Guitar Rig 5 Presets Zakk Wylde Guitars Bullseye
Zakk Wylde’s Guitar Rig Source: guitargeek.com. This website uses cookies to improve your experience. We'll assume you're ok with this, but you can opt-out if you wish.
Zakk Wylde is best known as the former guitarist for Ozzy Osbourne, founder of the heavy metal band Black Label Society, and as a songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and occasional actor. He was also the lead guitarist and vocalist in Pride & Glory, who released one self-titled album in 1994 before disbanding. As a solo artist he released one album called Book of Shadows in 1996.
As for the guitars, Zakk is mostly known for his Les Paul Customs with the bullseye finish. He mostly prefers playing on a shaved maple neck with ebony fretboard, using Dunlop 6000 wire. Almost all of this guitar are loaded with EMG 81/85 humbuckers, and feature some kind of a custom paintjob. Zakk even designed a couple of guitars himself, including the Gibson/Epiphone ZV and Graveyard Disciple model. More recently he started his own company called Wylde Audio, and plans on making and eventually using those instruments himself.
Zakk Wylde’s Electric Guitars:
1980s Gibson SG Firebrand Deluxe
| This is the first Gibson guitar that Zakk ever bought, and the one he used for practicing and learning when he was around 15 years old. The guitar was finished in pelham blue, and featured smaller black pickguard, and most likely a pair of Velvet Brick humbuckers (Bill Lawrence designed). Zakk ended up selling the guitar couple of years later, because he wanted to buy a Les Paul Custom. |
1980s Gibson Les Paul Goldtop
| Zakk played this guitar in Zyris circa 1985, as seen in this video Zakk Wylde Guitar Solo Zyris. We couldn’t find anything specific about this guitar, so if you happen to know anything please send us a message using the form below this article. |
1981 Gibson Les Paul Custom “The Grail”
| Zakk bought this guitar upon joining Ozzy Osbourne band in 1987. He traded this guitar with Scott Quinn, who in exchange got a double neck Gibson SG. When Zakk received the guitar, it was equipped with standard humbuckers, but Zakk very soon replaced them with EMG 81/85 set – after trying them out on one of his student’s guitar. Originally the guitar was finished in blonde/cream color (still visible on the sides and the back of the body). but Zakk felt this was Randy Rhoads’ signature thing, and he wanted something different – so he decided to send the guitar to a guitar luthier for a paintjob. The initial idea was to paint the Hitchcock Vertigo design on it, but the guitar came back with the bull’s-eye decals. Zakk ended up liking it, and he decided to just stuck with it. Zakk lost his 81′ Les Paul at one point in the 90s, as it supposedly fell of a truck that was transporting band’s equipment. The guitar randomly appeared at a local pawnshop in Texas couple of years later, and guy named Jerry Weisinger ended up buying it for $250 – initially thinking it was a retail Gibson Zakk Wylde Les Paul Custom. He read somewhere that Zakk lost his original 81′ Custom, so he took out the pickups out of the guitar he just purchased, and saw “Z.W.” underneath them. After comparing the serial number against the “The Grail”s which was available on Zakk website, it became clear that he owns Zakk’s original guitar. Luckily for Zakk, he was contacted by Jerry and he received his guitar back. As for specs, as already mentioned the guitar was equipped with EMG pickups, and it has a shaved maple neck with ebony fretboard. |
1980s Gibson Les Paul Standard “Shattered Glass”
| This is one of the guitars Zakk had prior to joining Ozzy Osbourne. It is supposedly the very same guitar he took with him on the audition for the spot in the band. It was originally finished in tobacco sunburst, but Zakk wanted something original so he had it custom-painted by a guitar luthier to feature shattered glass design. The guitar is mostly known for it’s appearance on the early photo sessions of the Ozzy Osbourne band in 1987, done by Mark Weiss. This guitar went through countless modifications. At one point it had pictures of all of Zakk’s musical heroes and bands glued to the body, and some time later it was completely stripped down to bare wood. Nowadays the guitar is known as the “Pope Page Dragon” – featuring finish identical to one on Jimmy Page’s original Telecaster. |
1989 Gibson Les Paul Custom “The Rebel”
This guitar originally started as a black Les Paul Custom, but inspired by Allman Brothers Band and Lynyrd Skynyrd Zakk decided to decorate the body with the Rebel flag design. Very soon though, he discovered that Bret Michaels from Poison already had that very same design on his guitar. Since he wanted for his guitar to be unique, one day while drinking beer at his house Zakk started sanding down the finish and began nailing bottle caps on the body – which eventually became the guitar’s trademark.
