Yep, there was a reason I've sold a lot of gear recently :lol:
Warning: long post alert!
Rewind to Early April, and I attended the World Guitars PRS event where I met Paul Smith, and had him sign my Modern Eagle. Davy Knowles was at the event, with his newly introduced Private Stock Signature Limited, and I was blown away by the look and tone of it:
www.prsguitars.com/signatureltd/I also loved the look of this one from the NAMM show in January, which is Paul Smith's personal guitar:
With GAS rapidly rising, I did some digging on the model to find out what was coming to the UK. 15 had been allocated to dealers and were fully specced up, but nothing matched what I'd like - either the neck shape wasn't right, or they had a trem or the colour was cr@p. For the price they are, I was only interested if the spec was spot on, so I gave up dreaming.
Except...
#15 had been held back for the boss of Headline Distribution, but Mark @ Guitars4You snagged it for me. I only had a couple of days to spec it and then the order went in. As an added bonus, after the 3 recent PRS events there was some of Paul's "Wood Library" stash of maple in the UK waiting to be shipped back, so I could even choose my own top - as far as I know, no one else in the UK had been able to do this.
Result!
Fast forward to a couple of weeks ago, and I had a call from Mark. I was expecting the "it's here" call, but unfortunately the guitar's build hadn't even started! The top I'd chosen was stuck in US Customs, and showed no sign of imminent release. Bugger!
So, I got to choose a new top 8) I sent the PS team the pic of Paul's guitar above, plus Miles Kennedy's below, and asked them to find something similar:
And this is what they've offered me. It's better than my original one, so I'm well happy!
I mocked this up to see how similar the woods were, and it seems pretty darn close to me:
So I guess it'll be here around Christmas time, which will be a nice present. I've always wanted a green Modern Eagle, but stand no chance of getting one as they're so rare, so this Sig Ltd will be the substitute. I've gone for a green top and natural back and sides, like the colour of the guitar below.
The waiting begins again!
