Charvel 550 XL Candy Red 1989

From the listing

Seller's description

A particularly cool and increasingly difficult to find 1989 Charvel 550 XL in Candy Red, presented here in very good condition and with a substantial number of tasteful modifications that give this guitar a very distinctive blacked-out, stealth appearance. The guitar has clearly been well cared for throughout its life and is in genuinely stunning condition for a 35-plus-year-old instrument. The most obvious sign of age is the natural fading to the Candy Red finish, which is visible in our photographs and, in our opinion, adds to the character of the instrument rather than detracting from it. There are no major knocks or significant damage to report, and overall this is an exceptionally clean example for its age. It is worth making clear from the outset that this is a heavily modified instrument. We believe the original pickups have been replaced with EMG active pickups, along with much of the original electronics. The original pickups and electronics are sadly not included with the guitar. GOTOH tuners have also been fitted, together with much of the hardware having been changed to create the very cool blacked-out appearance you see today. The tremolo is an original period-correct black replacement, and the combination of the black hardware, black pickups and Candy Red finish works extremely well. It gives the guitar a purposeful, understated look that is very much in keeping with the high-performance Charvel aesthetic of the period. None of the original hardware is included with the guitar. The rear tremolo cavity cover is also missing, as is the tremolo arm, so these points should be taken into consideration when viewing the instrument. The Charvel 550 XL sits firmly within the great era of Japanese-built Charvel guitars, when the company was producing instruments aimed squarely at serious players looking for fast necks, high-performance hardware and the kind of playability associated with the emerging superstrat market. The 550 XL design is a classic exampl