Ozzy Osbourne himself was not a fan of southern rock, so one day as he was poking Zakk about his musical preferences Zakk realized that his guitar was nowhere to be seen. He went outside and saw one of the guys with the guitar wrapped in some paper, trying to set it on fire. Seconds later, the huge flame caught the guitar as Zakk was trying to put the fire out. Luckily for him, the fire mostly caught just the paper, and the Les Paul itself wasn’t damaged too much. Zakk Les Paul was damaged once again in an accident caused by his little daughter, who bumped into one of Zakk guitars as they were standing next to each other, causing them to fall like dominos. The Rebel ended up with a broken headstock, but it was quickly repaired by Gibson luthiers. |
1957 Gibson Les Paul Junior
| Zakk received this guitar from Ozzy in the early 80s, as a present for his birthday (most likely his 21st). It’s his main go-to guitar for clean stuff in the studio, but he never uses it live. Zakk’s Les Paul Junior was made in 1957, and it features a single-cutout body shape with sunburst finish, and a single P-90 pickups in the bridge position. |
1980s Gibson Les Paul Standard “Red Bullseye”
| Zakk started using this guitar as early as 1989/1990. By the looks of the guitar on the cover of the June 1990 issue of Guitar World magazine, it is a Les Paul Standard with natural finish, featuring red bulls-eye design painted over the original finish, and of course two EMG pickups. Since then, the guitar was modified to look more like a Custom – mainly by changing the white pickup rings with black ones, and replacing the control knobs. |
The Glory
| This guitar was custom made by guitar luther Andy Beech, who at the time worked as his guitar tech (same person made that weird shaped guitar that Zakk used in the ‘Rock Star’ movie). It features flame maple top on one piece mahogany chambered body, mahogany neck with ebony fretboard, and EMG 85/81 humbucker set. Supposedly, the cutout was added by Zakk himself, since the original design didn’t allow him to reach the higher frets. Zakk played this guitar during the 1992 “Live and Loud” tour. |
Gibson Les Paul Custom “Mirror”
| This guitar started appearing towards the late 90s. The guitar is obviously a black Les Paul Custom wrapped in some mylar film to make the mirror effect on the circles, with two EMG humbuckers instead of the stock pickups. |
1978 Gibson Les Paul Custom “Camo”
| Another in the line of Custom Les Pauls with the bullseye design – this one with camo pattern. The guitar is a rather rare model with maple neck and white inlays. Later on, both Gibson and Epiphone produced a ZW signature model based on this guitar. |
Gibson Les Paul Custom Pelham Blue
| This is one of Zakk’s more recent guitars. It was custom built for him, and features pelham blue finish – identical to one on his first SG guitar – and of course styling the bullseye design. In reality, there are two identical Les Paul pelham blue guitars – one of which was stolen in 2014 but luckily recovered just a couple of days later. |
Gibson Les Paul Custom “Buzzsaw”
| Again one of the more recent guitars. This one features a slightly different design when compared to the usual bullseye. Beside that, the guitar shares the specs with the other guitars – maple neck with ebony fretboard and two EMG pickups. Zakk mostly plays the orange/black Gibson models, although there are couple of different color combos available, as well as a cheaper Epiphone version which Zakk endorsed a while ago. |
Gibson Flying V
| This is just basically a black Gibson Flying V with bullseye design, loaded with two EMG pickups and Floyd Rose tremolo. His first Flying V was probably a vintage guitar, but nowadays he mostly uses the signature model from Gibson. |
