The Ultimate Steampunk Guitar

I've long been a fan of Jake von Slatt's incredible Steampunk Stratocaster: in my imaginary rock and roll retro-future, I hover in an airship above London, playing it with an intricate brass and leather glove of my own devising, each claw a separate talon-shaped guitar pick.

But I think Von Slatt's just been trumped. Big time. There's a new steampunk guitar in town: the Villainizer, courtesy of Thunder Eagle.

The Villanizer started life as a Rhoads Jackson V. It's not every day you take a band saw to a guitar that plays as well as this thing does. However, I had no distinct plan other then doing a mechanical look to it. But I had more of a Sci-Fi / Blade Runner thematic in mind at that moment.

After cutting, a spacer was cut and installed to join the two pieces of the body. Knowing damned well that wouldnt be a strong enough of a join for just about any player, the steampunk look hit me, and I went on to installing the copper pipe, and soldering the joints. You just cant have steam power without a gauge, so I cannibalized an old oil gauge and made a custom face in it with my name and a real complex readout.

Gears. Man I hacked more gears together then I knew what to do with, and inlaid them into a cut plexi frame that was then screwed into the body...

Jake, I'm sorry, man. You've been owned. Oh, certainly, your Steampunk Strat is more clean and elegant. The brass gleams. But my steampunk is just like my rock: rusty and corrosive.

The Villainizer [Thunder Eagle Guitars] (via MAKE)