Italian shredder Matteo Mancuso, celebrated for his dazzling, jazz-inspired prog-rock guitar wizardry, recently touched down in Nashville for a show at City Winery, where he spent some time with PG’s John Bohlinger for this new Rig Rundown. Check out the video for a more in-depth chat on specifics, and have a look at the essentials of Mancuso’s fly rig below.
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Solar Power
Mancuso’s sunburst Yamaha Pacifica Custom features a Vega-Trem whammy bar, rosewood fingerboard, and locking tuners. The pickup configuration includes two DiMarzio Area 68 pickups and a DiMarzio PAF 36th Anniversary in the bridge position.
The sunburst Revstar, meanwhile, was built for Mancuso by Yamaha’s custom shop. It features a chambered Honduran mahogany body, pill-style inlays, and Luminlay fluorescent side dots. Rather than the Revstar’s typical 3-way selector, Mancuso’s uses a 5-way blade switch, with wiring for coil-splitting on the Lollar Imperial pickups.
Mancuso runs both guitars with .009–.042 strings.
Stadium and Stomp
While Mancuso loves his JCM800 back home, for international travel, he rolls with a Line 6 Helix Stadium XL for consistency night after night. In case the Stadium XL goes down, a Line 6 HX Stomp is on hand to keep the show going.
![Rig Rundown: John 5 [2026]](https://www.premierguitar.com/media-library/youtube.jpg?id=62681883&width=1245&height=700&quality=70&coordinates=0%2C45%2C0%2C45)
