EVH Gear has rolled out a refresh of its Wolfgang Special line, offering the high-performance electric guitar with a baked maple neck – and the choice of an EVH compensated bridge and tailpiece or Floyd Rose vibrato.
If you’re thinking the latter option is the most Eddie Van Halen, well, of course you are right; it even comes with the D-Tuna for on-the-fly drop D tuning (handy for Van Halen classics such as Unchained but also for, well, Spoonman, Killing In The Name Of… et cetera).
But then all of these Wolfgang Specials are inextricably linked to the man who designed the, whose initials are on the headstock – these roasted maple necks are quartersawn and graphite reinforced for extra stability, and have the very same shape and profile as those approved by EVH when the model was developed.
These necks have also been given the satin urethane treatment so that they don’t gum up on you when you sweat, and they’re paired with a 12” to 16” compound radius baked maple fingerboard, with 22 jumbo frets to explore. Dot inlays count ‘em out.
Furthermore, for a mid-priced high-performance guitar, the specs are pretty neat. Compared to previous Wolfgang Special TOM, these have the fine-tuners on the tail-piece – a touch of BB King on an Eddie Van Halen guitar.
All models feature a pair of EVH Gear’s flagship electric guitar pickups, the direct-mounted Wolfgang Alnico II humbuckers.
As per the Great Man’s preferences, these humbuckers are hooked up to a three-position toggle switch, a 500K EVH Bourns volume pot, with a low-friction action for easy swells (e.g. for when playing Cathedral) and a high-friction 250K tone pot so you don’t accidentally roll off some treble in the heat of battle.
Both the fixed bridge and Floyd models share a lot of DNA. You’ve got the same neck, the same basswood body, with single-ply binding. They both have EVH-branded sealed die-casted tuners.
The Floyd models have solid-colour headstocks – matching on some finishes, contrasting on others, such as the black headstock on the Ivory model – while the Wolfgang Special TOM Baked Maple models have natural finish headstocks.
The contouring and ergonomic flourishes are the same, and they’re prices include an EVH Striped Series gig bag. EVH Gear is offering the Wolfgang Special Baked Maple in Smoked Mesquite, Caution Yellow, Ivory, Stealth Black and Gloss Black, with chrome hardware on the Smoked Mesquite and Ivory models, black on the rest.
These are priced £1,299/$1,499.
The Wolfgang Special Baked Maple is offered in Gloss Black and Husk White with black hardware, and Kandy Green with Chrome Hardware – and if you’re looking for a really upscale looking option then the Oxblood version ships with with gold hardware and matching ‘Speed’ knobs. These will set you back £1,099/$1,399.
In other EVH Gear news, the brand has also expanded its Hypersonic series of digital modelling amps with a 2x12 version of the 5150III 6L6 combo amp. Again, it’s a super-lightweight option – 25.5kg is nothing for a 2x12.
No super heavy transformers and plate of tubes here. And yet you get that same face-ripping high-gain performance. Metal amps don't get much better, or more convenient.
Check it out in action above, and find out more over at EVH Gear. This is priced £1,399/$1,699.
