The Explorer

Alright then. This is my Holy Grail of axes. This is the guitar that I always wanted as a kid, and I got it pretty early in my guitar life, and this is probably the only guitar that I'll freaking die with. I have slept with this guitar. It will be willed to my best friend Brian (if it's not buried with me) because he is the only squirrel that I know that understands it and deserves it and will take proper care of it.

It's one of the early, early Ibanez Destroyers with a korina body, one of the "lawsuit" guitars. This guitar was probably built for Ibanez by Gotoh in Japan. It's a way better guitar than any Explorer Gibson has ever produced after the initial run of Explorers in the late fifties.

The pick-ups are early Dimarzio's with blonde bobbins that just sing, and if you were to ever open the back cavity you'd think that you were looking at a plate of linguine because there are like two dozen wires between the pots and the pick-ups. Crazy.

It had a normal type Les Paul bridge when it was produced. In the mid-eighties I had it replaced with a Washburn 2000 locking roller-bearing whammy system. Stays in tune for months, no mater how hard you lean on it.

Eddie Van had one of these and it was used extensively on the first three Van Halen albums.

When you strap this thing on and it's down around your knees you are rock and roll............