PRS Introduces the Robben Ford Limited Edition Signature, Lower-Wattage HDRX Amp, and Two New Acoustics

Robben Ford Limited Edition McCarty
On the heels of their successful launch into the world of stompboxes, PRS Guitars has just released several additional new products including an amp, two acoustics, and the highly-anticipated Robben Ford signature model electric guitar.
PRS Robben Ford Limited Edition McCarty Model
The PRS Robben Ford Limited Edition McCarty was first teased by Ford back in the summer of 2021. Limited to 200 pieces worldwide for 2022, this limited edition has been meticulously specād to deliver the highest level of playability and loud, clear, soulful tone. As an added detail, Paul Reed Smith has hand-signed the front of each headstock and Robben Ford has autographed the backplate of each instrument.
"As a guitarist, everything is important. All the details have an impact. The willingness of Paul and everyone at PRS to dig deep and refine based on my feedback as an artist has been priceless.ā ā Robben Ford
This limited edition is based on the PRS McCarty model and features a thicker mahogany back, a bound, 22-fret, 25ā scale length Pattern mahogany neck, and African Blackwood fretboard. The guitar is anchored by a Vintage-Style tuners and a PRS Stoptail bridge with brass inserts, both of which add to the guitarās liveliness and tone ā as do its thin, hard nitro finish and bone nut. Perhaps most noteworthy on this model are the Robben Ford signature pickups and the modified control layout. Personally dialed-in by Ford and Smith throughout the R&D process, these pickups are tuned to deliver loud, clear, and full tone across the spectrum. Never too dark or overpowering, these pickups are paired with a single volume and tone control, 3-way toggle pickup selector, and a single mini-toggle switch that splits both pickups into single coils.
āWorking on this guitar with Robben has been such an enjoyable experience. He pushed us hard to get every detail just right, and in the end, I think we have made an exceptional guitar that feels and sounds as good or better than many of the vintage instruments we hold as our teachers,ā said Paul Reed Smith.
The Robben Ford Limited Edition McCarty | PRS Guitars
PRS HDRX 20 and 1x12 Cabinet
PRS HDRX 20 and 1x12 Cabinet
The PRS HDRX 20 amp sounds like an old vintage plexi. PRS has painstakingly recreated the sound of the old transformers and it makes quite a difference in the musical smoothness of the sound.ā ā Eric Johnson
PRS launched the HDRX amp family in the summer of 2021 with both 100- and 50-watt heads. The PRS HDRX 20 features PRSās newly documented āAuthentic Hendrixā Touring Circuit. This circuit is heavily inspired by one of Hendrixās personal amps, purportedly used at Woodstock, which Paul Reed Smith and PRS Amp Designer Doug Sewell were able to study in 2018.
Designed to push the high-end so it is very clear, but not so much that itās harsh, the PRS HDRX shines without glaring and allows for thick yet articulate aggression that can be backed off for smooth, sweet tones. In this lower-wattage package, the HDRX 20 breaks up beautifully at more usable volumes. The addition of a Master Volume control on the HDRX 20, a new feature for HDRX amps, is another modern convenience. Players can use the Master Volume to control the power amp section of the HDRX, making it more user friendly for players who do not want to add a volume attenuator to their setup. The PRS HDRX 20 also features a 3-band TMB tone stack, 2-way bright switch, high-mid gain switch, and presence controls and is designed with internally bridged channels with individual treble and bass volume controls, eliminating the need for a jumper cable (historically used on the outside of the amp).
The HDRX 20 | Demo | PRS Guitars
PRS SE A20E and PRS SE P50E
PRS SE A20E
We are always looking for ways to expand the sounds we are offering. Sometimes that is revolutionary, sometimes evolutionary. The A20E brings all-mahogany focused midrange and warmth to our most-popular body shape, the Angelus Cutaway. The P50E was actually the first parlor instrument we designed and is now bringing a different sonic presence and some added style to PRS parlor guitars.ā ā Jack Higginbotham, PRS Guitars Chief Operating Officer
The PRS SE A20E Angelus Cutaway body shape delivers comfort and playability and is well-suited for picking and fingerstyle playing. The all-mahogany body gives the PRS SE A20E an organic, warm voice. The PRS SE P50E is a parlor-sized acoustic featuring a solid spruce top and figured maple back and sides, bringing a sophisticated new aesthetic to the popular parlor platform. This body size offers bold projection with more focused tone, and the maple back and sides provide unexpected warmth and tonal transparency.
