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SHOCKING: Seymour duncan - You Need To See This

“He felt a responsibility to look after these things. He was aware that you can’t be buried with them – you are but the temporary custodian”: Inside the greatest guitar auction of all time

With Jim Irsay’s epic collection of iconic guitars about to go under the hammer at Christie’s, we find out how this unique treasury of tone was prepared for auction

Guitar World

NAMM 2026 live! The biggest guitar news as it happened

All the hottest news and biggest surprises from the world’s premier guitar gear trade show

Guitar World

Seymour Duncan unveils MortalCoil active humbucker set, a multi-voiced pairing featuring the crushing new MC1 plus classic JB and Jazz humbucker voicings – will it dethrone Fishman as metal’s state-of-the-art pickup?

NAMM 2026: A serious upgrade to any high-performance electric guitar, Seymour Duncan promises a super-fast attack, clarity even when the gain is dimed – and hey, there's a single-coil voicing too

MusicRadar

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“The SG that I had at the Ozzy gig, that guitar needed a louder pickup but I still wanted that true-to-life guitar sound that I like”: Slash and Seymour Duncan dial up the raunch with the Guns N’ Roses legend’s signature 3.0 humbuckers

NAMM 2026: Hand-wired in Santa Barbara, they're not just for Les Pauls or SGs. Slash has one in his BC Rich Mockingbird – and they'd work a treat in a hotrodded S-style

MusicRadar

“It’s taken its time, but finally one of rock music’s most iconic instruments has been launched as a signature run”: All the guitar gear that has caught my eye this week – including a follow-up to the internet-breaking Bad Monkey story

It's pedal mania this week, with new drops from Strymon, JHS Pedals, and DigiTech – but a long-awaited replica of Tom Morello's legendary Rage Against the Machine guitar steals the spotlight

Guitar World

“I took it into rehearsals and Frank Zappa said, ‘If you wanted to ruin your guitar, why didn’t you loan it to a friend?’” Adrian Belew shares unseen photos of “the first relic’d guitar” – which he created with Seymour Duncan

The pair’s process was a little more primitive than modern methods

Guitar World

“When we were finished gouging it with screwdrivers, spraying blops of paint on it, dragging it around the yard, and banging it on the driveway, we hung it up in a tree”: Adrian Belew on how he and Seymour Duncan made one of the first relic’d guitars

The prog guitar icon has posted new pics taken by Seymour Duncan that show off their handiwork as they turned Belew's new Strat into a relic and started guitar's most controversial trend

MusicRadar

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“I’d heard these rumours that ‘it’s even been a sunburst’… I’ve read that one, too. But I could find no evidence of this”: Up close and personal with Gary Moore’s mythical 1960 Fender Stratocaster – the $330,000 Strat that lit up his Red House performance

Having just been auctioned for megabucks, we take a closer look at Moore's red Strat, sifting through the myths behind a guitar forever linked to his blazing 2004 performance of a Hendrix standard

Guitar World

“I started crying. I never thought in these 42 years I’d see my work on the stage. I’m going, ‘Damn it, Joe!’” Maricela Juarez is a legend in the pickup game – and she was given the ultimate shoutout by Joe Bonamassa and Josh Smith

The Seymour Duncan Custom Shop manager says working with Peter Frampton was her greatest achievement – until this touching moment

Guitar World

“It really is a special set”: Joe Bonamassa’s newest signature pickups are inspired by his Bolin ’Burst – the infamous Les Paul he acquired under extraordinary circumstances

The original pickups found in the famed Gibson that was once played by Tommy Bolin have been recreated in great detail

Guitar World

“Even today, that instrument is fascinating. I’ve passed it around and players of all sorts have all come to the same conclusion – there is something magic in that instrument”: Billy Gibbons on why Pearly Gates is one of the greatest Les Pauls of all time

All Gibson Les Paul Standards from 1959 are special but what is it about the ZZ Top frontman's Pearly Gates that makes it so unique? As Gibbons says, it might be something entirely supernatural

MusicRadar

“We’ve seen a few YouTubers turn their hand to guitar making, but this new one might just be my favorite”: All the new guitar gear that has caught my eye this week – including a triumphant return for one of Gibson’s most sought-after builds

Fender, Ernie Ball Music Man, Jackson, and a load of new Gibson drops headline this week’s round-up

Guitar World

“Working on Jimmy Page’s guitar was bucket list stuff for me”: Bare Knuckle’s Tim Mills on how he built the biggest indie pickup brand in the world – and why Page’s ‘Number One’ Les Paul sounds like Stevie Ray Vaughan’s Strat

