The ESP Guitar Company

We invited Caleb Shomo, the founder, vocalist, and multi-instrumentalist of rock band Beartooth, to drop by the ESP Showroom in Los Angeles to get an early look at the LTD Deluxe Viper-1000 Vintage Black, part of our "New for 2024" collection. The Viper-1000 already has a diabolical look with its asymmetrical double horns, and with the addition of the Vintage Black treatment, with a matte black finish and aged-look binding on the neck and headstock, this guitar just got a whole lot meaner. Built at 24.75” scale with set-thru construction that allows smooth access to the highest frets, the Viper-1000 Vintage Black pairs a mahogany body with a three-piece thin u-shaped maple neck. Its Macassar ebony fingerboard has pearloid ESP flag inlays and 22 extra-jumbo stainless steel frets, maximizing the sweet spot for both the neck and bridge pickups to offer their ideal tones. Its premium gold hardware includes LTD locking tuners and a TonePros TOM bridge and tailpiece. The Viper-1000 includes a set of Fishman Fluence Modern Humbucker active pickups (ceramic in the bridge and alnico in the neck), with push-pull control to select voicings and gold covers to match this guitar’s noteworthy aesthetics. Each pickup offers two voices. With the ceramic bridge pickup, Voice 1 is the ultimate high-output ceramic humbucker bridge pickup tone… crisp, searing crunch, tight bass with no mud, and a growl. Voice 2 delivers modern passive attack performance that has superbly organic distortion characteristics with outstanding dynamics and response. The alnico neck pickup’s Voice 1 is Fishman’s modern active high-output tone, offering the ideal active alnico sound: full, round, and boosted, but with unprecedented articulation and dynamics. Voice 2 gives you the crisp, clean and fluid neck humbucker tone you’ve always wanted.