Paul Reed Smith PRS Private Stock Holcomb Guitar, Frostbite Glow

Music Store Live is proud to offer up another unique and beautiful creation from our friends over at the Paul Reed Smith Private Stock department. There's never any question as to the quality of the instrument you're getting when you get any PRS guitar. But there's something magical with these Private Stocks and, at the end of the day, they're unique and simply unlike any other PRS guitar out there. 

This one is based on the Mark Holcomb signature and it's one of the coolest looking and meanest sounding guitars we've ever seen. It's got the Seymour Duncan Alpha and Omega pickups that Mark loves so much. The pickups are absolutely awesome and they can handle any amount of gain you want to throw at them. They're defined and highly articulate, ready to take on anything. You'll never get buried in a mix with this. Definitely geared for the shredder and hard rocker out there, these are some seriously killer pickups, no doubt, and they clean up quite nicely too. It's also got a full 25.5" scale and flat 20" fretboard radius, which just makes the fretboard lightning fast and also gives the strings a little more punch and definition as opposed to the 25" scale found on other PRS guitars.

We scoured through PRS's private stock wood room to find the pieces used for this guitar. Notice the heart shape on the top just under the bridge. And the gorgeous ash back is a one-of-a-kind piece, for sure. We went with an awesomely figured piece of ziricote for the neck, but we chose a more tame piece of ziricote for the fretboard so that the spalted maple bird inlays would stand out. The ziricote neck feels absolutely incredible. We love the way raw wood necks feel. Over time they just get better and better as the natural oils from your hands seep into the pores of the wood. In our experience, these are the types of necks that start off feeling amazing and only continue to improve over time. The tone is very similar to Brazilian rosewood, which is usually regarded as the holy grail of tonewoods. It's smooth, full, and warm, while also having a very defined and bell-like top-end that shines through beautifully.

Everywhere you look on this guitar, there's going to be something that catches your eye. But, of course, it's one thing when you're there in the wood room picking stuff out and all you can do is try to envision how it's all going to come out. It's a whole other thing when the finished product arrives and it exceeds what were already very high expectations! This guitar came out even cooler than we could have imagined!

PRS's Private Stock guitars are the cream of the crop, of course. This one is a true masterpiece in every way. It is both a work of art and a player's dream all in one.

P.S. The date on the back of the headstock is a palindrome!

Private Stock represents the highest quality of materials, the most personally crafted instruments, and the greatest level of customization available from PRS. Whether you choose one of our Private Stock models or spec a Built to Order instrument, every Private Stock is carefully conceived and built with a “one-off” mentality. Through this program, we strive to deliver heirloom-quality, musical instruments. All woods for this guitar were hand-selected by the dealer during a trip to our Private Stock vault in Maryland.

"I have never seen anyone playing guitar in a bad mood. There’s something magic about guitars because they are simultaneously art, musical instruments, treasured possessions, and tools to joyfully spend time with. If you get an extraordinary instrument from Private Stock that is equally as good as a family heirloom and a musician’s tool to make a living on, we have done our job." - Paul Reed Smith

Unique features to this PRS Private Stock guitar are:

- The dealer hand-selected all of the woods used
- The top is beautifully bookmatched quilt maple
- Stained figured white ash back
- Ziricote neck and fretboard 
- Spalted maple bird inlays and headstock eagle
- Flame maple fretboard and headstock binding
- Ziricote tuner buttons
- Ebony pickup rings
- Alpha/Omega pickups, string-through plate bridge, 25.5" scale, and 20" radius are unique to the Holcomb signature guitars

Seymour Duncan Alpha and Omega Holcomb Signature Pickups

The progressive metal virtuosos of Periphery are known for their technically complex rhythms and precise tones – tones which require high output passive humbucker pickups with just the right amount of output and articulation whether standing alone or working in a dense mix. The Alpha and Omega pickups were created to match that level of precision and versatility.

Working with guitarist Mark Holcomb, the Omega bridge pickup was created to provide destructive percussion and growl in the mids and low end. It’s aggressive but it also has lots of clarity and brightness, which cuts through whether you’re playing sophisticated chords, complex single-note lines or intense solos.

The Alpha neck pickup is unlike most traditional neck models. It was voiced to combine the best qualities of a neck and a bridge pickup, with some of that fat glassy sound but also plenty of your pick attack and fretting-hand phrasing.

The Mark Holcomb Signature Alpha & Omega high output passive humbucker pickups are made in Santa Barbara, California. "The Alpha/Omega set has been the heartbeat of my sound for the past several years. Since we developed and released the first 6-string set in the custom shop, I’ve had the same pickup set in every one of my 6, 7 and 8-string guitars, live and in the studio. It has remained one of the few components of my rig and setup that I haven’t even thought about tweaking.”-Mark Holcomb