Gibson EDS-1275
| Zakk has at least two of these, one white with the stock pickups, and other originally blank now with a mirror front plate and EMG pickups. More recently, he also acquired a black and white bullseye EDF-1275. |
Gibson/Epiphone ZV
| This guitar was introduced in the mid 2000s as the first Zakk Wylde designed guitar. The top portion of the body was inspired by the Gibson SG model, while the bottom is shaped like a Flying V. The body was made of mahogany, while the neck is maple with rosewood fretboard. The rest of the specs are identical to Zakk’s Les Paul Customs. Gibson produced only a limited number of this guitar, while Epiphone still makes and sells a somewhat cheaper version of the ZV. |
Epiphone Graveyard Disciple
| Zakk designed this guitar with the help of Epiphone. It was inspired by some older models, like the Bo Diddley Gretsch. The body was designed to look like a coffin, and it’s made of one-piece mahogany, with the neck being maple with ebony fretboard. The guitar is also equipped with two EMG pickups, and the Floyd Rose tremolo system. |
Karl Sandoval V
| This is one of Zakk’s favorite on-stage guitars. It is fitted with EMG instead of the stock DiMarzio pickups, and it has a polka dot paint-job. He mostly plays it as a homage to late Randy Roads, Ozzy Osbourne’s guitarist who used to play the same model. Zakk has few of these, perhaps the best known one has black paint-job with white dots, which he used in the music video for “Suicide Messiah”. |
Dean Razorback
| Guitar given to him by Dimebag Darrel, shortly before his death. Zakk only used it once on stage to play “In This River,” to pay a personal tribute to Dimebag. |
Zakk Wylde’s Acoustic Guitars:
Gibson Chet Atkins SST
| Used in the early days with Ozzy, most notably on “Mama I’m Coming Home”. Based on some of photos on Zakk’s social pages, he still has the guitar, and takes very special care of it. |
Gibson Dove
| Only instance of Zakk playing this guitar is a video recorded in 1994, during Pride & Glory UK tour (Zakk Wylde Lovin Woman – acoustic). |
Alvarez 12 string
| Seen mostly around the time Zakk worked on his solo album in 1996, which was mostly acoustic. It is safe to believe that he used the guitar on some of the songs on the album, like “As Dead as Yesterday” and “Way Beyond Empty”. |
Loucin Guitars Zakk Wylde “Fiddle of Doom”
| This is one of the more recent acoustic guitars. It was custom-built for him the feature a natural bulls-eye and buzz-saw designs, and a EMG AT125U Piezo pickup. |
Epiphone Masterbilt EF-500RCCE
| Also one of his more recent guitars. Zakk’s personal guitar is a custom version of the Epiphone EF-500RCCE model, which in it’s stock condition features cedar wood top with rosewood back and sides, and Shadow NanoMag/Flex pickups. Zakk was seen playing one version of the guitar with The Les Paul Trio in 2013, and it featured bulls-eye finish and a EMG ACS pickup. Another version of the guitar can be seen on a video posted on EMG’s YouTube channel. This one featured darkened natural finish with a Black Label Society logo featured on the front of the body. |
Zakk Wylde’s Guitar Amps:
– Marshall JCM 800 4210 Combo Amp
Used on the first Ozzy Osbourne album.
– Metaltronix M1000
Although some articles that we’ve read during our research indicate otherwise, Zakk said that he never used this amp in the studio (source). He supposedly only used the Metaltronix preamps on the tour that followed the release of the first album (1988/89).
– Marshall JCM 800
In the more recent years, before switching to his own brand of amps, Zakk mainly used Marshalls. The company even made him his own signature model which is basically a beefed-up version pf the JCM800 2203. His cabinets are usually stacked up with 200W EV speakers.
