What's better than a holiday? A New Gear Holiday!
So I recently returned from a holiday to the States where I picked me up one beautiful axe, a Fender Select Strat in dark cherryburst with maple neck and SSS pups config.
I was told that I'd have no option other than to check it into the main luggage hold of the airplane so I made sure I wrapped it properly. First a layer of bubble wrap and then I still had them wrap it with that plastic sheets at the airport and slapped on as many fragile stickers as I could lay my hands on. At check in I managed to persuade the airline to cabin check it.
Here she is, on my living room floor. Not sure why, but it seemed appropriate to blur the telephone number.
Despite all my wrapping, despite it being cabin checked and despite all the fragile stickers, they somehow still managed to tear the wrapping on one corner and scuff the case. :?
At any rate, here we go sans all the wrapping.
And when the box is opened
And perhaps a few close-ups and different angles.
I tried to capture the flame nicely but what the pictures don't seem to capture is the gorgeous texture of the quartersawn flamed maple neck and fretboard.
I'd have to be honest but I feel like such a poser. I can't even come close to doing this guitar justice. I'll do my best though and hopefully one day, when I'm big, I can live up to the guitar.
Some thoughts on some of the specs:
The pickups are Fender Select Stratocaster pickups. I can't say that I'm familiar enough with Fender pickups to tell yet whether these are any good and how they compare to other pups but I will say that I absolutely love the sound of this guitar - and that's just through my solid state amp. In the shop I had it rigged up to a Fender Eric Clapton signature amp and I was in heaven! The single pup positions (1, 3 and 5) does have a little bit of noise on them but I have heard worse. The mixed positions (2 and 4) sounds as noiseless as the humbuckers on my Epiphone Les Paul.
The bridge/middle tone control has a no-load position. When it's dialed all the way to bright, it clicks into a position where it removes the pot and capacitor from the circuit which apparently brightens up the tone and raises the output of the pup. I can't say that I have an ear for this yet but I'll have to get used to the pot almost "sticking" to the no-load position. It means that you can't just gently roll it off with your pinky. You actually have to take it with two fingers to turn it. Once it is out of that position it rolls as freely as the other tone control or volume knob.
The fretboard has a conical radius (Fender calls it compound but I think that might be incorrect) of 9.5" at the nut and 14" at the bridge end. Again, better players than me might find this very convenient but I'd have to be honest that my skill at noodling up on the high end of the neck is not of such a level that I really notice much of a difference. Maybe, one day when I'm more adept at that sort of thing, I'll also benefit from the contoured heel.
I'll still take the guitar for a setup some time but it feels very good in my hands. It will probably take a little while to get used to the slightly longer neck and therefore slightly larger distance between frets than I'm used to on my Epi LP. Also, the modern C-shaped neck feels much less bulky in my left hand than I'm used to on the Epi LP but my overall experience with the guitar so far is overwhelmingly positive. It feels good, sounds great and looks beautiful.
