domhatch
i've had my strat - an '07 highway 1 - from new, so a good three to four years now, and never really enjoyed playing it. i kinda only have it because i thought it was a good deal, and coz you just really have to have a strat. a while back i had it looked at by mark at andy's, had the trem blocked, a new tusq nut put in and the gauge lowered to .10s. then i stuck it in its case and forgot about it - and most of my others - because we were moving, etc. tonight, i organised the study/studio, and plugged in the strat for a laugh.
and was blown away.
it sounded so good through my little vox ac4. i fiddled with different settings on the amp (not that there are many, but you can play with the tone and the 'volume' a bit), in conjunction with the guitar's tone and volume pots, and get some deeply satisfactory twang, not to mention some good 'n clean 'n drive when asked. it's also very neat to play. maple neck/fingerboard, which is oddly alive and slick (i usually prefer dark woods), and the action is great, not as taught as before. (yes, i know that comes with lighter strings, but even so...) so i am now one happy and converted strat owner - bear in mind folks, this is to all intents and purposes a stock-standard highway 1.
so i was just wondering. how many of you have ever bought a guitar you weren't expecting much out of, made a small or inexpensive tweak to, and discovered a gem you suddenly loved? let's hear the story.
dh
StefStoep
I picked up a MIM strat for R1000, a couple years ago.
The bridge pickup wasn't working and I took it to Grant Fouche to fit the cheapest one he had in stock since I was planing on just selling it on for a profit.
He also did a decent setup on the strat. I plugged it in and it just felt right!
Still got the strat and I love it! But still need to upgrade my pups!
domhatch
yeah, me too. the pups sound flaky through my blues jr. but through this little vox, a bit fuller. maybe it's me amp that needs looking at... still, i'm much happier with the guitar now, and it's definitely a keeper.
VellaJ
I bought my Strat-style Epiphone for R1000 when I was starting out with guitar, and figured I would upgrade when I got better. That's still my only electric guitar, several years down the line ?
I would never be able to get rid of this axe. Fast neck, comfortable, and decent sound, even with the standard pups. No other guitar feels like it (well, nothing that costs less that R10,000 ?). Awesome little guitar...
BluJu
I've also got a highway 1 that I am in love with. Changed the bridge pup to a JB Jnr. It sounds pretty good.
I'd love to slap some Kinman woodstocks in there to see how it sounds but they don't come cheap.
guidothepimmp
I feel like that about my RS405 ('83 version of a fender Ibanez style)
I do my own setups but after I installed kinman woodstocks... I fell in love...
Werner-Carstens
I have a MIM Classic 60's strat. After I fitted it with Kinman Woodstock Plus pups I had the sound sorted, but the 7.25 radius was still annoying for those big blues bends. A quick visit to Foster vd Merwe in CT to reprofile the neck to 12" radius and it was all there from the moment I plugged it in. The American Deluxe strat is not seeing a lot of action nowadays...
da-rok
my first guitar was a fender squier, thought it was a good starting axe that i was going to get rid of when i got into the hang of it... many years later and after a few mods i did ( the only thing i havnt changed is the wood) it almost plays better than my 1961 singanture strat i drag all over the show...
the two things that made the biggest difference was the fretts and the pups... basically 2 and a half grand and 8 hours of grinding frets gave my knock off cheapo a similar feel and sound to my 16 grand strat... go figure...
slyd
Yeah, definitley . .. ?
I had played humbucker axes for all my life,. . . . then I bought a MiM strat in the late 90's, and plucked on it now and then, never quite playing it enough to really get a "feel" for it, and always being drawn back to the familiarity of the "buckers". This carried on with it being my 2nd guitar, until I was in a situation to relax and experiment, while jamming the strat, that I began to find all the different "expressions" available in this instrument.
It's now my #1 aXe, and luuuuuv it to bits!! :-[
Reinhard
I hated my strat. Really upgraded it, numerous setups and still played like sh*t. As a last resort had Foster v/d Merwe refret. Plays really nice now and he set the pickups perfectly. Now the strat actually gets played ?
domhatch
lots of good stories. but the moral of the stories seem to be 'buy a strat you hate and fiddle with it until it suddenly comes right'? personally, i can live with the pickups for a while longer, but i'd really like lower frets, these jumbos are not my thing. that said, i'm not doing anything else to my strat for a while. just gonna enjoy what i have while i have it...
slyd
Almost every night that I play with our jamming group, I stop and say "geez, I looove this guitar", or "Wow, I looove the sound I had in that song". It really HAS GOT me! :-[
