The ESP Guitar Company

want this guitar with gotoh tom string thru bridge and passive pickups of bareknuckle

I have this in the cherry burst finish, rare I guess because it’s not made anymore. Now, understand that I’m pretty obsessive when it comes to tinkering with my guitars. Nothing is ever perfect when I get it - there are always several things I want to change.  Tuning heads, pickups, pickup rings, pots, knobs, nuts, you name it, I’m going to assess whether or not it needs to be changed. Not with this one.  I’ve made one mod to this one.

I love the EMG 81/81 set - after all, it’s a big part of what made Metallica’s tone back in their glory days - it’s a very strong choice for any shredder -type guitar. But relatively recently ESP put out the pickup set that is, in my opinion, the best mass-produced set available, and that’s the Hetfield signature set.  So I got a set of F-spaced Hets (you MUST get the F-spaced for this guitar or your sound will be sorely diminished!) and plugged them in - took 10 minutes. And now I have a guitar that Hetfield himself would be happy to play on stage (if he was a strat player, that is).

Oh, and I also sanded down the back of the neck with a scotch-Brite type pad so it’s no longer a gloss finish and my thumb doesn’t stick when I’m trying to move around.  I do this with every finished guitar, including the most expensive.  That sticky neck is unacceptable.  If ESP was to make one change, it should be to make the neck a satin finish.

So with the Hets in there, the tone is otherworldly (it was already spectacular with the 81s).  The playability of this machine is almost flawless.  It responds instantaneously with glorious sound to the slightest touch of the strings. It’s actually hard to get this guitar to go OUT of tune - I play it for a week at a time without having to adjust the fine tuning knobs.  

So far in my guitar playing journey, I’ve never played anything that does a better job of putting my hands in touch with the sounds i’m making, if that makes any sense to anyone out there.  It’s like a direct interface that works WITH you - HELPS you make your music.  The rest of the guitars I’ve played we’re all instruments I had to bend to my will, so to speak.  This one is different, and I now understand why people pay big money for the guitars that are made the right way. I would LOVE to save up for one of their $4000 standard ESP M models to see how much farther they’re really able to take this excellence.

Why did the price increase to 2199? 

I've noticed all the floyd equipped m series have alder bodies but the hard tails are mahogany, any reason other than keeping cost down?

I just snatched this guitar and i got to say im very pleased by the build quality, i can obviously see and feel the Japanese craftsmanship in this metal machine, really good work,  i hope you consider the sustainiac pickup in your future models. Thanks ESP.