A decade after its limited edition run ended, PRS Guitars has brought back the US-made Mark Holcomb signature guitar back from the dead, refreshed it, and has officially inducted it into the Maryland brand’s Core Series.
This is one of those models that you present to people who do not believe that PRS makes metal guitars; it even ships from the factory in Drop C tuning, just to get you started with your adventures in low-end riffs. Off-beat time signatures and rhythmic subdivisions are highly recommended.
The Periphery guitarist says that his new marque is an evolutionary triumph.
“This new Core model is a culmination of all of the touring, recording, and writing I've done for the last 11 years with PRS and is a product of all the iterations PRS and I have done over that time,” he says. “This guitar surpasses all of what we’ve established and is my new gold standard for tone and playability.”
At a certain remove, you might consider it variant of the Custom 24. It has the 24-fret board, the same body shape, but this is PRS playing around with the recipe. Yes, it has a solid mahogany body but that violin-carved top is not figured maple, it’s mango – maybe you should think about breaking out some of those exotic scales and modes to go with those subdivisions.
The Mark Holcomb Core model is a very different beast. Its dimensions are different. Where the 2025 Custom 24 has a 25” scale, here we have 25.5”. The neck is maple, not mahogany, and it is carved into a signature profile, and it’s topped with an ebony fingerboard with a 20” radius.
When Misha Mansoor spoke with us earlier in the year, he demurred when asked which of his two Periphery bandmates’ signature models would he play if he was given the option, and he demurred, insisting both were great, but it’s interesting to see here that, like Mansoor, Holcomb prefers the 20” fingerboard.
It feels something that is uniquely Periphery, even if Jake Bowen’s 27-fret Ibanez JBM9999 has a slightly rounder 16.9” radius.
Anyway, this Holcomb PRS comes fitted with his a pair of signature electric guitar pickups from Seymour Duncan, with the Scourge humbucker at the bridge, the Scarlet ‘bucker at the neck, and five-way switching.
We have a PRS plate-style string-through bridge, a set of Phase III locking tuners (we did say this was designed for down tuning), and you’ll find Holcomb’s name on the truss rod cover. Birds count out the frets in traditional PRS style. This is a serious guitar, and Holcomb, who is not new to this business, describes it as a dream come true.
“I couldn’t be more proud of it,” he says, “and I’m supremely grateful to PRS for their innovation and dedication to perfection.”
The PRS Mark Holcomb Core comes with satin black hardware as standard but you’ve got plenty of options when it comes to finishes, with Charcoal Wraparound Burst, Holcomb Wraparound Burst, Holcomb Blue Wraparound Burst, Cobalt Smokeburst, Fire Smokeburst, Gray Black, and Purple Mist Wraparound Burst. Those models with the stained binding are ridiculously cool.
They ain’t cheap either. These high-end electric guitars are priced from £4,999/$5,200 street. But then the SE Mark Holcomb – also available as a seven-string guitar – is still available, and that offers plenty of change from a grand, and it has MusicRadar’s seal of approval.
For more details, head over to PRS Guitars.
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