Gibson Jason Hook Sherman Explorer
From his in-demand session work with several of LA’s top artists, to his time with the legendary Alice Cooper, to his explosive riffage with Five Finger Death Punch, Canadian guitarist Jason Hook has displayed some of the most incendiary playing and eviscerating tone heard in rock today. A customized Gibson Explorer has long been at the forefront of Jason’s arsenal, and that same furious style, tone, and attitude forms the foundation for the new Jason Hook M-4 Sherman from Gibson USA, available in a strictly Limited Edition of 400 guitars.
Based on one of the most radical guitars ever created, Gibson’s original Explorer model, the Jason Hook M-4 Sherman carries Jason’s modified forearm bevel for improved playing comfort and an extended cutaway for superb upper-fret access, along with his distinctive Sherman tank-inspired green-stripe graphics and commemorative truss-rod cover. In addition to its killer looks, the Jason Hook M-4 Sherman sports high-quality Seymour Duncan™ humbuckers, locking Mini Grover™ tuners and top-notch hardware all around, and includes a custom olive-green hardshell case with a pouch full of exclusive case candy, including a signed Certificate of Authenticity with holder.
All this, and it is primed to shred just as hot as you like it thanks to Gibson USA’s famed build quality and unparalleled playability. The body of the Jason Hook M-4 Sherman is made from solid mahogany, a tonewood with a long history at Gibson, and a reputation for warm lows, sweet highs, and extremely musical mids. It is crafted in the image of the legendary Explorer model, with Jason Hook’s adaptations of a deeper cutaway and a beveled upper body edge for improved playing comfort.
A solid, quarter-sawn mahogany neck is glued in and topped with an unbound fingerboard made from Grade-A granadillo, an exotic tonewood with a very desirable look, feel, and sound. It carries 22 jumbo frets and a PLEK-cut Corian™ nut, and follows Gibson’s traditional 24 ¾” scale length and 1 11/16” width at the nut for superb playability. While the woods and construction make the Jason Hook M-4 Sherman a total tone machine, its Alpine White finish with green Sherman-stripe army graphics in high-gloss nitrocellulose lacquer make it a unique looker for the player or collector, and a total showstopper on stage.
Jason’s selection of two outstanding Seymour Duncan™ humbucking pickups—the acclaimed ’59® in the neck position and a hotter JB® in the bridge—perfectly translate every note, from smooth to scorching, to your amplifier of choice. They run through a custom wiring conduit to a three-way toggle switch with custom washer, plus individual volume controls and master tone knob. The classic pairing of a Tune-o-matic bridge and stopbar tailpiece keep the guitar locked and loaded for resonance and sustain, while a great set of locking Mini Grover™ tuners with a 18:1 gear ratio make string changes and tune-ups a breeze. The Jason Hook M-4 Sherman comes protected in a custom olive-green rectangular hardshell case with unique M-4 Sherman tank graphics, and includes a signed Certificate of Authenticity with display holder, a Gibson USA owner’s manual, and truss-rod wrench.
Gibson 20th Anniversary 1957 Les Paul Black Beauty
The Gibson Custom 20th Anniversary 1957 "Black Beauty" Les Paul celebrates 20 years of Gibson Custom's historic reissue series. Limited to 100 guitars worldwide, this collectible Les Paul sports a 1-piece mahogany body for supreme tone, a 1-piece mahogany neck for stability and sustain, and a 1-piece ebony fretboard. Everything about this reissue is top-notch from the CustomBucker pickups to the framed, hand-made, one-of-a-kind Certificate of Authenticity to the engraved "20th Anniversary" medallion over pickup switch access.
Fender Ritchie Blackmore Tribute Stratocaster
For more than 40 years now, Ritchie Blackmore's famously forceful G-minor blues riff in 1972 Deep Purple classic "Smoke on the Water" has served as the quintessential heavy rock guitar riff and a metal-melody primer for burgeoning rock guitarists everywhere. Its place in rock history is as solid as the stature of the guitarist who played it.