PRS SE P50E
Both new acoustics feature PRSās distinct bracing pattern, which is modeled after a speaker cabinet and creates a single-diaphragm instrument. PRS hybrid āXā/Classical top bracing allows the top to freely vibrate and project, while the back and sides are more heavily braced to ālock them downā and encourage the tone of the guitar to push through the top. All PRS SE Series acoustics also feature the PRS-Voiced Fishman Sonitone Pickup system, which allows the natural sound of the instrument to come through. This electronics system features an undersaddle pickup and soundhole mounted preamp with easy-to-access volume and tone controls. Additional high-quality features include solid tops, ebony fretboards and bridges, bone nuts and saddles, as well as PRS trademark bird inlays and headstock design. Both acoustics ship with high-quality gig bags included.
The SE A20E | Demo | PRS Guitars
For more information, please visit prsguitars.com.
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- PRS HX 50 Review - Premier Guitar āŗ
The country virtuoso closes out this season of Wong Notes with a fascinating, career-spanning interview.
Weāve saved one of the best for last: Brad Paisley.The celebrated shredder and seasoned fisherman joins host Cory Wong for one of this seasonās most interesting episodes. Paisley talks his earliest guitar-playing influences, which came from his grandfatherās love of country music, and his first days in Nashvilleāas a student at Belmont University, studying the music industry.
The behind-the-curtain knowledge he picked up at Belmont made him a good match for industry suits trying to force bad contracts on him.
Wong and Paisley swap notes on fishing and a mutual love of PhishāPaisley envies the jam-band scene, which he thinks has more leeway in live contexts than country. And with a new signature FenderĀ Telecaster hitting the market in a rare blue paisley finish, Paisley discusses his iconic namesake patternāwhich some might describe as āhippie pukeāāand its surprising origin with Elvisā guitarist James Burton.
Plus, hear how Paisley assembled his rig over the years, the state of shredding on mainstream radio, when it might be good to hallucinogenic drugs in a set, and the only negative thing about country-music audiences.
Tom Bedell in the Relic Music acoustic room, holding a custom Seed to Song Parlor with a stunning ocean sinker redwood top and milagro Brazilian rosewood back and sides.
As head of Breedlove and Bedell Guitars, heās championed sustainability and environmental causesāand he wants to tell you about it.
As the owner of the Breedlove and Bedell guitar companies, Tom Bedell has been a passionate advocate for sustainable practices in acoustic guitar manufacturing. Listening to him talk, itās clear that the preservation of the Earthās forests are just as important to Bedell as the sound of his guitars. Youāll know just how big of a statement that is if youāve ever had the opportunity to spend time with one of his excellently crafted high-end acoustics, which are among the finest youāll find. Over the course of his career, Bedell has championed the use of alternative tonewoods and traveled the world to get a firsthand look at his wood sources and their harvesting practices. When you buy a Bedell, you can rest assured that no clear-cut woods were used.
A born storyteller, Bedell doesnāt keep his passion to himself. On Friday, May 12, at New Jersey boutique guitar outpost Relic Music, Bedell shared some of the stories heās collected during his life and travels as part of a three-city clinic trip. At Relicāand stops at Crossroads Guitar and Art in Gilbertsville, Pennsylvania, and Chuck Levinās Washington Music Center in Wheaton, Marylandāhe discussed his guitars and what makes them so special, why sustainability is such an important cause, and how heās putting it into practice.
Before his talk, we sat in Relicās cozy, plush acoustic room, surrounded by a host of high-end instruments. We took a look at a few of the storeās house-specād Bedell parlors while we chatted.
āThe story of this guitar is the story of the world,ā Bedell explained to me, holding a Seed to Song Parlor. He painted a picture of a milagro tree growing on a hillside in northeastern Brazil some 500 years ago, deprived of water and growing in stressful conditions during its early life. That tree was eventually harvested, and in the 1950s, it was shipped to Spain by a company that specialized in church ornaments. They recognized this unique specimen and set it aside until it was imported to the U.S. and reached Oregon. Now, it makes the back and sides of this unique guitar.
A Bedell Fireside Parlor with a buckskin redwood top and cocobolo back and sides.
As for the ocean sinker redwood top, āIām gonna make up the story,ā Bedell said, as he approximated the life cycle of the tree, which floated in the ocean, soaking up minerals for years and years, and washed ashore on northern Oregonās Manzanita Beach. The two woods were paired and built into a small run of exquisitely outfitted guitars using the Bedell/Breedlove Sound Optimization processāin which the building team fine-tunes each instrumentās voice by hand-shaping individual braces to target resonant frequencies using acoustic analysisāand Bedell and his team fell in love.
Playing it while we spoke, I was smitten by this guitarās warm, responsive tone and even articulation and attack across the fretboard; it strikes a perfect tonal balance between a tight low-end and bright top, with a wide dynamic range that made it sympathetic to anything I offered. And as I swapped guitars, whether picking up a Fireside Parlor with a buckskin redwood top and cocobolo back and sides or one with an Adirondack spruce top and Brazilian rosewood back and sides, the character and the elements of each instrument changed, but that perfect balance remained. Each of these acousticsāand of any Bedell Iāve had the pleasure to playādelivers their own experiential thumbprint.