The guitarist behind the beloved U.K.-based artisan pickup brand, explains how he got started in the biz, the attention to detail that makes Bare Knuckle so good – and what's coming next

Guitar World

“This guitar is my new gold standard for tone and playability”: Mark Holcomb’s US-made signature PRS is back for good – and it has a figured mango top and ships in a chug-friendly Drop C tuning

Equipped with the Periphery guitarist's signature Seymour Duncan humbuckers, this is a PRS tooled up for low-end progressive metal riff work

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Guitar World

“I have a rule: I never argue with a woman holding a knife. So I’m like, ‘All right, Bonnie, I’ll bite...’” How a blues legend ended up engraving her name into Joe Bonamassa’s favorite 1955 Fender Strat

It has been his number one road Strat for years, but until the iconic singer put her Dremmel to the back of its body, it didn’t have a name

Guitar World

“We all have easy access to the parts needed to make a pickup… You certainly don’t have to start like Seymour Duncan did with a record player’s turntable”: Why more guitar builders are making their own pickups

We speak to Juha Ruokangas about why his company took pickup design into its own hands – and then retrofitted an old PRS Custom 24 with his humbuckers to see how they sounded

Guitar World

Philip Sayce has some of the most potent guitar tones in modern blues rock – and now Seymour Duncan has recreated them with a signature single-coil set inspired by his go-to vintage Strat

Sayce’s sound blends a 1963 Strat with pickups from 1958, which have been faithfully reverse-engineered by Seymour Duncan’s in-house tone experts

Guitar World

“For power Stratocaster playing”: The tones of Joe Bonamassa’s obscure “Greenburst” Strat have been brought to the masses with new Seymour Duncan signature pickups

The single-coils feature period-correct wiring, staggered Alnico 5 magnets, and gray bottom flatwork to faithfully recreate the tones of the “star” guitar

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MusicRadar

“The ‘gray bottoms’ have a little more high output – they have a punchier sound to them”: Joe Bonamassa and Seymour Duncan put pre-CBS tones on the menu with “Greenburst” Stratocaster pickup set

The hottest mod of the year? These replicate the same gray-bottomed single-coils in the ’64 Stratocaster that stopped Bonamassa in his tracks at Norman’s Rare Guitars

Guitar World

“Two new K7s, inspired by the eternal Yin and Yang”: Ibanez’s signature line-up is packed with dazzling artist models – and, newly reunited with both Korn guitarists, it’s bringing back an old friend

Korn’s Head is back in the Ibanez fold and has a new 7-string model, rubbing shoulders with the likes of Joe Satriani, Lari Basilio, Josh Smith, George Benson and, of course, his bandmate Munky…

MusicRadar

NAMM 2025: “A more versatile and professional instrument for those looking for the unique rubber bridge sound”: Orangewood unveils Seymour Duncan-equipped Juniper II acoustic and baritone rubber bridge acoustics

For all your indie-folk needs, the new and improved Juniper II: now with a splittable Seymour Duncan Hot Rails pickup and a baritone option for low-end plunk

Guitar World

“The McLaughlin Strat was stolen after Beck absentmindedly left it in an open-top hot rod”: The highlights of the Jeff Beck guitar auction – from the story of Seymour Duncan’s Tele-Gib hybrid to his legendary Oxblood Gibson Les Paul

Christie’s Jeff Beck Auction offers a revealing look at numerous iconic instruments from the guitar hero’s entire career – from the Yardbirds to Johnny Depp

Guitar World

“Anti-colonialist anguish, hope, joy and the search for connection, all through his guitar. That’s what makes a guitar hero”: Guitarists of the Year 2024 – the players who took 2024 by storm

Slash made a blues record. St. Vincent boggled our minds again. And Grace Bowers blew everyone away… Here we take a look at the players who made 2024 a banner year for the instrument

Guitar World

“The first big gig for Starship was opening for Skynyrd in Florida in front of like 30,000 people. I had all these note-for-note solos, going, ‘God, I hope I nail these!’” Alastair Greene played sideman to rock greats –before he came back to the blues

The guitarist recalls the stress of his no rehearsal debut for Starship, learning lessons from Robin Trower and growing up with Seymour Duncan

Guitar World

“Streamlined, pro specs and built for brutal chug”: The ESP LTD Deluxe EC-01FT is a no-nonsense tone machine that asserts single-pickup supremacy

This new offering from ESP draws raw inspiration from the brand’s popular Eclipse series, enhanced with refined features and a cutting-edge custom Seymour Duncan humbucker pickup

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