PRS Paul Reed Smith Experience Limited 2018 Paul's Guitar, Black Gold Nitro, Ziricote Fretboard

Historically, the Paul’s Guitar (like the Modern Eagle before it) has been a realization of Paul Reed Smith’s latest discoveries surrounding tone – the result of ideas mulled over a long period of time. As a guitar builder and musician, Paul is continually refining his life’s work and the Paul’s Guitar is his next step forward. As such, this instrument showcases Paul’s dedication to the finest points of tone and aesthetics and boasts several personal touches, including “dirty” deep-curl maple tops, new smaller “Brushstroke” bird inlays, and narrow pickup bobbins.

While the aesthetics are similar to his guitars of the past, the Experience Limited 2018 Paul’s Guitar combines pickup innovations and a unique, but intuitive electronics layout to achieve a new tonal palette. Paul has recently spent a great deal of time meticulously studying vintage single-coils, dissecting them with the goal of bringing to market the clarity, fullness, and musicality that they provide. Most notably, this research has resulted in the new John Mayer Silver Sky signature guitar and its 635JM pickups. Through this research, PRS’s new TCI treble and bass pickups were developed. TCI (Tuned Capacitance and Inductance) pickups start with the end in mind. Knowing the desired tone goal in the beginning and designing the pickups to achieve that tone, allows the pickups to get a very pure, vintage sound while being very consistently reproducible.

The Experience PRS 2018 Paul’s Guitar also features two mini-toggle switches between the volume and tone knobs. This set up allows players to put either or both pickups in true single coil mode, which delivers the clarity and uniqueness of vintage single-coil tones in both single-coil and humbucking positions.

“I don’t just like the newest version of my guitar, I love it. With these new pickups, I can move from a strong bridge pickup to a very clear, “whoopy” neck pickup – you can hear every note – by just setting the mini-toggles and using the 3-way as normal. It’s a highly musical and very usable setup,” said Paul Reed Smith. “This guitar has clear, spanky single coils when you split the pickups but a very full soapbar quality when they are in humbucking mode. It’s just beautiful.”

The Paul’s Guitar is Paul Reed Smith’s choice for playing with his band – in the studio and on stage. Available in Black Gold Nitro finish. Only 100 instruments will be available worldwide.