The Ritchie Blackmore Tribute Stratocaster takes you back in time and back to the shores of Switzerland's Lake Geneva, where the smoke from the burning Montreux Casino drifted over the waters on Dec. 4, 1971, as the building was destroyed. That night, the members of Deep Purple watched the "fire in the sky" from their hotel and drew inspiration for a timeless rock classic. Blackmore played the song's powerful double-stop riff on a black 1968 Stratocaster, not knowing at the time that he was creating an archetypal guitar figure that would be eagerly imitated by legions of guitarists.
The Fender Custom Shop Ritchie Blackmore Tribute Stratocaster has a two-piece alder body with a lightly worn Black urethane finish, a "U"-shaped maple neck, 7.25"-radius maple fingerboard with medium jumbo frets, and custom '68 Stratocaster pickups hand-wound by Fender legend Abigail Ybarra. Other distinctive features include three-way pickup switching, Schaller® tuners, four-bolt neck plate stamped with the serial number and the stylized Fender "F," and a vintage-style synchronized tremolo equipped with Blackmore's distinctive custom ¼" trem arm.
Each instrument also includes an exclusive tribute decal on the back of the headstock, certificate of authenticity and orange-lined black textured vinyl case with the "Fender amp" logo.
Gibson Frank Zappa Roxy SG
Frank Zappa has long been hailed as one of the most inventive rock guitarists ever to have graced the stage and studio. The live performances with his band The Mothers at the Roxy Theatre in Hollywood from December 1973 and after—documented in the album Roxy & Elsewhere and on subsequent DVD releases—are often considered to display the pinnacle of his unbridled invention.
The heavily modified SG Special used in those shows is an iconic instrument among Zappa fans, and now Gibson USA recreates that legendary SG in perfectly faithful detail to bring the Frank Zappa® “Roxy” SG to anyone seeking an extremely versatile, and superbly playable modified-vintage SG Standard.
Zappa’s original SG Special was an early ’60s model with a fast, slim neck profile and the smaller pickguard characteristic of the era, which would have been made with P-90 pickups originally. While it reflects the heavily modified state of FZ’s guitar, the Frank Zappa® “Roxy” SG still functions perfectly as a straight-up vintage-reissue SG when desired. But just flip either of the two mini-toggle switches to split the uncovered humbuckers’ coils, or to throw the pickups out of phase, and you leap into funky Zappa-certified tones—all aided by the highly functional Maestro-style vibrola with Lyre tailpiece. And with its natural neck and headstock, and a carefully color-matched rendition of FZ’s faded nitrocellulose Cherry finish, the Frank Zappa® “Roxy” SG looks every bit as distinctive as it sounds.
The Frank Zappa® “Roxy” SG begins with the same time-tested tonewoods that helped to make the SG Standard legendary in the first place. The body is crafted from solid Grade-A mahogany in the iconic double-horned style with beveled edges for enhanced playing comfort. A solid, quarter-sawn, Grade-A mahogany neck is carved in the slim early ’60s profile that Zappa preferred, which measures 0.775” at the 1st fret and 0.910” at the 12th, for superb speed and comfort. It’s topped with a Grade-A rosewood fingerboard with pearloid dot inlays and 22 frets made from wire based on precise measurement of the jumbo frets on the original “Roxy” SG. Like FZ’s guitar, the neck is natural mahogany, and the headstock is white.
The modified electronics on FZ’s original “Roxy” SG were a big part of that guitar’s mojo, and Gibson USA goes all out to replicate that versatility in the Frank Zappa® “Roxy” SG. Two enhanced ’57 Classics with four-conductor wiring replicate the same thick, juicy tone of the humbuckers Zappa added to his guitar. They are routed through a pair of mini-toggle switches mounted in a channel under the pickguard, to yield coil-splitting for single-coil tones, and out-of-phase tones, both of which were a big part of Zappa’s signature sound. The remaining control complement includes the traditional three-way toggle selector and an independent volume and tone control for each pickup.
Tremolo was a key part of FZ’s signature sound, and the Frank Zappa® “Roxy” SG is loaded with a Maestro-style vibrola with decorative Lyre tailpiece and flat bar handle to give the same creative kick to your own playing. A Tune-o-matic bridge offers precise intonation, while a set of Grover™ tuners with historic rounded buttons are both efficient, and true to the look of the original guitar. The guitar carries the smaller early ’60s five-ply SG pickguard with special dimensioned neck spacer to alter the position of the neck pickup to match FZ’s original guitar and a traditional black truss-rod cover.
