About the Maker (from Wikipedia):
Dean Guitars is an American manufacturer of guitars. It was founded in 1976 in Chicago, Illinois by Dean Zelinsky and is currently owned by Armadillo Enterprises in Tampa, Florida. Dean owner Elliott Rubinson performs and tours with major artists that use his instruments like Michael Schenker and Uli Jon Roth. In 2009, after original founder Dean Zelinsky left the company citing creative differences, Rubinson made the unusual decision to change his name to Elliott Dean.
Dean Guitars were especially popular with metal players, and their popularity rose with the return of Dimebag Darrell in 2004, guitarist for Pantera and Damageplan. Dean offers over 30 different Dimebag models today. Other world famous artists that play Dean guitars exclusively are Jeff Berlin, Vinnie Moore, Dave Mustaine, Glen Drover, Leslie West, Michael Schenker, Michael Amott, Uli Jon Roth, Eric Peterson, Karl Sanders, Tracii Guns, Michael Angelo Batio. Dean guitars is responsible for building the famous four neck guitar for Michael Angelo Batio.
About the Guitar:
Dean Guitars produced a limited run of the "USA Leslie West Signature 40th Anniversary" guitar to commemorates 40 years since Woodstock and features a 5A Quilt Maple Top, USA DMT Leslie West "Mountain of Tone" Humbucker Pickup, and Ebony, Mahogany, Paduk and MOP "Leslie West Peace" Symbol Body Inlay.
· 5A Quilt Maple Top / Mahogany Body
· 24-3/4” Scale
· Set Mahogany Neck
· Ebony Fingerboard
· Custom Leslie West Signature Inlays
· Grover Tuners
· Satin Nickel Hardware
· Tune-O-Matic Bridge
· Ebony, Mahogany, Paduk, & MOP “Leslie West Peace” Symbol Body Inlay
· USA Dean DMT Leslie West “Mountain of Tone” Humbucker Pickup
· Finishes:
Trans Amber
Here is what Dean Guitars said abouth this custom shop build guitar:
Dean Leslie West Woodstock 40th Anniversary Guitar: Hi, I’m Josh Maloney with Dean Guitars. I’d like to tell you a little bit about this new Dean USA Custom Shop Leslie West Woodstock 40th Anniversary Soltero. Leslie West is a very famous guitar player. Playing with Mountain and writing “Mississippi Queen,” he’s had a whole host of accomplishments, but one of the biggest was he actually played Woodstock in ’69. There’s not a lot of artists left that can say that. So to commemorate such an historic landmark, we at Dean Guitars have done a Custom Shop Leslie West Soltero to kind of commemorate that. As you can see, it’s got a really highly figured quilt maple top. The peace sign LW inlay is hand inlaid into the body using ebony, pearl, padook, mahogany, various exotic woods. It has his Leslie West Dean magnetic technology signature Mountain of Tone pickup in the bridge position. It only has one pickup, so the bridge position is where it lies. One volume one tone, and Leslie, being the character that he is, insisted his knobs go to eleven, so as you can see, his knobs go to eleven, the only guitar we make in the line that has that. It also has a signature, literally, pearl inlay going up the neck. This is all hand done in Tampa by our custom shop. We’re probably only going to make a dozen of these guitars because they’re so labor-intensive and so elegant that the manufacturing time is a little bit longer than normal. However, if you get one, then you’re part of a very exclusive club – the Leslie West Commemorative Woodstock Soltero.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C-P7UkkBXoA
