Dean Dave Mustaine King V VMNT Signature USA Custom Shop Flying V NAMM American Pre-Production Prototype 2006 PRE-GIBSON Megadeth Korina Signature Guitar Artist Owned by DAVE MUSTAINE Master Built Masterbuilt by Dean Zelinsky ESP DV8 Lawsuit

Dave Mustaine's personal Dean Prototype V, master built by the world-famous guitar luthier, Dean Zelinsky on January 11th, 2006. This is the first Dave Mustaine Dean guitar ever built and was a prized part of Mustaine's private collection during the most successful era of Megadeth's incredible comeback, which included Mustaine winning the coveted Grammy Award for Best Metal Performance.

The guitar was showcased at the January NAMM 2007 with Mustaine and Dean Zelinsky only a month after Mustaine abruptly terminated his contract with ESP Guitars in December 2006. Mustaine and Dean's founder put on a ruse for the cameras, claiming that the guitar was only built in the past few days and is a 2007 Prototype. You can see from a screen grab that there is White-Out covering up the original build date written on the back of the headstock. A link to the NAMM 2007 video is attached here.

What has never before been revealed until this listing, is that hidden inside the guitar's control cover is a secret inscription confirming the true build date of January 11th 2006. Americans use the month-day-year date format. A signature from Mark Jabben is then underlined with an arrow. This is significant, because for this guitar to have been completed in the beginning of January 2006, the design would have had to of been discussed and approved in 2005, within the first anniversary of Dimebag Darrell's infamous death on stage causing a huge impact on the trajectory of Dean Guitars. This also means that Mustaine was making moves to jump ship from ESP very early on while still under contract. This guitar gives tremendous insight into a fascinating aspect of guitar lore, where the Japanese brand ESP would begin to lose its grasp on significant metal artists, and American brands like Dean and Gibson would find the genre embracing them far more significantly. The signature from Mark Jabben is also interesting, as he was responsible for finishing work on Dean Custom Shop guitars at this time. He ended up killing his neighbor and then shooting his girlfriend, landing him in a Texas prison for the next 20 years. It all adds to the crazy history of this guitar.

The guitar was once accidently sent to Texas to be sold at auction, but was sent back to Mustaine at his urgent request. A note documenting the incident is included from the famous auction house. The guitar was built with no pickups as Dave's signature Live Wire line was being developed. Those were attached for the NAMM showcase before being removed and permanently fitted with Mustaine's historically loved passive Duncan pickups with Emerson 500k pots.

This is a very exciting piece of guitar and heavy metal history. It's the price of a new 18k Rolex watch. Post Malone bought my other Dave Mustaine guitar on a shoping spree for GQ Magazine. He has a lot of great watches far more expensive than this guitar. Maybe he'll pick this instead of his next watch. I am excited to see where it ends up.

The guitar is triple signed by Dave amustaine on its headstock, on its body and on its Certificate of Authenticity. There are exclusive pictures and video of the guitar backstage at Wembley in London with Dave that will be made available to the new owner. It is in fantastic condition, as is often the case with items owned by Mustaine.

Worldwide shipping to any country. Will be professionally packed and shipped with UPS or FedEx. Hand delivery within Europe is available and preferred after payment clears. I am selling off my entire guitar collection, so follow me here and keep an eye out on upcoming listings. Many artist owned items from my time in the music industry.