I saw this picture on Facebook earlier today. It's a creation of the ESP Custom Shop in Japan. The Facebook post was accompanined by all the predictable "How on Earth do you play that?" comments, all of which are quite obviously missing the point. You don't play it, it's a work of art.
It's a similar situation to artist Yoshihiko Satoh's "Present Arms" art pieces (12-necked Stratocasters!); a lot of these photos have been doing the rounds again virally on Facebook et al, with most commenters simply not understanding that whilst these are technically functional pieces, you are not really supposed to play them. It's their inherent absurdity that makes them objets d'art.
Guitars as art? Why not? I'd hang 'em on my wall if I had the opportunity.
Hey guys,
I live in Japan and I kept seeing this strange travel guitar. It's called a GR-PPG and you can see it here or even buy it from here (I have nothing to do with this site, just saw it in English). It's supposedly made by Grassroots which is ESP's cheapo line for the Asian market, but this one doesn't even have a name on it nor is it on their website, which is why it took me a while to find it. I thought it was as stripped down as you could get while still being somewhat Strat-like.
Just thought you guys might enjoy it.
Keith.
Thanks Keith. From the front it looks like a Strat with an invisible body. It's funny, but you can almost "see" the body shape that isn't there - it's just what you are expecting, I guess. Weird one. I wonder if John Mayall approves.
This is a weird one. It's a Japanese-made ESP Bass IV, obviously based on the now legendary Fender Bass VI six-string bass which originally went into production in 1961 and which was recently reissued in modified form as a part of Fender's Pawn Shop series and even more recently as a Squier Modified Vintage model.
However, this ESP version has one major difference from the Fender in that it DOESN'T HAVE SIX STRINGS. That's right, this is - rather confusingly - a four-string version of a six-string bass, hence it's a Bass IV rather than a Bass VI. I guess it's for those who like the Bass VI's stylings but would prefer a traditional four-string bass. (Actually, there are a couple of other differences too: it doesn't have a tremolo, and the bridge is set back further implying that this has a longer scale than the short-scale Bass VI).
To my eyes it looks rather odd, it's like have a bass Stratocaster; it looks good but slightly wrong at the same time.
This particular ESP Bass IV (I have to keep checking myself - it's so easy to automatically type that as "VI") is currently listed on eBay with a Buy it Now price of US$1,720.
This ESP Hybrid I guitar from the 1980s is a Strat/Tele hybrid. It's essentially Tele parts on a Strat body, plus a Strat-like tremolo with a David Gilmore-sized arm. (Not that Gilmore is short, I'm talking about his preference for diminutive tremolo arms). Anyway, it's a lot nicer aesthetically than those other Strat/Tele hybrids that feature Strat parts on a Tele-style body, and which unfortunately look like someone has taken a saw to a Stratocaster.
As an 80s Japanese-made guitar, it's quality all the way, and so should appeal to those who like their Teles to look a little more contoured than usual and to have sprouted an upper horn and tremolo arm. Hopefully they like shell pink too. For those people, this guitar is currently listed on eBay with a Buy It Now price of $790.
I picked this up from the ESP Craft House in Shibuya about 4 year ago. It had been hung near the ceiling unplayed.
I'd guess this was built as an example of ESP's custom work. It's probably one for ESP collectors only. I can't imagine anyone else needing to have the ESP logo quite so large on their guitar. Nevertheless, the design of a flag in flight, as it were, has been nicely realised.
Currently listed on eBay with a Buy It Now price of $3980.
I'm not normally a fan of "graphic" finishes on guitars, but being a big fan of those old Universal horror flicks I can't help admiring this ESP Ltd Bela Lugosi "Tales From The Grave" guitar currently listed on eBay with a Buy It Now price of $999.
Hi, I'm a fan of the Guitarz blog. With all the oddball shapes that run by you, I thought it would be cool to share some photos of this oddball bass I recently acquired. It's a Grass Roots bass from the early 90s, I think. Previous owner told me it was MIJ but I think Grass Roots moved production to Korea at some point. My facts might be off as I'm not usually an ESP fan. It has that characteristic Firebird/SG neckdive but because of its odd Rickenbacker headstock-on-Iceman/Firebird-bass cut, the butt end of it perpetually rests underneath my elbow and maintains balance but for all the wrong reasons. Any idea where this is from and when it was made? Originally white, I believe. Yellowed clear coat. Both P-bass and Jazz Bass pickups.
Thanks for those photos, Francis. I'm afraid I know nothing about this bass nor the Grass Roots brand. You mentioned ESP, and your bass does look like it could be a relation of this ESP Phoenix Firebird-like guitar that we looked at in April 2010.
If any readers know more about this bass please let us know via the comments. Thanks!
Here we see an ESP Gundam Axe guitar listed on eBay with a Buy It Now price of $799. The seller doesn't tell us very much about it, only that he bought it in Japan in 2007 literally whilst running for the return flight home.
The insubstantial body does look very much as it has been crafted from plastic; the fact that the blade section of the axe shape contains a built-in amp and speaker make this all the more likely. Of course, ESP are no strangers to the use of plastic in their guitar bodies, witness the Devil Girl.
