NGD: 2000 Custom 22 (Steven Wilson fans, check this out...)

[kmburkhart]

Picked up this 2000 Custom 22 in Emerald Green up from Reverb for a very fair price - all stock, with gold hardware. Love it so far! Plays like a dream after a small truss rod adjustment. I have always liked the Dragon II's for higher gain tones. Keeping this one in Drop D. SW's has more blue in the finish and I think it's a couple years newer (non-winged tuners). Cool video of him going over it here.

Rest of the pictures here: http://imgur.com/a/IZkfc

My PRS family shot:

The SE 277 is stock aside from the awesome USA clear/black knobs - I would like to do a pickup upgrade on it. I keep it in Drop A, and sometimes capo up if I need Drop C. I truly love the bridge on this guitar. I can't get on with a wraparound stoptail - traded an otherwise great SE 245 goldtop towards this new (to me) CU22 because of that.

The S2 Custom 22 has 57/08's in it as well as the clear/black knobs. I think this CU22 sounds better for low/mid gain tones than the other one. I'd like to upgrade the trem to a Mann Made and add a Graphtech Ghost piezo system while I'm at it.

They're all monster players! I write/record music in my home studio with these instruments. I've got some others too, but I play these the most.

 

[sergiodeblanc]

Aww yeah!

 

[toothace]

Most excellent!!

 

[markd21]

That CU22 is AWESOME!! Enjoy.

 

[veinbuster]

Cool!

And nice to see someone taking a photo with the whammy bars installed.

 

[László]

Suhweet!

 

[dkilpatrick]

Nice!

 

[bodia]

Sweet as sweet! Congrats!

 

[Jekylmeister]

Mine has a 3 way switch. It is my fave.

 

[kmburkhart]

Thanks everyone! I might change it over to McCarty switching, but it's good as it is right now.

 

[shinksma]

Awesome! I got into PRS because of Steven Wilson and that exact guitar he talks about in the video. I saw them early on the In Absentia tour (2002), and SW was still playing his ESP, IIRC, then the next time I saw them, later on the co-headlining tour with Opeth (2003), he was playing that Emerald Green CU22. (And I had to look at Wikipedia and my concert tickets from that era to jog that memory - I had originally thought it might have been the Deadwing tour where he first used the PRS).

I made it my mission to get one eventually, but couldn't justify the price for quite a while (guitar was taking a back seat to my work and other stuff). Ten years later, I found a CU24 10 top with birds in Emerald green (I had always wanted a 24 fret guitar, so that trumped getting SW's exact CU22 model).

My CU24 has the rotary switch - I love it! Yeah, I like what you get out of McCarty switching and push-pull or using the five-way-blade, but the rotary five way has that certain "thing" going on.

 

[kmburkhart]

@shinksma, that's awesome - similar story for me. I started following PT/SW in 2003. John Wesley (touring guitarist) lives in the same city in Florida that my best friend lives in. I got to check out his studio and play the infamous singlecut trem that was a prototype for the P22/24 guitars. I can't find it anymore, but there was a cool video of PT playing at the Ram's Head Live in Baltimore, MD in 2002 that you'd appreciate. Very low quality (Real Media stream) but a nice document of that period of the band.