Washburn USA Custom Shop WM100 98- Natural Figured

99 Washburn WM100 in Very Good Condition. Gorgeous one-piece lightweight mahogany body with a beautiful-unique bookmatched figured maple top, at just over 7 1/2 lbs. Strong and musical unplugged acoustic voice--and equally so plugged in with an abundance of audible overtones as the chords ring out. When I first picked this one up, I found playing it inspired many new song ideas.

Neck carve reminds me of a 59 medium--super comfortable C shape with not too much shoulder. I'm at a point where I only have "keeper" guitars but simply can't afford to keep them all and still explore other guitars where my musical interests take me.

The Washburn guys in Chicago Custom Shop in the late 90's took so much pride in their builds (see video below--and tell me if you want those passionate and decidated guys to be building your guitar).

I had this Washburn set up, including fret level, crown and polish at Norman's Rare Guitars in LA over the summer to my preferences with low to medium action with 10's and is a buttery smooth player. Comes with a Peavy heavy-duty case, which fits very nicely since this guitar's shape is so similar to a Wolfgang.

There are signs of play wear all over guitar. Upon close inspection you will see plenty of small scratches, dings, blemishes, and swirling from playwear. As shown in the picture, there are some tooling marks on the rosewood board and a blemish as pictured, which were there already when I purchased the guitar. Yet the guitar appears very clean overall, and I am somewhat overstating the amount of wear and tear, but I want to be clear that the camera just doesn't pick up the finer stuff like the eye does--and would much rather overstate than understate the small stuff.

The combination of unique beauty, lightweight, high quality tonewoods, and musical voice make this Washburn a special instrument indeed. Probably the best deal around for a USA custom shop instrument as this brand tends to be under-appreciated, yet their build quality matches or more often exceeds instruments costing three or four times the cost.