As for the shape of the guitar it is most odd, and especially strange for guitar that looks designed for the metal market it has a lone humbucker pickup in the neck position and not in the bridge position. Also with the bridge having such a small footprint on an area of "body" comprising more thin air than actual body material I can't imagine that the guitar would sustain very well.
Although it looks very metal the ESP Gundam is more of a novelty guitar; it's another guitar inspired by a Japanese anime series, the Gundam being giant fighting robots or "Mobile Suits". The guitar we see here appears to be based on a weapon as used by one of these robots.
Personally I think I prefer the Doraemon guitar (now, don't get all technical with me and say that Doraemon was originally a manga series rather than anime - it's all related).
For a while now (and yes, it's been a while since I've posted here, sorry, but don't worry, I've been playing guitar a lot in the meantime), I've been wanting to post about a stratocaster - even if I'm not a fan of this guitar, it would be bizarre not to show once in a while the most iconic electric guitar in history on a blog that is dedicated to all guitars. Not so easy though, because there's not often something new or exciting about strats, neither about Fender models or any of their innumerable copies or clones...
And then I saw this one! And, surprise!, I not only find it worth writing a post about, I even like it a lot, I could have one like this - yes, even with the EMG pickups. It's said to have been 'reconstructed' but it doesn't say what was the original guitar, but I assume that you don't put expensive hardware and electronics on a total cheapo. I had already noticed that a chrome pickguard makes a strat look much cooler (here), and the tele knobs make it even better (if I'm not wrong some G&L custom strats have a similar combination).
Despite its EMG pickups - clearly metal oriented - one cannot call it a superstrat, it keeps the classic design and electronics, two humbuckers strats have been introduced by Fender themselves in the 1970s as fat strats - let's say it's a heavyset strat... A super cool heavyset strat!
I know, I know... I rarely feature "metal" guitars or those designed purely for shredding as it's not really my area of interest in the guitar world and I feel that plenty of other guitar blogs already more than adequately cover these type of instruments.
However, this particular ESP Ltd EC-CZ II Clockwork Zombie, currently being offered for sale on eBay UK at a knock-down Buy It Now price of £499, caught my eye. It's a limited edition issued as part of ESP Ltd's Graphic Series and features original artwork by Sam Shearon, a.k.a. dark artist Mr Sam.
Almost exactly two years ago as I write this, I spent some time in the company of Sam Shearon, who is an absolutely charming fellow with a seemingly endless supply of stories and anecdotes on all matter of subjects, and from having had a close-up look at his artwork I can testify to his considerable talents. We did speak about doing an interview for Guitarz about Sam's work for ESP Guitars among others, but there were so many other distractions that weekend, some involving sampling the delights of various alchoholic beverages, that sadly we never got around to it.
One thing that amazed me was that although Sam's intricate artwork looks airbrushed, he said that he does all his artwork on a PC using a mouse! Wow, he must have a very steady hand.
I'm told that Sam's designs on ESP Ltd guitars often sell out nearly as soon as they are released. The particular model had a retail price of £849 in the UK, so at this eBay seller's price of £499 some lucky shredder could get themselves a bargain.
Firstly, before I comment on the lovely guitar pictured here, I'd like to apologize for our brief hiatus. Blogger were having technical issues and whilst they were sorting these out, somehow, Thursday's blog posts went missing.
According to Blogger all missing posts have now been restored across their network of blogs... but not on Guitarz, so it seemed.
However, I was able to cobble together something to replace the missing post about the Argentinian Morgan guitar from what little text I had already copied over to our Facebook page.
As to Bertram's post about the Hoyer solidbody, ironically I was able to reconstruct that from one of those dreaded scraper blogs! Which doesn't stop me from wanting to eradicate said scraper blog from the face of the blogosphere. Seriously, these scraper blogs are one big headache, and now I am up against the 4th one I've had to wage war with since the beginning of April. If anyone has any good workable ideas about how to contend with this menace, then please contact me, I'm all ears. But I am going through the official channels, reporting them to Google Ads, etc - trouble is that takes time to sort out.
Anyway, long-term readers of the blog may recognize the ESP Doraemon guitar which we originally looked at in December 2008. Still, it bears repeating because it is such an oddball guitar, and we now have many more readers who may have missed it first time around.
Japan is the source of some particularly wacky guitars, but I think for me, this is my favourite. Unlike many novelty guitars - particularly those of the cartoon character with built-in speaker variety - it actually sounds pretty damned good as this video (below) will testify.
Doraemon himself, eponymous star of a Japanese manga comic series which first appeared in 1969, is a robotic cat from the 22nd century sent to aid schoolboy Nobita Nobi.
As to the ESP guitar, it certainly wouldn't win any prizes for ergonomics! Nevertheless, I would love to have one, if only for kitsch value.
Thanks to Bill Cesavice who saw this auction on eBay. ($519.99 Buy It Now price, if you're interested).
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.
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!
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!
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!
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!
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.
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
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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!
