Schecter has just released the Nick Johnston USA Signature – a limited-quantity, American-made guitar built for the Mastodon lead guitarist. It also looks a whole lot like Epiphone’s Brent Hinds Flying V from a little while back. Whether or not that was an intentional homage remains to be seen.
Anyway! The neck is a 9-piece Wenge/Purpleheart/Maple build, sculpted into a Custom C shape designed for fast, fretboard-spanning lead work. It’s topped with a 14″-radius Ebony fingerboard and 22 Jescar premium German silver frets. Aluminum ring fingerboard inlays and Luminlay side markers add to the guitar’s distinct visual identity.
Pickups are a set of NJ Signature Atom-Buckers, built with Alnico III magnets for a darker, moderate-output tone with full mids and soft highs. Schecter notes the pickups respond well to picking dynamics at lower gain — suited to jazz fusion or classic rock tones — while still delivering aggressive growls and metallic screams when pushed through high-gain amps or modeling presets. A 5-way Super Switch expands the pickup-switching options beyond a standard configuration, paired with Master Volume and Master Tone controls.
Hardware includes a Hipshot Ibby HM bridge, Hipshot locking tuners, and a Graph Tech Black TUSQ nut, a combination built to hold tuning stability through Johnston’s demanding playing style.
The Schecter Nick Johnston USA Signature is available now in limited quantities through Sweetwater for $6,499. Here’s hoping they drop a more affordable version soon, as most companies usually do after the release of something this pricey.
