaway - Aria Pro II A & B with clean Amplitube presets.