JAYDEE ‘OLD BOY’ SG
The metal god’s number one
After much begging, Tony Iommi eventually persuaded Jaydee’s John Diggins to be his guitar tech for a US tour. Diggins thought a spare guitar might be handy, so he built what was to become Tony’s most iconic SG. It was also to function as a test bed for pickup designs, and Diggins came up with a number of bespoke designs. His humbuckers were narrower than Gibson’s but with huge output, and Tony eventually settled on a bridge pickup with blade polepieces. Iommi had struggled with poor intonation on his SG Specials, so Diggins went for a Schaller Badass bridge. His ebony fingerboard marked a shift towards 24-fret necks for metal, and the crucifix inlays gave Iommi his visual signature.