You would think that guitar players could be content shredding awesome solos while holding one of the most worshipped musical instruments on the planet. Jim Morrison certainly didn't give head to Ray Manzarek's organ on stage. No sir, he went down on the all time greatest phallic symbol this side of a firearm.
Still, for some strummers that just isn't enough. What if you want to not only kill a room, but actually kill a room? The good news... if that's the correct way to think about such things... is that the option to go on a murder spree immediately after nailing a blistering lick is totally on the table.
What I'm saying is, clap, you monkies. Clap and cheer, because no guitar player in the history of the planet has been praised for their fine impulse control, and now they're armed.
Masaki Kyomoto Special Has a Sword Built Right In
Assume that you're actor/guitarist Masaki Kyomoto, and for the purposes of this article we'll also assume you're completely insane. There you are, on stage musicing the living shit out of a song when some drunk hurls a beer bottle at you to express their meatheaded displeasure for you guitar, which incidentally looks like it was painted by Van Gogh while he was getting a hot pork bath from H.P. Lovecraft.
No problem! Just grab hold of the rigid purple erect thing... it's Japan, and pull out your full-length samurai sword to exact swift vengeance on all who mock your gear. This was one of four custom made guitars that ESP built especially for Kyomoto, who starred in films like Legend of the Eight Samurai. According to guitarnoize.com, "The guitar features a short scale neck, Alder and cast material body, a carbon nut, a Seymour Duncan SH-1b and the bridge is listed as a 'Badass Type.'"
And a sword. Good luck getting your hands on one. ESP did them just for Kyomoto and isn't selling them on their Web site
In 1996 Damien Esmond wanted something violent and dangerous, so he had guitar maker Ed Roman craft the Damien Death Cross. It has an Arrow headstock, gothic cross inlays, is made from solid lacewood snakeskin wood with an ebony fingerboard, 24 frets, and real Floyd Rose Tremolo. Of course, what really grabs your eye is the razor sharp spike that protrudes from the base. It's visually exciting and metal as all get out, but it's also extremely dangerous.
"I still enjoy the eye popping out of the skull look I get when fans/strangers/mosh'ers in the pit see it for the first time, when they realize that its real as fuck, and potentially deadly (The spike has been inside my thigh twice now( very deep) and my lead singer's thigh once (he's learned to hang on the other side now, for safety)," said Esmond in a letter to Roman in 2010.
