PRS Paul Reed Smith Limited Edition Special 22 Semi-Hollow 10-Top Guitar, River Blue, Pattern Neck

Player's Perspective

If this reminds you a lot of the John Mayer Super Eagle, well you're not the only one. There are some slight differences, but in short, this is a great way to get that Super Eagle sound and vibe without dropping over $10k on a guitar. PRS's release of the Limited Edition Special is a welcomed addition to their lineup, even if it's just temporary.

It all starts with the body of a Custom 22. The neck pickup is right under the natural 3rd-order harmonic for a rich and lush tone full of harmonic content. The bridge pickup has some nice bite to it and can handle distortion really well without sounding thin or underpowered. But then PRS went ahead and added a Narrowfield middle pickup and they hollowed out some of the body. The result is a guitar that is more versatile while being a bit smoother and warmer sounding at the same time.

You can still achieve bright and spanky sounds quite easily (check out John Mayer getting that high and trebly Jerry tone with his Super Eagle on any of the Dead and Co. shows!) but the top end won't ever get harsh and ear-piercing thanks to the semi-hollow design. While it's naturally designed to be heard and to stand out in a mix, you can also easily mellow it out for an almost jazzy kind of tone, if that's what you're after. Then there's the middle pickup, which sounds like a single-coil with a bit of extra punch and no 60-cycle hum. It matches up well with the output of the humbuckers whether they're in full power or split-coil mode.

As per usual, PRS hit it out of the park with this limited edition design.

It’s All in the Details: TCI-Tuned Pickups

Paul Reed Smith is known as a man who studies history, scrutinizes the details, and never stops applying what he learns to his own instruments. It is that passion, care, and tenacity that has permeated PRS Guitars’ culture and led to the constant evolution of PRS products. Last year, PRS announced TCI (tuned capacitance and inductance) pickups on the Paul’s Guitar. But, TCI is more than a pickup, it’s a process. That process has now been applied to all PRS pickups offered on our Core line of instruments, with the exception of a few artist Signature models.

“TCI stands for Tuned Capacitance Inductance. When you wind a pickup, the coils are capacitors, resistors, and inductors simultaneously. Our more refined ability to be able to tune those factors is what we have incorporated into TCI pickups,” said Paul Reed Smith. “To our ears, the results are very musical. We are very proud of how far we’ve come in the understanding and making of pickups. It’s been a fun process.”

PATTERN NECK SHAPES

Neck shapes have always been a high priority for PRS and a hallmark of our quality. A guitar should feel comfortable, like "home," as soon as you pick it up, and the neck is paramount to that connection. These new neck shapes reflect modern tooling and programming that allows us to even more preciously shape and consistently reproduce our necks.

Perfected after years of prototyping, the new "Pattern" neck is an updated Wide Fat PRS neck style based on Paul’s pre-factory design. These necks were found on the instruments built for Carlos Santana, Peter Frampton and Howard Leese from the late 70’s to the mid 80’s.

Our in-house guitar tech will inspect, test, set up, and clean all of our instruments on site prior to shipping. All of our instruments are guaranteed to be fully functional upon arrival.