bent-steel saddle, vintage-style bridge with a style locking tuners, which again, just look It’s the Nigel Tufnel dilemma - I wanted my Strat
push in bar. The push in bar was something like vintage tuners, but they lock and help the to go to 11, and in this guitar’s case, it will go
that I advocated for over a really long time. tuning. The tremolo stays in tune quite well, to 20! It has a flat, clean boost that doesn’t
They ended up doing it on the American Strat and I don’t have any issues with it. Usually, if change the character or tonality of the guitar.
professional, and I’d like to think I had a hand the tuning is getting finicky it means I need to It’s a 10db boost, built in. It’s just killer! With the
in making that happen because the twist in bar change the strings, or lube the nut a little, and treble bleed mod especially, you can have the
and keeping track of that spring is constantly a then it’s good to go. There are some tricks to boost on and actually turn the volume down
pain, and you end up stripping them out. getting it to stay in tune correctly. I’m going to and still get the chimey, clean tones. But when
make some videos on it that shows people the you turn it all the way up, it screams! It does
Visually, the guitar looks vintage. The whole little things you can do that are game changers things that no stock Strat should do. That
idea was vintage style; modern function. and make it work really well. Of course, if you function is a push-push volume pot. The main
Everything that’s been done to it is basically don’t want it to float, you can just slam the volume pot, you just push it with the side of
stealth. When you pick it up and look at it, it bridge like a regular fixed-post bridge. your hand to turn it on, and then push it again
looks like a vintage ’50s Strat. We added a
to turn it off.
compound radius fretboard, Fender’s version It has a custom-built circuit in it – this is the of a 6105 fret, which is a tall, narrow fret. The first interview that I’m mentioning this to, Historically, I’ve never used the middle tone pot
truss rod is adjustable through the headstock, and we went through many iterations of the for anything. I usually unhook it and leave the
which was a non-negotiable for me. I adjust circuit. There’s actually a 9-volt battery in the middle pickup wide open, with no pot control.
my truss rod constantly. If you take the finish guitar, but you can’t see it. It’s hidden behind The neck pickup always had that tone pot
down on the back of the neck and have the raw the back plate. The circuit does not affect the connected, but I never used it. So, what we did
wood, I think the truss rod is one of the most sound of the guitar at all when it’s not on, so it is was disconnect it and put either a capacitor,
important adjustments on the guitar, and I want completely bypassed. Basically, what I wanted a resistor, or both, on the neck pickup so it
to be able to get to it and not take the neck off. was a Stratocaster that had more output. still sounds like it has a pot connected to it,
The heel is cut away so that you can get up Anytime I’ve messed with a pedal to do it, I’ve because those 250k pots roll off some of the
to the high frets easily. And it has vintage- never been able to find a great linear response. top end and gives those pickups their sound.
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May 2018
WorshipMusician.com