Feelin' Good

If ruling the world’s stadiums isn’t enough, Muse’s main-man Matt Bellamy now has his sights set on dominating the guitar world

- Stuart Williams

For decades, Hugh Manson’s custom builds pushed what we expected from a hand-built guitar. Attention to detail and meticulous selection of woods, hardware, and components all added up to some of the finest UK-made instruments to pass through Guitarist HQ. But there was one association in particular that put the Manson name on the tip of guitar players’ tongues, and that was the long-standing relationship between Hugh, the brand, and one Matthew Bellamy.

As an upstart on the scene back in the mid-to-late 90s, Bellamy frequented Mansons Guitar Shop in Exeter, acquiring his first custom-made Manson guitar after receiving his initial advance when Muse were signed. Usually, we’d say the rest is history, but as we’ve seen since this was simply the origin of strumm-etry…

Now, in a time where our credit cards live in fear of being wiped by the magnets of a period-correct PAF clone and where accidentally scraping the finish on our guitars simply makes them more ‘vibe-y’, Manson and Bellamy turned their attentions to making the guitar do things it shouldn’t. “The guy that says, ‘I want you to build me a Strat’. What is the point?” Hugh said in 2015. “I can sell you a perfectly good reissue of a Strat. How am I going to improve on however many million have been made already? Our challenges lie elsewhere.”

Those challenges? How about fitting an X/Y MIDI controller into the body? Or perhaps you’d consider a ZVEX Fuzz Factory, a ribbon controller… maybe a Fernandes Sustainer, and a kill switch? While we’re at it, can we do lasers, too? Then we’ll talk finishes…