the neck has an ebony fingerboard and 24 frets
the pickups are DiMarzio of some sort

The kill switch/button is designed to momentarily cut off the guitar signal so it's silent for a second (or less) and is then pressed repeatedly to give a staccato effect (a stop/starty sound for non-musicians). They work in one of two ways, as far as I know....there could be more. I'm not sure which is Buckethead's way.

1) A normally closed button switch that's connected to the hot and the ground wires coming from the pickup - on press the pickup signal is instantly grounded hence the sound is "killed" whilst the button is pressed.

2) A normally open button switch that's put as a break along the hot wire (black, I think) to the output jack. On press the signal is open so no current will pass along hence sound is momentarily "killed."

I think 1) is the better way as the other may provide some noise on some guitars and isn't always compatible.
I suspect Buckethead's is most likely wired like that.







Is the Star Wars Knob a volume or tone control?
I think it's more likely that the one volume knob is rewired for both pick ups, and the Star Wars pot is a tone rewired for both pickups. While he might not use his bridge pick-ups so much, I can't imagine he'd leave them without a volume control of any sort. What would be the point in putting the selector in? Similarily, I can't imagine he'd leave it with no tone control. I persoanlly hardly ever touch the tone controls, but sometimes they come in useful to add extra bite or soften the tone a bit. I imagine it's the same for other people.

What Gibson had to say about this Les Paul:
"As for the specifics on the guitar, you need to contact Buckethead. Please understand that we do not discuss the specifics of a customer's Custom Shop guitar with other people" They did say however that they hadn't seen the white metal hardware before, so I assume it was custom made for him. (Thanks to crapmetal for that info)

~thanks to Kev and Doug Cartwright for the info and diagrams!