Randy Rhoads by Jackson
The Jackson Randy Rhoads is an electric guitar manufactured and sold by Jackson. It was originally commissioned by the late guitarist Randy Rhoads, guitarist for Ozzy Osbourne, who died in 1982.
Originally, this guitar was to be called The Original Sin. Rhoads's second Flying V, which was black with a silver pickguard and string-thru body bridge, was going to be called the Concorde. Randy re-designed these newer 'Concordes' or production models with a longer horn because he felt too many people were relating his white Pinstripe V to a Flying V; he wanted to produce a guitar that bore more resemblance to a shark's fin. His V's both had maple bodies with maple thru body necks. Also, the smaller amount of wood on the treble side of the strings could be shaped to give more treble to those strings. This guitar features Grover locking tuners and a pair of Seymour Duncan humbucking pickups, a TB-4 (bridge) and a SH-2 (neck). The SIN had a standard blocked vintage-style t remolo. The vibrato is of very high quality; and the pickups are designed to capture the treble more efficiently than a normal guitar.
It features a pair of humbucking pickups (not always the case, as seen on the Kevin Bond Signature model and new RR24 model), and often a Floyd Rose tremolo. The fingerboard has flattened frets, to ease the user's playing if playing fast. The guitar usually has 22 frets, but in certain series, it is featured as a 24 fret model for an extra pitch range. The headstock is typical Jackson and some series have a reversed headstock for a slight upcharge.
This model was Jackson Guitars' first model. It was, and still is, a very popular model that put the Jackson name on the map. When Rhoads commissioned his guitar from Charvel, company president Grover Jackson had his name put on the headstock of the custom model instead of Charvel. Grover originally produced two prototype Concordes that Randy received (the first white Concorde and the Black and Brass Concorde). Randy had ordered 4 in total but died before receiving the other two (another string-thru (accidentally sold at NAMM) and another black-and-brass Concorde (pictured at right) with a tremolo and reverse inlays (the first to have reverse inlays)). These other two Concorde's were held in an incomplete state waiting for Randy to give feedback about the tone and play of the prototypes before completing them. Tragically, Randy was killed before he could give Grover any feedback about the guitars.
