“Me and Dime were tight – but I don’t like the guitars Dime played. A headstock that looks like a baby guitar? I don't need all that real estate”: Kerry King on his personal history with B.C. Rich and ESP – and why he switched to Dean

Over the decades, Kerry King has been endorsed by B.C. Rich, ESP and now Dean. As much as he has always loved the company’s guitars, he wasn’t ready to work with them when they first approached him shortly after the death of former Pantera guitarist Dimebag Darrell.

“I was friends with a lot of the Dean people, even though I didn’t use their guitars ’cause Dime was there, and he and I were good friends,” King says.

“When Dime unfortunately left us, Dean wanted me the next day. They needed a new guy. I had a great deal with B.C. Rich, and Dean didn’t want to match it. I’m like, ‘Why am I leaving if you’re not gonna match my deal?’ So I stayed with B.C. Rich until almost the end of the Slayer run.”

That’s when Dean made King an offer he couldn’t refuse, and, just in time for his musical rebirth as Kerry King, he was adopted by a new guitar company. 

“That’s my new family now,” he says. “I’ve only used Dean onstage for about a month, so it’s still very new to me. But I did the new album with Dean guitars. I knew the owner’s dad [Elliott Rubinson] before he passed away, and now I’m really tight with everyone over there. And I’m super loyal. If you don’t give me a reason to leave, I won’t.” 

To date, Dean has created two signature guitars for King, the USA Kerry King V (limited edition 50 PC) and the USA Kerry King Overlord Battalion Grey, and there’s more to come. Below, King discusses the particulars of his Dean guitars and how he landed his past endorsement deals. 

Your first B.C. Rich was a Mockingbird. Was that before you were endorsed?

“Yeah, we certainly weren’t made of money back then. My dad was my sponsor for a while. He would live vicariously through me. He played a little bit of guitar, so he would scour the free newspaper, The Recycler, ’cause everyone would put guitars, amps, all kinds of shit in there. 

“He found a B.C. Rich Mockingbird. I didn’t even know what a B.C. Rich was. He took me to see it, and I didn’t have any idea what all the switches were for, but I’m like, ‘If I can’t make a cool sound with all these switches, there’s gotta be something fucking wrong with me.’”

You’re playing the Mockingbird on the back of Slayer’s first album, 1983’s Show No Mercy.

“That guitar belonged to the Hard Rock Japan for a while. I donated it. And then when I got together with my wife of 21 years almost, she was like, ‘You should get that back.’ And I went, ‘Yeah, you’re kind of right.’ So I traded them another one for it. I got in contact with the manager of that Hard Rock, and he understood the situation. I offered him something else and he said, ‘Fine – it means more to you than it needs to be here.’”

That guitar led to your relationship with B.C. Rich. Didn’t they paint it red for you?

“That was back in the day when I didn’t know what strap locks were. We were at rehearsal, and I got underneath my strap with my thumb. The guitar undid itself, the head came down on the ground like a fucking guillotine and the headstock broke off. 

“That was not a nice day, but it gave me my first introduction to the people at B.C. Rich, the Rico family. They put a truss rod and two other rods in it so it would never happen again – just in case I dropped it. I had them paint it red ’cause it was Koa. It still is Koa, but it’s a red Koa. Call me a dick now, but I didn’t think I wanted a natural guitar.”

Did that lead to your first endorsement?

“The second B.C. Rich I got, or that anyone saw, was the black Warlock I played in the early days. I think the Mockingbird sounded better, but the Warlock looked cool for what I was trying to portray. The B.C. Rich factory was only about 20 minutes from my parents’ house, so I would go to the factory five days a week, just drooling and checking shit out. One day the public-relations guy said, ‘Hey, we want to give you this guitar.’ It might have been a Bich. 

“I was maybe 20. I looked at him and said, “Why?” It didn’t occur to me that companies endorse players and give them guitars. The guy showed me a stack of letters from people that wanted to play the guitars that I had, and I went, “Oh, wow.” So that’s how I got my first B.C. Rich deal.”

You stayed with B.C. Rich for a long time, endorsing guitars with various design elements and price points. They did a signature V for you when South of Heaven came out (1988), and you played the Bich, Ironbird and the Beast V. What brought you to ESP?

“That was right after we did Seasons in the Abyss [1990]. B.C. Rich leased their company to Class Axe, and Class Axe couldn’t make a neck-through-body guitar. I’m like, ‘Well, call me when you can.’ And they never did, so I went to ESP for about a decade. I was a fixture for them at NAMM during the ’90s.”

What brought you back to B.C. Rich?

“I was always friends with the Rico family, and when they got their lease back from Class Axe, they kept wanting me to come back to B.C. Rich. I was wary ’cause the way we broke up was not good. I had ordered a Mockingbird Supreme back then, which had cloud inlays and all the electronics. 

“I had them make some sexy natural ones. They called me and said, ‘Hey, this guitar’s done, but we’re selling the company, so if you want it, you need to come buy it.’ And I said, ‘Fine, gimme ’til tomorrow.’ That guitar was gorgeous. They didn’t wait. They sold it to someone else, which was a bullshit move.”

How did they get you back?

“I was happy with ESP. They treated me well for a long time, and I’m still friends with the owner. And then one day, I finally decided to give B.C. Rich another chance. I said, ‘Alright; just so we’re sure, build me a guitar and if I like it, we’ll roll.’ I think that might have been the first V with the tribal paint job. So I went back over, and we went on that tribal offshoot for 20 years, with the fire backgrounds and the marble backgrounds. We got a lot of mileage out of that artwork.”

Did you feel like you got all that you could out of your relationship with B.C. Rich when you struck a deal with Dean?

“The Rico family was out of B.C. Rich again. They belonged to HHI. So it was corporate, and I have very strong times with family businesses. I was friends with the Marshall family. I was friends with the Rico family. And I was friends with a lot of Dean people, but I needed some shit changed because Dean was Dime’s label and me and Dime were tight – but I don’t like the guitars Dime played. A fucking headstock that looks like a baby guitar? I don’t need all that fucking real estate up there. 

“So we made the headstock look like it’s got devil horns. I took what was reminiscent of my B.C. Rich headstock and combined them into something new that neither one can claim so nobody can say, ‘Oh, it looks like your B.C. Rich.” And that’s how I got my ‘V’ with the points at the edges – and the Overlord, which I put out last year.”

What other guitars are you working on with Dean?

“I’ve got a new A&R guy there. I said, ‘Okay, for the purists, let’s make – and nobody has seen this – a couple of classic ‘V’s for people that don’t like the points on my first Dean V. I had one made trans-black with a really classy inlay. It’s a conservative ‘V’ with teeth. It’s got an edge to it. The other new one I’ve got has this beautiful inlay on it that people will just have to see. I’ll have both of those when I go on tour.’”

• From Hell I Rise is out now via Reigning Phoenix Music America.