– Wylde Audio Amp
In 2015 Zakk announced that his working on his own brand of audio equipment, including a brand new amp.
Zakk Wylde’s Effects:
Old pedalboard:
– Boss CE-1 Chorus
– Boss SD-1 Super Overdrive
– Dunlop Rotovibe Expression Pedal
– Dunlop JH1D Jimi Hendrix Wah
Stage pedalboard (nowadays):
– MXR M169 Carbon Copy Analog Delay
– MXR ZW-44 Zakk Wylde Overdrive (old version; check the new one here)
– MXR Eddie Van Halen Phase 90 Pedal
– Dunlop Rotovibe Expression Pedal
– Dunlop ZW-45 Zakk Wylde Signature Wah
Backstage pedals:
– Dunlop DC Brick Power Supply
– Jim Dunlop ZW38 MXR Black Label Chorus
– MXR Eddie Van Halen Phase 90 Pedal
– Jim Dunlop EVH117 MXR Evh Flanger (Used on Crazy Horse.)
Zakk Wylde’s Guitar Strings:
Zakk is using signature Jim Dunlop strings. .011 to .070 on down-tuned guitars and .010 to .060 on standard tuned guitars.
Zakk Wylde’s Guitar Picks:
– Dunlop Tortex Pitch Black 1.14mm picks
Adam Jones, guitarist for the band Tool, is arguably one of the most influential guitarist to emerge from the 1990’s. Compiling an accurate guide to the gear used by Adam Jones is tricky business, as Tool as a whole are known for spreading misinformation about themselves and their music, which extends to gear.
Adam Jones is famous for his preference for Gibson Silverburst Les Paul Customs. The original Gibson Silverburst Les Paul Custom was manufactured between 1978-1985 however was famously discontinued by Gibson due to complaints about the finish flaking and altering the tone of the guitar. This tone alteration is what Jones has said he finds appealing about the Silverburst Les Paul Custom.
Popular opinion seems to be that Jones fits all his Gibson Silverburst Les Paul Customs with a Seymour Duncan SH-4 JB in the bridge and Seymour Duncan Jazz in the neck. I’d also seen references to him having used Seymour Duncan Trembucker’s occasionally as well but haven’t found a reliable source for that.
In a September 2019 interview with Guitar World on release of the Fear Inoculum Jones revealed that popular opinion may well have been wrong when it came to his pickup of choice.
“I still use just the original Seymour Duncan Super Distortion pickups. I buy those up whenever I see an old one from the ’90s.”
Guitar World, September 2019Jones also uses a Natural finish Gibson Les Paul on for the tracks “Prison Sex” (tuned BADGBE) and “Parabol/Parabola” (tuned BEDGBE).
Adam Jones runs multiple amplifiers at the same time to build his guitar tone. Two amplifiers that have consistently remained in his setup since 1994 are the 1976 Marshall Super Bass and Diezel VH4 “Blueface” (manufactured between 1994-1997). The Marshall Super Bass is a non-master volume amp that has both of its channels wired together.
Jones has also used a Mesa-Boogie Dual Rectifier (2 channel version) live, particularly in the 1990’s, although it would appear that this head has been replaced with a newer issue Diezel VH4.
When playing live, Jones does not switch channels on the VH4, leaving them set on channel 3.
In more recent times Jones has experiment with a variety of amplifiers in the studio. A Sunn Beta Lead was said to have been used during the recording of Lateralus.
In an interview with MixOnline.com, Joe Barresi, who was an engineer on the recording of 10,000 Days gave a detailed explanation of the gear Adam Jones used in the studio.
