PRS SE Torero – NAMM 2010 PRS news
By MNJ
| Posted in Music Technology
The PRS SE Torero is the latest model in the popular PRS SE range, and as visitors to NAMM 2010 are finding out today, it has a range of features never seen before on a PRS production guitar.
The Toreo is aimed squarely at the metal and shredding fraternity and has all the features required for lovers of the locking trem and scooped mids to rock out.
Unusually for PRS, the Torero is a 3-piece through neck construction and a 25 1/2″ scale length. A bound maple top and flamed maple veneer sit atop a mahogany body, while the guitar also features a wide thin neck carve with a scooped heel to allow total access to the top of the fretboard. To allow super-bends the Torero sports jumbo frets and a wide, bound ebony fingerboard.
True to form, the Torero includes an original chrome Floyd Rose locking system for pull ups, dive bombing and general trem related antics. A single master volume and tone with a three way blade switch control the active EMG 81 and 85 pickup combination, and there’s a battery compartment on the back. The Torero includes a PRS gigbag.
Sticking with the genre, there are three artist models also being launched today in California. First up is the PRS SE Mikael Akerfeldt. Mikael is the guitarist with Swedish metal band Opeth. The guitar features a singlecut mahogany body with a maple top and flamed maple veneer, maple neck with an ebony fretboard and flamed maple headstock veneer. It also has 24 jumbo frets, original PRS bird inlays, PRS trem and gold hardware. Pickups are HFS and vintage bass. It will be available in a tortoishell finish and with the Opeth ‘O’ logo on the body.
Next in line is the PRS SE Nick Catanese. Nick is the ‘other’ guitarist in Zakk Wylde’s Black Label Society, ’nuff said. The guitar is a striking black and red affair featuring an extra thick singlecut mahogany body, with a mahogany neck and ebony fingerboard. There are 22 jumbo frets and no inlay. There’s no trem here, just a Tonepros stoptail bridge. Pickups are metal favourites EMG 81 and 85, mounted in red pickup rings. Oddly for a PRS, the pickup selector is on the upper bout. The Nick Catanese is available in a gloss black with a red binding on the body, neck and headstock. There is an ‘Evil Twin’ logo on the body behind the bridge.
Last up is the PRS Paul Allender model. Paul is guitarist with purveyors of all that is doomed, Cradle of Filth. His guitar is a double cutaway with mahogany body topped with a flamed maple veneer. The body features an arm carve and rounded edges and the neck is maple with an ebony board. There are 24 jumbo frets and ‘bats in flight’ inlays, a standard PRS trem and nickel hardware. Pickups are EMG 89 and 81-TW with coil tapping. The push-pull volume taps the neck pickup and the push-pull tone taps the bridge. The Allender is available in Emerald Green Burst or Red Burst.
Tags: prs mikael akerfeldt, PRS NAMM 2010, prs nick catanese, prs paul allender, PRS Teroro