ESP FT-300K Fanatic Crisis Shun signature guitar

guitarz.blogspot.com:

We here at Guitarz have looked at a fair few weirdly-shaped contemporary guitars from Japan, most notably from makers Fernandes and ESP. This particular guitar, an ESP FT-300K Fanatic Crisis Shun signature no less, takes the familiar Strat layout and gives it a twist - or, should I say, a stretch. Despite the Strat layout of the three single coils, those are in fact Jaguar-style pickups. The guitar also seems to be equipped with a kill switch near the lower horn.

Fanatic Crisis, by the way, were a Japanese Nagoya kei rock band active from 1992–2005; Shun was their guitarist and, no doubt, endorsee of this model guitar.

G L Wilson

© 2011, Guitarz - The Original Guitar Blog - now in its 10th year!

Pointy... Pointier... Pointiest!

guitarz.blogspot.com:

Thanks to "Mini Van Halen" for sending on this picture. I confess I know nothing about this extremely pointy Edwards guitar, other that the Edwards brand is part of the ESP empire. I suspect it's a one-off creation. It certainly looks as if you could do yourself a mischief on those sharp points; the headstock looks particularly lethal.

G L Wilson

Guitarz - The Original Guitar Blog - now in its 10th year!

ESP Custom Shop XJ-12

guitarz.blogspot.com:

I started the month with a series of Electric 12-string guitars, and today would like to show you yet another example from more recent years. It's an ESP XJ-12 built in ESP's Japanese custom shop circa 2003 for the Japanese market. According to the listing on eBay, these guitars were sold in Japan at 200,000 Yen in 2003 (about $2,400).

The style is obviously Jazzmaster/Jaguar influenced; in fact it reminds me of Hohner's professional Hollywood series of several years ago. The headstock with its 4+8 tuner arrangement is an unusual but attractive feature.

This seller has several of these in different finishes; I found the gold sparkle edition, pictured above, particularly eye-catching. In the photo of the translucent green XJ-12 below we can see another interesting little detail in the Strat-type output socket inset into the edge of the guitar - especially useful if you like to have your guitar lead angled upwards and tucked behind your guitar strap.

G L Wilson

Guitarz - The Original Guitar Blog - now in its 9th year!

ESP Japan Custom Shop Ultratone as played by Arnold Schwarzenegger

guitarz.blogspot.com:

OK, let's do a caption contest on this one!

This guitar, as played by Arnie himself whilst campainging for Governor at a rally at the California State Capitol October 5, 2003 in Sacramento, California, is currently up for grabs on Gumtree.

It's an ESP Japan Custom Shop Ultratone in black relic finish with a set maple neck topped off with a rosewood fingerboard inlaid with skull and cross bones position markers and with 22 extra jumbo frets. It is equipped with a single EMG 81 humbucker in the bridge position and a single volume control, and also features Tone Pros hardware, Sperzel tuners, and comes with a ESP Custom Shop case.

Thanks to Bill for this one.

G L Wilson

Guitarz - The Original Guitar Blog - now in its 9th year!

A Les Paul that thinks it's a Strat

guitarz.blogspot.com:
We've all seen "Double FAT" Strats which are outfitted with a pair of humbuckers in an attempt to emulate the Les Paul sound.

However, I've not previously seen a guitar so obviously styled after the Gibson Les Paul but featuring the Stratocaster triple single coil layout including the angled pickup in the bridge position. This guitar, from 2008, is an ESP Edwards E-CL-96I Luna Sea Sugizo model, that is to say, another Japanese signature guitar designed for a Japanese musician we in the West have never heard of.

In keeping with the Strat part of the equation, the guitar has a bolt-on neck and a tremolo. In this instance the trem is a Floyd Rose, which aren't totally unheard of installed on Les Pauls. Gibson have a Floyd-equipped Les Paul, the Les Paul Axcess Standard, in their current catalogue.

G L Wilson

Guitarz - The Original Guitar Blog - now in its 9th year!

