Chords for Guthrie Govan demos his new Charvel prototype for Guitarist magazine

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ [D] _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ [A] _ _ _ [C] _ _ [D#] _ _
_ _ [D] _ _ _ [F] _ _ [D] _
_ _ _ [E] _ _ This is a very [D] very new guitar [D#] and it two weeks ago this guitar [C#] didn't really exist and
_ [F#] so it's a
the second prototype
[E]
Guitar that I've been working on [D#] with the good people at Charvel
I should add this is not a signature guitar people of the internet.
This is just a prototype and
But it's got a lot of cool things going on and let's start at this end
We have a roasted or baked or I think Charvel call it caramelized maple neck
Essentially means they take normal maple and then cook it
Which makes it more [G] stable when the climate varies and also makes it resonate differently
So there are a few people doing that and they all have their own word for what the baking process is
This [E] neck additionally has a couple of graphite
Reinforcement rods running all the way through it
Which again adds a [Fm] little bit of stability and seems to eliminate any kind of dead spot as well every [F] note on this guitar is
_ [F#] _
Completely even which pleases me greatly
_ Locking tuners on the back [D#] because locking tuners are good
The nut intriguingly is bone rather than one of these self lubricating materials.
That's something I figured out
whilst doing long tours something that happens with
The nuts that lubricate themselves they're great for tuning stability
But the D string in particular has a way of kind of hacking through the nut slot
[D] so if three weeks into a tour you discover that
The open [Fm] D string just sounds like a buzzing mess.
That's worrying
You don't need that when [E] you're many many time zones away from [Fm] home.
So bone nut with
[F#] Something like nut sauce the unfortunately named nut sauce
That seems to be just as stable for tuning and lasts longer
What else do we have massive stainless steel frets?
These are like very very jumbo, which is great for those
_ It's being able to do big bends and not hear the sound of
_ The sound of your [F] finger kind of rubbing [C#] against the fingerboard
with this
_ _ [F#]
It's a lot smoother
_ Then here we [D#] have this freakish looking neck joint
Which is basically like a strat style neck joint, but someone's taking a whole mouthful out of it there
[E] So that's [D#] worked out really well
[F#]
For playing up at the top.
I feel no neck joint at all when I'm up there which again is a good thing
The body is birds-eye maple _
which is kind of pretty but not annoyingly pretty and _ _
Basswood
_ for the back of the body
_ [F]
It's a nice all-round wood [D] combination it kind of does the barking rock thing, but it also cleans up nicely so
If you're gonna take one guitar on the road and you need to get a lot of noises out of it
This combination seems to work and go to
Non locking tram [G] with the two posts and the knife edges
_ _ [C]
[G] so lots of pulling up there's a
back routing going on _
[C] _ [F#] And
_ Then the more traditional style bent steel saddles there which is because I prefer the tone
[A] _
_ _ [D#] Special prototype pickups here made by Michael Frank Brown or Braun
I [Fm] can't remember how to say [E] his German name, but he's the mad scientist who did the pickups for the Eric Johnson signature strap
Clearly a wise man [A] and I can't [N] really describe what he's done here, but they're very honest sounding pickups
They seem to pick up on all the details.
So I'll just go through the various noises that [Fm] this guitar makes
_ [F#] _ _
This is the humbucker [C#] so _ _ [A#] _
[B] _ _ [D] _ _ more of the warm [G#]
and _ [D] _ _ _ [D#] _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ [F#] _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ [F#m] _
_ _ _ _ [F#] _ of course if I [N] crank it up
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ [D] _
_ [A] _ _ [F#] _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ [F] Then we have various [E] single coil [G] flavorings here
_ _ _ _ [A] _
_ [F#m] _ _ _ [N] _ _ _ _
_ _ [C] _ _ _ _ _ [F#] _
[G] _ _ [A#] _ _ _ [D] _ _ _
[D#] _ _ _ [G] _ _ _ [Gm] _ _
_ _ [G] _ _ _ _ _ [F] _
_ _ [Gm] _ _ [D#] _ _ [G] _ _
_ [F] _ _ [D#] _ _ [Gm] _ _ _
_ _ _ _ [B] _ _ [F#] _
And of course this one this is maximum rock
[F] _ _ [Gm] _
_ [Dm] _ _ _ [Cm] _ _ [D#] _ _
_ _ [D] _ _ _ _ _ [Gm] _
[Dm] _ _ _ [G] _ _ _ _ [Gm] _
_ _ [D] _ _ _ [G] _ _ [B] _
_ _ _ [Gm] _ _ _ _ [F#]
So there you go.
That's my guitar.
It's a work in progress, but I'm kind of pleased with it