GEARREVIEW
Jet-Black Revelator SuperTone
KEY FEATURES Light weight
Rooted in Authentic Vintage Design
Both Lollar and Porter Custom Pick-Ups
Revelator Guitars was born in 2002 in the farms just about 20 miles south east of Philadelphia by Eric Stein . After working a multitude of jobs from building furniture to antique refinishing and carpentry , Eric decided to pursue his passion of building guitars full time . He ’ s owned , played , fixed , and finished vintage guitars most of his life . With musical tastes steeped in the old blues Masters , it ’ s only natural that the company ’ s name came from the old Son House song “ John the Revelator ” ( hopefully you have heard Phil Keaggy ’ s amazing version ).
At first Eric began by hand routing 50 ’ s era correct Fender bodies from templates of his own vintage guitars . Next , he started building complete instruments , and actually was one of the earliest guys to make “ relic ” style guitars . Recently the company has taken on more employees to help facilitate Revelator ’ s future success . When I asked him about this , he replied , “ We have steadily gathered steam , exposure , and taken on more artist endorsements . This year marked the release of the SuperTone , which is our take on past legendary offset designs , but with the Revelator flair .”
What is the Revelator flair , you ask ? It seems Eric made the wise call to gather several unique aspects from iconic guitars and blend them into something new .
The first thing you notice when you pick up the SuperTone is how light this offset body guitar is ( usually offsets average 8-10 lbs ). I like lightweight guitars , but at 5.5 lbs , this one takes the cake ! It is made of Sugar Pine , and I was already on board .
The guitar is well balanced and there is no “ neck-dive ”. Speaking of the neck , this model sports a hand shaped and contoured heavier C back profile made of maple ( think authentic
BY BRUCE ADOLPH
vintage Fender ) with a rosewood slab board ( yes , think Fender again ) with the truss rod adjustment at the heel . The fingerboard has a 10 ” radius with hand fretted and leveled 6105 size frets ( translation : medium size ). High playability marks for this guitar too … action , feel , and fretwork . The headstock and body are painted Jet Black with a Nitrocellulose Lacquer finish ( lightly aged ). Eric uses gold Gotoh lined , Kluson style tuners and a gold Hipshot Strat style 6 saddle bridge . Next feature up is the brass tone bar that accommodates the “ string through body ” design .
The pick-up selection is where Revelator hits a home run as he uses two of my favorite boutique pick-up makers … I know them both personally and I was thrilled to hear that Eric smartly mixed the two together . The neck position is a Porter Pickups Gold Portertron Humbucker ( think Gretsch Filtertron – full and rich tone ) and the bridge pick-up is a single coil Lollar Special Telecaster Flat Pole ( high output with a more rounded top end . More mids and bottom too . Roll back the tone knob some and head for P-90 land ). Now , just think about that combination for a minute … lots of tonal versatility ! This guitar also resonates well before you plug it in , with such a light body too !
continued on 45
Eric Stein
Nov � Dec 2016 WorshipMusician . com
19