ESP Phoenix II

guitarz.blogspot.com

I was searching about the Firebird legacy and I found one that is clearly rooted in it and more than a mere copy, the ESP Phoenix II. Unfortunately the result is not convincing, the lower horn is too wide, though its Rickenbacker style curve could have been nice. I keep looking, any suggestion is welcome.

BTW, a white finish with a black pickguard is one of my favorite finish.

bertram

Guitarz - The Original Guitar Blog - now in its 9th year!

Get your sunglasses at the ready... ESP Mirage Deluxe M2

guitarz.blogspot.com:
ESP Guitars do seem to feature on these pages more and more as I search for the weird and the wacky. I'm sure they've only got themselves to blame with their outrageous designs and demented finishes.

I used to play a pair of pink paisley Fenders, a Strat and a Tele, and I thought that they were - how shall we say? - rather eye-catching, but they were nothing compared to this visually loud ESP Mirage Deluxe M2 allegedly from the ESP Custom Shop in Japan and as played by Vernon Reid of Living Colour.

If you can live with the day-glo finish, underneath which lies a body of swamp ash, then it does look to be a very nicely crafted guitar, although with its EMG pickups and Floyd Rose-licensed trem it wouldn't be my first choice of guitar.

Of course, to the collector of ESP guitars (someone must collect them, surely?) this guitar would represent a must-have purchase.

G L Wilson

NB: There are a lot of blogs STEALING content and bandwidth. If you read this anywhere else but on guitarz.blogspot.com then you are reading a blog that STEALS content. Please support original bloggers!

ESP Devil Girl (slight return)

guitarz.blogspot.com:
We've looked and laughed at the ESP Devil Girl previously here on Guitarz, almost to the very day, seven years ago (see here) but seeing that the readership has grown quite a lot since then, I think it's well worth another look, not only for amusement value but also as there is an example for sale on eBay right now.

I've got no problems with the use of alternative materials in guitar making, but with plastics you can end up with something very cool looking indeed such as a whole myriad of plexiglass guitars from Dan Armstrong onwards, or else you can end up with something crappy that looks like it's been molded from the wax from the outside of a Dutch Edam cheese.

No doubt someone will insist that this guitar sounds great, but seeing as it's equipped with a single EMG HZ humbucker, I think that highly unlikely. Never mind, I'm sure someone will enjoy it.

G L Wilson

NB: There are a lot of blogs STEALING content and bandwidth. If you read this anywhere else but on guitarz.blogspot.com then you are reading a blog that STEALS content. Please support original bloggers!

ESP Star Turtle

guitarz.blogspot.com:
I guess you could call that a tortoiseshell finish!

It's an ESP Star Turtle Les Paul-style guitar and is apparently the signature guitar for Takamizawa of the Alfee (another Japanese band I've never heard of before).

G L Wilson

NB: There are a lot of blogs STEALING content and bandwidth. If you read this anywhere else but on guitarz.blogspot.com then you are reading a blog that STEALS content. Please support original bloggers!

ESP S-type guitar with custom graphics

guitarz.blogspot.com:

The graphics on this Japanese-made custom shop ESP-400 Strat-a-like look to have been inspired by the likes of Eric Clapton's "Crash" Stratocasters. It's a shame that this guy has to sell this guitar, as it must be quite personal to him, featuring as it does a picture of a dog he used to own. But we've all had to part with items we didn't want to; I know I have.

G L Wilson

NB: There are a lot of blogs STEALING content and bandwidth. If you read this anywhere else but on guitarz.blogspot.com then you are reading a blog that STEALS content. Please support original bloggers!

ESP Exotic Forest Custom

Another borderline guitar, a classic and so-so ESP design but made of exotic wood with natural finish, wooden pickguard, knobs and pickup covers, this is the Exotic Forest Custom that I found in the custom gallery of the russian ESP website.

It's also called Oyaji Forest but I couldn't find more information about it (and also why it's called like this, if someone can say more...)

On the same gallery you will also see the Armor Custom - ugly but delirious - and the 7-String Custom that I think is almost great but is actually not - I cannot really say why...

