Trey Anastasio Reveals New Languedoc Guitar, “The 4.0” [Photos]

Trey Anastasio revealed his latest toy this week, unveiling a brand new guitar made by luthier, and former Phish soundman, Paul Languedoc. Along with several photos of the new axe posted to Facebook, Anastasio included a lengthy note in which he calls this new guitar “The 4.0″—eluding to, if only jokingly, a new era of Phish.

While the guitar looks very similar to Trey’s two Koa guitars, made in 1996 and 2002, there are several new developments included on “The 4.0”. Instead of the usual white plastic binding found on Koa1 and Koa2, the new axe features “holly for the off-white binding, and ebony for the fingerboard and tail piece,” according to the Facebook post. Furthermore, Paul used ebony on the pickup casings, while koa makes up the top and back combined with a maple neck.

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Koa2 differed from Koa1 in several ways, including the bridge pickup placement—which was pushed closer to the neck pickup. For Koa3 (The 4.0), the bridge pickup sits even closer to the neck, which is sure to add a different element to its sound.

“It’s impossible to overstate how much these guitars and Paul’s friendship means to me. I love Paul, our first crew member, my friend and roommate for many years,” said Anastasio.

“When I play his guitars, I can feel how they were shaped, sanded, molded, and created with love by his bare hands, his soul and spirit. They are beautifully hand-crafted works of art. It’s been the honor of my lifetime to have the privilege of playing them,” he continued. “The fact that this new guitar appeared during this downtime gives me hope for a new era of live music. I’ll play it with love and gratitude, from the first notes of the next live shows.”

Check out the full post below, which contains several pictures of “The 4.0”.