Happy 60th Fender Strat..

[PaulKay]

Fender Strat Slideshow

Never owned one, but they are iconic in music today.

[billhammond]

My blue/purple Mex Strat was among the guitars and gear I sold a dozen years ago to help finance my Goodall purchase, a decision I have never regretted. But it was great fun while it lasted.

[RickW]

I had an all natural strat years ago, that I used as the template for the one I'm building. That was a great guitar, should not have sold it. Oh well. Looking forward to getting the home build one finished.

The brilliance of Fender designs was not only the fact that they are great guitars. It's the fact that they are designed for ease of manufacturing. With the right tools, you can whip up a strat, tele or pre bass pretty damned easy, out of the simplest of materials. It's a great story of industrial design meets art.

[Deleted]

I like my American Standard Strat a lot. The neck is like buttah, and it's a well constructed guitar. The Mexi Strats are really good value for money, too.

[Tamarack]

I have always found it interesting that the iconic guitar of rock & roll was invented because Leo Fender liked country & western music.

[dickt]

So who is the earliest famous strat player? Buddy Holly?

[Marshall]

Had a Squire strat in the early 90s. Paid $225 for it. Traded it and some & for a PA I never used. I got talked into that one.

The neck scale is longer than Gibsons. I notice that kind of thing as I get older and more(?) set in my ways.


Strats are cool. Teles maybe cooler.

[mnhermit]

I know, I'll light my strat on fire today to celebrate - maybe I should just light it up and play it more

[Lonnie]

Leo got it right all those years ago, and with all the technological advances in virtually everything over the last 60 years, the Strat is still so wonderfully right with such minimal changes. It's a near perfect example of form following function.

It does amaze me that the iconic between-pickup sound of the Strat was an accident. We called it the "eggshell" sound... Long before Knopfler, when the blade switch was 3 position, rather than the current 5, you had to move the switch ever so carefully to find that sweet spot between two detent positions.

[Deleted]

Leo Fender didn't know how to play the guitar either. I always found that interesting, too. That is 180 out from most guitar inventors.

[Deleted]

Apr 19, 2014 11:25:03 GMT -5 @pauls said:

Leo Fender didn't know how to play the guitar either. I always found that interesting, too. That is 180 out from most guitar inventors.

I think Leo Fender, like John D'Angelico, were closet players. They never played in front of people other than maybe family or a few close friends.

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For my 13th birthday I was allowed to pick out my own electric guitar, I had been playing a old Stella until then. What I chose was a Smoke Green Gretsch Double Anniversary, had they had a Seafoam Green or Sherwood Green Strat on display I probably would have chosen that. Kids, color matters when you are being cool.

[Deleted]

Looks indeed matter to me in an electric, Marty. My soul is at rest regarding lack of electric GAS now that I have a figured top Les Paul.

Funnily enough, they same doesn't hold true for acoustics. I'm pleased as punch with my plane jane D-O3R, and would be "hard pressed to justify paying for inlays that add nothing to the sound." I'm quoting myself there.

Absolutely hypocritical, I know. I can't explain it, either.

[Doug]

Anything more than this is just wasting wood.  Wasting wood is not green and it's anti-environment. 

[Deleted]

Doug, take a look at the opening scene from "It Might Get Loud." The "guitar" Jack White constructs is more minimalist that the one you show.

[Hobson]

I have a Mexican strat that I bought used. Good intonation and easy to play. I've been completely happy with it, but it's not my favorite guitar. I bought it strictly because I was tired of having my Gibson LC1 bumped into on stage when I'm playing for my chorus. You almost can't destroy the strat. It's like the Bermuda grass of guitars. (Maybe that simile came to mind because I've been spending time digging that nasty rhizome-propogating stuff out of my garden.)

[mccoyblues]

Apr 19, 2014 9:48:47 GMT -5 Lonnie said:

Leo got it right all those years ago, and with all the technological advances in virtually everything over the last 60 years, the Strat is still so wonderfully right with such minimal changes. It's a near perfect example of form following function.

Not only did Leo get it right with the Strat but he did it twice. Three years earlier he came up with the near perfect Fender Precision Bass.

[John B]

Marty, I have one of those Gretsch add-on wiggle bars. I first saw one when I saw Dave Hull perform - he had one on a tricone. I'm just waiting for the time I get another guitar with a tailpiece so I can use it.

I had a Strat for a while, but ended up trading it in for a Hamer Special, which I wish I still had. For whatever reason, I just didn't "feel" it - it didn't seem to have its own personality. It did a lot of things well. The Hamer did a few things VERY well.

I do want a Tele, though.

[Dub]

Apr 19, 2014 7:31:55 GMT -5 dickt said:

So who is the earliest famous strat player? Buddy Holly?

The first 1954 Stratocaster prototype (gold) was given to famous Texas Playboy Eldon Shamblin and that was way before Buddy.

[Cosmic Wonder]

I do love me the look of a Sherwood green strat.

Mike

[Lonnie]

I wonder if Leo applied the Golden Ratio or the Fibonacci sequence to any of the design elements of the Strat or P-bass... the shapes of the body and headstock are so visually compelling that it hardly seems to be accidental. Remember when CBS changed the headstock dimensions on the Strat for a couple years? It was just ugly.