Rosette and inlay detail on an Adirondack spruce top.
Ultimately, thatās what brought Bedell out to the East Coast on this short tour. āWe have a totally different philosophy about how we approach guitar-building,ā Bedell effused. āThere are a lot of individuals who build maybe 12 guitars a year, who do some of the things that we do, but thereās nobody on a production level.ā And he wants to spread that gospel.
āWe want to reach people who really want something special,ā he continued, pointing out that for the Bedell line, the company specifically wants to work with shops like Relic and the other stores heās visited, āwho have a clientele that says I want the best guitar I can possibly have, and they carry enough variety that we can give them that.ā
A Fireside Parlor with a Western red cedar top and Brazilian rosewood back and sides.
A beautifully realized mashup of two iconic guitars.
Reader: Ward Powell
Hometown: Ontario, Canada
Guitar: ES-339 Junior
Iāve always liked unusual guitars. I think it started when I got my first guitar way back in 1976. I bought a '73 Telecaster Deluxe for $200 with money I saved from delivering newspapers.
I really got serious about playing in 1978, the same year the first Van Halen album was released. Eddie Van Halen was a huge influence on me, including how he built and modded guitars. Inspired by Eddie, I basically butchered that Tele. But keep in mind, there was once a time when every vintage guitar was just a used guitarāI still have that Tele, by the way.
I never lost that spirit of wanting guitars that were unique, and have built and modded a few dozen guitars since. When I started G.A.S.-ing simultaneously for a Les Paul Junior and a Casino, I came up with this concept. I found an Epiphone ES-339 locally at a great price. It already had upgraded CTS pots, Kluson tuners, and the frets had been PLEKād. It even came with a hardshell case. It was cheap because it was a right-handed guitar that had been converted to left handed and all the controls had been moved to the opposite side, so it had five additional holes in the top.
Fortunately, I found a Duesenberg wraparound bridge that used the same post spacing as a Tune-o-matic. I used plug cutters to cut plugs out of baltic birch plywood to fill the 12 holes in the laminated top. I also reshaped the old-style Epiphone headstock. Then, I sanded off the original finish, taped the fretboard, and sprayed the finish using cans of nitro lacquer from Oxford Guitar Supply. Lots of wet sanding and buffing later, the finish was done.
I installed threaded insert bushings for the bridge, so it will never pull out. The pickup is a Mojotone Quiet Coil P-90 and I fabricated a shim from a DIY mold and tinted epoxy to raise the P-90 up closer to the strings. The shim also covers the original humbucker opening. I cut a pickguard out of a blank and heated it slightly to bend it to follow the curvature of the top.
All in all, I'm pretty happy how it turned out! It plays great and sounds even better. And I have something that is unique: an ES-339 Junior.
ENGL, renowned for its high-performance amplifiers, proudly introduces the EP635 Fireball IR Pedal, a revolutionary 2-channel preamp pedal designed to deliver the legendary Fireball tone in a compact and feature-rich format.
The EP635 Fireball IR Pedal brings the raw power and precision of the ENGL Fireball amplifier into a pedalboard-friendly enclosure, offering unmatched flexibility and tonal control for guitarists of all styles. This cutting-edge pedal is equipped with advanced features, making it a must-have for players seeking high-gain perfection with modern digital convenience.
Key Features:
- Authentic Fireball Tone ā Designed after the renowned ENGL Fireball amplifier, the EP635 delivers the unmistakable high-gain aggression and clarity that ENGL fans love.
- Two Independent Channels ā Easily switch between two distinct channels, with each channelās knob settings saved independently, allowing for seamless transitions between tones.
- Built-in Midboost Function ā Enhance your tone with the integrated Midboost switch, perfect for cutting through the mix with extra punch.
- Advanced Noise Gate ā Eliminate unwanted noise and maintain articulate clarity, even with high-gain settings.
- IR (Impulse Response) Loading via USB-C ā Customize your sound with user-loadable IRs using the included software, bringing studio-quality cab simulations to your pedalboard.
- Headphone Output ā Silent practice has never been easier, with a dedicated headphone output for direct monitoring.
- Premium Build and Intuitive Controls ā Featuring a rugged chassis and responsive controls for Volume, Gain, Bass, Middle, Treble, and Presence, ensuring precise tonal shaping.
SPECS:
- Input 1/4ā (6,35mm) Jack
- Output 1/4ā (6,35mm) Jack
- Headphone Output 1/8ā(3,5mm) Jack
- 9V DC / 300mA (center negativ) / power supply, sold separately
- USB C