Vivian Campbell - Equipment

Equipment

At the beginning of Campbell's career, his main instrument was a Les Paul with DiMarzio pickups. This guitar was used on Dio's Holy Diver, as can be seen in the booklet pictures. As so-called superstrats became increasingly popular among metal guitarists in the mid-1980s, Campbell switched to a Charvel. Vivian recounts in the October 1985 issue of Guitar for the Practicing Musician that he read in a Gary Moore interview about Grover Jackson and Charvel. He subsequently contacted the company. Grover came down to a rehearsal for the first album and gave Vivian a guitar. He had it repainted with the "Holy Diver" artwork. Vivan used a combination of Duncan J.B Custom's and Invaders for the "Last In Line" tour. For the "Sacred Heart" album he started using the Charvel pickups "which were a lot like the Duncan's but hotter" to quote Vivian from the article. At around the same time he filmed an instructional video in which he plays a blue B.C. Rich ST, a model first produced circa 1986.

When he joined Whitesnake, Campbell acquired a pink-red-and-yellow Rand, a high-end 27-fret guitar handmade by Rand Havener, a former B.C. Rich employee. This guitar featured innovative sculpted wings, almost no neck heel due to its neck-through construction, a pointy, very droopy headstock, a pao ferro fretboard, custom inlays, a Floyd Rose bridge, and two Tom Anderson custom pickups. It can be seen in the "Still of the Night" video; another Rand was used in the video for "Is This Love."

During the same period (1987–1988), Campbell had Dallas-area luthier Buddy Blaze make him a custom guitar. This instrument, nicknamed the Shredder, had a Strat-shaped mahogany body with polka-dot graphics, a 24-fret neck with "ping-pong" inlays (going from top to bottom up to the 12th fret and vice versa up to the 24th fret) on its ebony fretboard, a pointy reverse headstock, and two Seymour Duncan humbucker pickups, a Full Shred in the bridge position and a JB in the middle position. The bridge was a Floyd Rose. A deal was then set up between Buddy Blaze and Kramer Guitars, and the Shredder went into production under the name NightSwan. Vivian signed with Kramer as an endorser, and there are a few ads showing him with this guitar. He played the original Shredder through Whitesnake's 1987-1988 world tour. Midway through the Whitesnake world tour, Campbell arrived unannounced at Glenn Curries house in Portadown, Northern Ireland and tried to buy a guitar and offered £3,000 at the start but was told it was not for sale. Campbell said ok then ill keep going and kept bidding up until £10,000 but was continually told it was not for sale and was unsuccessful in the attempted purchase. The Curries maintain that Campbell was under the influence of strong narcotics at the time, or put in their words, "off his face on something".

After leaving Whitesnake, Campbell initially played a custom-made Tom Anderson Strat-style guitar in the Riverdogs and Shadow King. When he joined Def Leppard Campbell had more custom Andersons built, which he used throughout the Adrenalize tour. During the recording of Slang, Campbell switched back to Les Pauls and currently continues to play Gibson guitars.