1 long-arse Tour 3 tremolo systems... The story of Adrian's Black Lado Earth
What I think happened, based on interviews and photos...
In 1984 Iron Maiden recorded Powerslave. The record showed quite a bit of evolution in Adrian's guitar playing. Partly responsible was his blue sunburst Ibanez Roadstar, which he recieved while being endorsed by Ibanez. That guitar had something no guitar of H had before: a locking tremolo system. Adrian relied quite heavily on that while recording songs for Powerslave. And while H liked what the guitar did in studio, it just didn't feel right on stage, so he needed some new guiars that would do the job on stage, since none of his guitars had tremolos. Yes, there was the SG with the Bigsby, but, doing divebombs with a bigsby is just a suicide on stage tuning-wise. So, for that job, Adrian ordered 2 new guitars, a gray sunburst and a black Lado Earth.
So, Adrian began the World Slavery Tour mostly playing 3 guitars: the black and silverburst Earth's and his Gibson SG with bigsby. Both Earths at this point had stock Lado pickups and stock Lado tremolos, which were quite similar to stock Fender tremolos and, most importantly, had no locking nuts.
H's black Lado Earth, without a locking nut (1984).
H's black Lado Earth with stock parts.
TNOTB Live from Poland 1984, with H playing the black Lado.
I assume, during England shows H swapped his SG for his trusty Les Paul Goldtop and began using that guitar again (there are photos from Bristol comfirming that). Since that guitar sounds so great, he decided to switch bridge pickups in both Lados to DiMarzio Super Distortions (both black at this time), hoping to match the amazing sound of the Goldtop.
The black Lado Earth in autumn 1984 (original spec, minus DiMarzio Super Distortion in bridge).
While the Lados were better than the Roadstar, they still didn't bring the tuning stability Adrian wanted. So, I assume, while in Germany, in October 1984, H got a locking Rockinger Tremolo system which he fitted on the grayburst Lado and a Kahler nut, which was the less used guitar at the time of the two. It wasn't perfect, but it was better than the stock tremolo, so Ade began to use the grayburst as his primary guitar. Soon he added the rockinger tremolo to the black Lado too, which was now used less, since he got used to the feel of the silverburst one and wanted to use the Goldtop too, because of the sound. Last picture in this post (photo in the bottom left corner) shows this phase (grayburst with a Rockinger tremolo and the black one with the stock one).
H with the black Lado, with Rockinger Tremolo + Kahler nut installed.
So, the tour was going by and the black Lado Earth was now a backup/warm up guitar. Adrian still hasn't resolved his tuning issues (switching guitars almost every song), so he decided to try something new. A Floyd Rose. He commisioned someone to install it in his backup guitar, the black Lado. The guitar recieved a gold unit, a new white DiMarzio Super Distortion, but the old Kahler locking nut remained on guitar. I assume this experiment didn't bring the desired results (possibly, because the locking nut of Kahler tremolo is behind the original nut of the guitar) and H kept switching guitars on stage between almost every song. The black Earth remained a warm up / backup guitar.
Top left: The black Lado Earth in Japan 1985. Gold Floyd, white Super Distortion. Rockinger route still visible on the right side of the Floyd.
Bottom left: The black Lado Earth in autumn 1984 (original spec, minus DiMarzio Super Distortion in bridge).
Edit: The original tremolo on the black Lado was a non-locking Rockinger tremolo.
So experiments with tremolos on the black Lado Earth didn't bring the desired results, and Adrian was forced to switch guitars for the reminder of the tour between almost every song. But after the tour, Grover Jackson built him the guitar, that solved all of his issues. The white HSH Jackson Superstrat...
So, this is the what I learned and what I assume happened with Adrian's Black Lado Earth, which is IMO the best looking Lado guitar he has ever owned (not a big fan of Lado shape, but this one looked great imo). I wonder where this guitar is now...
Hopefully you enjoyed this.