Bertram

ESP Doreamon Guitar

From Japan (naturally) comes this ESP Doreamon guitar based on a cartoon character that I'm not really aware of but have seen on guitars before! I like the fact that it seems to have a built-in amp but the sheer size and shape of it means that it would be totally impractical as a travel guitar. It's extremely cheesy and I have to confess to secretly liking this one mainly because of its ridiculousness. It's a very odd shape, it's funny, and it's another example of what the imaginations of those wacky Japanese can come up with.

The Damned's Captain Sensible and his ESP LTD Viper 1000 Deluxe

A lot of guitarists (online at least) seem to be into heavy rock and those widdly widdly players that no-one except for other guitarists seems to be into. I have to confess that most this kind of music just leaves me cold. As I grew up in the late 1960s and 1970s my own guitar heroes include people from the punk and new wave era. One of my very favourites is Captain Sensible of classic punk band The Damned.

The Damned were reportedly the first punk band to release a single ("New Rose" in 1976), the first to record an album (1977's "Damned Damned Damned") and the first to tour America. All of this, I suppose, depends on your definition of "punk" but we're talking about the late 70s phenomenon primarily in the UK, the most famous protagonists of which were The Sex Pistols.

In their original line-up Captain Sensible started out as The Damned's bass player but when they reformed in 1979 (first punk band to split, first to reform...) he took over on lead guitar duties and occasional keyboards.

Over the years they have had numerous line-up changes but the funny thing is that whoever is playing somehow the songs always sound quintessentially "Damned". I think they've had something like six drummers, eight bassists, six guitarists but only the one vocalist in Dave Vanian (although he has been known to go AWOL over the years).

Their current line-up has been in place for about five years and they are one of the best bands on the live circuit today. Last night at London's Carling Islington Academy I attended their album launch gig, celebrating the release of their latest album "So Who's Paranoid?" where they played a two-hour set of old and new songs all of which sounded fantastic.

Captain has been playing ESP LTD Viper guitars for the last eight years or so, but I thought his new white ESP LTD Viper 1000 Deluxe equipped with Seymour Duncan Custom-5 pickups and gold hardware sounded great and looked great under the stage lights. The design is obviously derived from Gibson's SG although the body has been skewed into an offset shape like Fender's Jaguar and Jazzmaster guitars.

Sensible is a very much under-rated guitar player. I think people don't take him seriously because The Damned are known as a punk band (although they are much more sophisticated than that) and because back in the 1980s Captain also had a solo career as a pop star and even made No.1 in the UK with "Happy Talk", a cover version of the song from the soundtrack of Rodgers and Hammerstein's "South Pacific". What a lot of people don't realise is that this guy is a very talented musician. I remember being blown away by his playing on 1979's "Machine Gun Etiquette" album (give "Plan 9 Channel 7" a spin), and if you're not impressed by his solo on "Under The Floor Again" (on 1982's "Strawberries") then you must have been lobotomised.

Samurai Guitar

This exceedingly ugly guitar, a one-off from the ESP Custom Shop (known for their, quite frankly, barking designs) belonging to Japanese actor/musician Kyomoto Masaki includes the ultimate guitarist's accessory, for cunningly concealed within the guitar's body lies a samurai sword! Just what every guitarist needs! Why he couldn't be satisfied with a couple of Allen keys, I'll never know.
(Via Guitar Noize)

Custom ESP Guitars for Tomi Koivusaari and Esa Holopainen of Amorphis (another metal band from Finland, in case you didn't know).

ESP Launch Two New Guitars, LTD Range Expanded

ESP Statue of Liberty Guitar: Is that proper? That is the question, posed by Music Thing.

ESP Guitars celebrates 30 Year Anniversary

ESP Introduces New Guitars for 2005: there's a spiky one, there's a knobbly-looking one, and there's a lop-sided looking acoustic. All in black.

ESP profiles new signature guitars from Magedeth's Mustaine and Metallica's Hetfield