Lauren | soldguitars

(SOLD)

Jaden Rose Custom Shop Wenge

(ex. Jaden Rose)

"Lauren"

Let's get a few things straight. [1] Jaden Rose seems like a lovely bloke; humble, polite and approachable, but I don't really care about that. [2] He builds exquisite guitars (... he built 'leaf' above, which is fantastic). I DO care about that. The guy must have been BORN with sawdust behind his ears. He spent his life making fine furniture, before turning to guitars ... he's a gigging musician too, and a rather tasty player, which MUST be a bonus when you build guitars for a living.

I started off wanting one of his 'S2' (Series 2) guitars. Those are handmade in England, but are made on a production-line basis, with batches of guitars being worked on at the same time. The idea makes sense ... making 20 necks, then 20 bodies, then 20 wiring looms is a far more efficient way of doing things than simply getting to work and building a guitar. They're lovely guitars. So, I got together some cash with a view to buying one, but then figured "in for a penny, in for a pound". SO, I looked into the prospect of snagging one of his 'OS' (Original Series) guitars. They are made, one at a time, lovingly, by Jaden himself using top-notch materials. He offers a choice of ingredients, so that they're customisable too. They're also rather expensive, so I thought about it for a LONG time. While I was thinking about it, THIS popped up for sale. I didn't know much about it at the time, but the "Jaden Rose Custom" transfer on the back of the headstock distinguishes this from an 'OS' guitar, meaning that this is from Jaden's Custom Shop. Ask for what you want, and you get it. That's how it would NORMALLY work, anyway.

I noticed that this guitar (THIS guitar, not one like it) is one of those featured on Jaden's website (see below), so I thought I'd check out its history. Jaden reckons that this wasn't a "normal" Custom Shop guitar, as he specced it and built it as HIS personal guitar. He gigged it for a while until a customer threw enough money at him to convince him to sell it. Would he have taken extra-special care over this one, knowing that he was going to own and use it? Or would he have thrown it together from left-overs that he swept up from the shop floor?! I rather suspect that it was the former. The skinny, pointy body is a sandwich of a mahogany back and a wenge top (I LOVE wenge, which I'm told is pronounced "WenGay"). The horns are sculpted which makes this look almost reptilian ... kinda like a Klingon or something. Whatever ... it's beautiful, although a buddy of mine referred to it as "evil-looking". The neck is a 5 piece affair, made from wenge and purple heart (similar to "Siebenhund", although that has strips of bubinga too), with a thick ebony board, stainless steel frets and abalone dots. The bridge and tuners are both by Hipshot, and the pups are cool covered DiMarzios (a Tone Zone at the bridge and Air Norton at the neck) with a DiMarzio 'Petrucci' switch, which gives an out of phase split coil setting in the middle position. This SOUNDS entirely awesome. The Air Norton especially ... what a tone. It also feels astonishing. Light and sculpted, with a reasonably chubby neck and beautiful fretwork, as usual from Jaden. The stainless frets are also a great idea ... tough, smooth and slinky.

By the way, the name Lauren comes from the Latin name for wenge ... Millettia Laurenti.