Every Frank Zappa® “Roxy” SG comes protected in a black Gibson hardshell case, and includes a Zappa CD, an owner’s manual and adjustment literature.
Gibson Joe Walsh 1960 Les Paul Aged
Joe Walsh is a rare and distinguished member of the rock and roll élite who has managed to retain his distinctive and instantly recognizable tone and playing style through the course of a career spanning five decades. From joining the James Gang in 1968, to his long and ongoing solo career, to his pivotal role as lead guitarist with the Eagles, that thick, rich, sustaining Les Paul tone has remained the centerpiece of Joe’s sound. Now the look, feel, and tone of his own exalted original 1960 Les Paul Standard has been recreated in exacting detail by the world-renowned craftspeople of Gibson Custom as the Joe Walsh 1960 Les Paul Standard.
Working closely with Joe Walsh, the guitar’s current owner, and the guitar itself, Gibson Custom has analyzed this rare original ’Burst in exacting detail, reproducing it with unprecedented precision in a Limited Run totaling 250 guitars: 50 hand-aged by Tom Murphy and signed by the artist, a further 75 Murphy aged, and 125 treated to Gibson’s proprietary VOS processes. The result is a dead-on 1960 Standard that not only offers every drop of that legendary Joe Walsh tone, but which also presents the magical look and feel of this beloved artist’s guitar.
From the carefully hand-selected maple top, to the accurate “tangerine burst” finish, to a neck profile measured precisely from the original guitar, to the Custom Bucker PAF-style pickups and period-correct electronics, the Joe Walsh 1960 Les Paul Standard is a stunning recreation of one of the most desirable electric guitars ever made. In addition, as a member of the 2013 class of Historic instruments, the Joe Walsh 1960 Les Paul features Gibson Custom’s 20th Anniversary Specifications: genuine aniline dye back and sides, historically accurate truss rod assembly with no tubing, hot hide glue neck joint, historically accurate binding color, and 1 piece Rosewood fingerboard. All together, it presents a rare opportunity to own the closest thing possible to this historic artist guitar. Reserve yours now at your authorized Gibson Custom dealer.
Gibson Custom lays down the foundation for the Joe Walsh 1960 Les Paul Standard by marrying a solid, lightweight, one-piece, Grade-A mahogany body with a top carved from maple that has been hand selected to match the look of Joe’s original guitar. A thin nitrocellulose “tangerine burst” finish and your choice of hand aging by Tom Murphy or Gibson’s VOS treatment complete the authentic look and feel. A quarter-sawn Grade-A mahogany neck is carved to an accurate 1960 profile that measures 0.800” at the 1st fret and 0.854” at the 12th, and topped with a one-piece, Grade-A rosewood fingerboard with trapezoid inlays made from period-correct cellulose nitrate, and a nylon 6/6 nut at the top end.
To ensure that the Joe Walsh 1960 Les Paul Standard sounds every bit as sublime as it looks, Gibson Custom loads it with a pair of Custom Bucker pickups, made with Alnico III magnets and wound to precisely match the specs of Joe’s original PAF humbuckers. The traditional four-knob Les Paul control complement includes “bumble bee” tone capacitors on the tone potentiometers, and a three-way pickup selector.
The accurate ABR-1 Tune-o-matic bridge is set up with its saddles slanted precisely as found on Joe’s original guitar, and partners with a lightweight aluminum stopbar tailpiece. A set of Grover™ kidney-button tuners, a common upgrade on guitars of the era, offer smooth and precise tuning. The body and fingerboard binding, pickguard, truss-rod cover, switch ring, and control cavity covers are all period-correct for shape and color, and the guitar’s controls carries four gold Top Hat knobs with silver Vol/Tone inserts.
All guitars include a Gibson Custom hardshell case. Fifty guitars will be hand-aged by Tom Murphy and signed by the artist and come complete with a leather-bound Certificate of Authenticity. All guitars include Certificate of Authenticity, owner’s manual and adjustment literature.