The Ibanez Musician MC500 with ORIGINAL CASE - stands as the crown jewel of late-1970s Japanese luthiery, crafted at the legendary FujiGen factory as a high-end answer to custom boutique instruments from builders like Alembic and B.C. Rich. Built for maximum structural rigidity and endless sustain, this model features an intricate, multi-ply neck-through design comprised of rock maple and black walnut running seamlessly from the oversized headstock straight through to the bottom strap button, flanked by beautifully carved ash, maple, and mahogany body wings. To achieve its legendary "sustain monster" status, Ibanez recessed a massive, solid brass sustain block directly into the wood beneath the heavy gold-plated Gibraltar I bridge (needs to he replated) and its iconic "Cloud" tailpiece. (Needs a replate)

This monumental natural resonance is paired with a dark, premium ebony 24-fret fingerboard with abalone dot inlays and a half-bone, half-brass nut for pristine open-string clarity.Beyond its remarkable wood craftsmanship, the defining characteristic of the MC500 is its integrated studio-grade active preamp, known as the EQ-Tone System, which completely transformed the instrument into a sonic chameleon.

The guitar is driven by two high-output Super 88 Tri-Sound humbuckers, each wired to its own 3-position mini-toggle switch that allows players to instantly shift between standard humbucking, single-coil tap, or parallel modes.

When you flick on the small active preamp bypass switch, you engage a tactile control layout featuring two top-row metal knobs for Master Volume and Pre-amp Gain boost, alongside three bottom-row Sure Grip knobs dedicated to a highly responsive 3-band active EQ (Bass, Midrange, and Treble) with center-detent neutral stops. This extensive onboard circuitry allows musicians to carve out anything from bright, bell-like single-coil funk to thick, saturated humbucker growl, and then dial in precise frequency cuts or boosts to slice cleanly through a live mix or push a tube amplifier into organic overdrive directly from the face of the guitar. Because the MC500 was an incredibly expensive, top-tier instrument for its time, production numbers remained remarkably low—with only 164 units shipped in its initial 1978 run and just over 1,100 total completed before it morphed into the MC550 in late 1980.

Tuners have been replaced with Aria.