This beautiful Knaggs Keya Tier 1, Serial #3, one of the first hand made Keya guitars from Joe, is finished in Golden Natural with an "incredible big leaf" West Coast curly maple top over a South American mahogany body. Originally selected by Joe to be the top and color for Serial #1, it became serial #3 after the customer for #1 chose a quilted maple top. The figured Mahogany neck has a Custom '85 carve similar to the early PRS instruments.
This guitar has a number of features no longer attainable. It can’t be compared with those being made today, because these features are not being built any longer. The Body / headstock / fingerboard have an exceptional curly maple purfling with green ripple B/W/B binding that enhances the beauty and elegance of this instrument. This Keya was the very first to have a Brazilian Rosewood fingerboard. It has a Pearlworks inlayed sea shell fingerboard of Black lip Mother-of-Pearl and Mother-of-Pearl. The fingerboard has a 12" radius and includes a highly figured Rock maple binding with green ripple Abalone purfling.
The phenomenal bookmatched Brazilian Rosewood headstock has a seahorse inlaid. This guitar has 2 Fralin Pure PAF pickups, which besides Bare Knuckle, are my favorite humbuckers in Joe’s guitars. They give this guitar a very robust and special sound. This guitar also has a single coil mode to give the neck pickup a nice clear classic tone. Rounding out the specs is a vintage bone nut and gold / Engraved Waverly open back tuning pegs. The bridge is Joe's exceptional one-piece tune-a-matic.
Great guitar!