ESP Guitars
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Native name
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株式会社イーエスピー |
|---|---|
| Private | |
| Industry | Musical instruments |
| Founded | 1975 |
| Founder | Hisatake Shibuya |
| Headquarters | Burbank, California, United States |
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Area served
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Worldwide |
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Key people
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Makoto Suzuki (President) Matt Masciandaro (CEO) |
| Products | Electric guitars, bass guitars |
| Owner | Hisatake Shibuya |
| Subsidiaries |
LTD Guitars Grassroots Guitars Edwards Guitars Navigator Guitars |
| Website |
Espguitars.com (Global) Espguitars.co.jp (Japan) |
Makoto Suzuki (President)
ESP Company, Limited (株式会社イーエスピー Kabushiki Gaisha Ī Esu Pī?) is a Japanese guitar manufacturer, primarily focused on the production of electric guitars and basses. They are based in both Tokyo, Japan and Los Angeles, California, United States, with two distinct product lines for each respective market. ESP Company manufactures instruments under several names, including "ESP Standard", "ESP Custom Shop", "LTD Guitars and Basses", "Navigator", "Edwards Guitar and Basses", and "Grassroots". Their products range from Japanese-built custom shop instruments to lower end mass-production Korean, Indonesian and Chinese made instruments.
In 1975, Hisatake Shibuya opened a shop called Electric Sound Products (ESP) in Tokyo, which provided custom replacement parts for guitars and quickly gained a reputation for the high-quality of these replacement parts. At this time, ESP also began crafting guitars under the ESP and Navigator brand in the Japanese market.Ronnie Wood of The Rolling Stones and Akira Takasaki were users of these guitars.
ESP replacement parts were first introduced into the US in 1983 and began crafting custom instruments for local New York artists between 1984 and '85. Among these artists were Page Hamilton (Helmet), Vernon Reid (Living Colour), Vinnie Vincent and Bruce Kulick (KISS), and Ronnie Wood (The Rolling Stones). At this time, ESP also introduced the 400 Series as the first production line to be distributed in the US.
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Wikipedia