“Adam mainly runs three amps: He has a Marshall that he loves, a Diezel and then he was using a Mesa Boogie at one point. I brought in a Bogner Uberschall head and a Rivera Knucklehead Reverb, and several other things. Then we just experimented with combinations of heads and cabinets until it worked for the song. Most of the 4×12s were Mesa Boogie cabinets, which are superior for their low end, except for the Marshall head, which went through a Marshall cabinet, and the Rivera went through a Rivera cabinet. I usually used stock miking. For me, that’s a Shure SM57 and a Sennheiser 421 on every cabinet. The third mic could be anything that I felt the sound needed more of.” The signal chain for tracking guitar was a bit complex. “Adam would play into whatever pedals he needed,” Barresi says. “That signal then went into a Systematic Systems Splitter. Then it would go to between three and five heads. The signal from the heads went to their own individual cabinets. Each cabinet had two or three microphones on it. Then all the microphones came back to the console, and they were blended down as separated for each amp. The Diezel amp went to its own track. The Marshall amp went to its own track. The third track was a blend of the Bogner and the Rivera, or whatever I liked for the song. And that would be one take — three tracks of guitar.”
Source: MixOnline.comWhilst Jones is on record saying, in a 1994 Guitar School interview, that he strongly disliked using effects pedals. In the bands early days he used a Boss Delay pedal and an equalizer in his live setup, later adding a Crybaby Wah and a Ibanez Flanger. The wah is thought to be a Dunlop CryBaby BB-535 or 535Q.
With the recording of Lateralus Jones’ setup began to feature more effects, and he has been quoted as saying that he uses an Access Virus B pedal hooked up to a Moog Taurus bass synth pedal for some tracks, in particular the introductions on “Reflection” and “The Grudge”.
In an April 2006 interview with Guitar World magazine, Jones stated that he used the Gig-FX Chopper Effects Pedal. He also spoke of how a number of his effects had been modified.
For the track “Jambi” from 10,000 Days he stated that he used a Foxx Tone Machine Reissue and a Heil talk box.
A picture of his pedal board that surfaced early 2008 (as seen below), includes an Boss BF-2 Flanger, Boss DD-3 Digital Delay, Ernie Ball Volume pedal, MXR M-133 Micro Amplifier, Line 6 DL-4 Delay Modeller and StroboStomp Virtual Strobe Tuner, Boss- PSM5 Power supply/Master switch (x 2), DOD FX40B EQ.
From roughly 2009 onwards his pedal board has remained relatively stable. In the images below, to the left is an Access Virus Synth with Roland PK-5 pedals. On the main board bottom left to right:
- DOD FX40B EQ
- Boss BF-2 Flanger
- Boss DD-3 Digital Delay
- Dunlop CryBaby BB-535
- Ernie Ball Volume pedal
- MXR M-133 Micro Amplifier
- Boss PSM5 Power supply/Master switch (x 2)
- StroboStomp Virtual Strobe Tuner
Reading buddy software coupon code. Along the top there is a Heil Talkbox, Peterson Stobe Stomp and Korg Rack Tuner.
In a 2010 interview with DunlopTV Tool’s guitar tech Chris Leahey walked through Adam Jones’ setup. The pictures below are still from the video, the quality is not great but you can make out the settings on the Flanger and the Digital Delay.
Whilst the core of his pedal board has consisted of Delay, Flanger and Wah, Adam Jones has been seen experimenting with a variety of other effects as well (as seen in the image below).
Other pedals Adam Jones is rumoured to have used, and not previously mentioned above include:
- Snarling Dog Blues Bawls
- Snarling Dog Mold Spore
- Voodoo-Lab Tremolo
- Dunlop Heil Talk Box
- Boss SYB-3 Bass Synth
- Access Virus Classic (Redtop)
- Gig-Fx Chopper
- Boss CE5 Chorus Ensemble
- Buzz Box Signature Buzz Melvin Distortion
In a September 1993 with Guitar Player, Jones was quoted as saying that he uses an Epilady TRIO (a women’s electric hair remover) in place of an E-Bow. “An Epilady is even better than an E-Bow,” he said. “It makes great sounds when you push it against the pickups.”
The video below is the DunlopTV interview with Tool’s guitar tech referenced earlier.
Last updated: Jan 14, 2020 @ 9:53 pm