The word “iconic” is overused these days. I try to avoid it.
It’ll be hard in this next bit.
If you are not a guitar player, and someone says “electric guitar”, it’s more than a little likely the first guitar you picture in your mind is a Fender Stratocaster.
There are other electric guitars – but if the world had to explain “electric guitar” to an alien, this would likely be the example of choice.
The Fender Stratocaster turns 70 this year.
Radio repair man turned inventor Leo Fender could not possibly have known what he was starting when he began designing the Strat in the early 1950s. Perhaps because he wasn’t a guitarist, he approached the design differently, with an eye on not just manufacture but also repairability. Hence the bolt-on, rather than glued-in, neck. He had hit the mark a few years earlier with the Broadcaster, later renamed the Telecaster due to a legal wrangle with rival manufacturer Gretsch. He also designed the Fender Precision bass. Both were instant successes, popular with western swing bands, but the Telecaster was and remains a slab-like, utilitarian workhorse – two pickups, no nonsense. And as much as musicians loved its sound, they often complained that its square edges dug into their ribs and banged their hip bones.
The Strat, with its neatly nipped navel and two-horned cutaways, is probably what first comes to mind when anyone hears the words “electric guitar”. Millions of players have learned on a Strat – whether made by Fender, its budget Squier imprint, or one of the numerous companies producing copies. Many others dream of owning a top-of-the-range model from the Fender custom shop, costing a five-figure sum. Then there are the secondhand Strats with one previous famous owner. The black 1969 model that Pink Floyd’s David Gilmour played on The Dark Side of the Moon, Wish You Were Here and The Wall went under the hammer for almost $4m, in aid of a climate change charity.
They are famously versatile – their electronics provide thinner tone than the beefy Les Paul, but the three pickups are out of phase with each other, which helps give the Strat a dizzing sonic variety.
There’s reedy and out of phase:
To piercing, with tones you didn’t know existed until you played them:
To pretty much anything you want:
I finally got one, three years ago. It’s a Squier – but it gets the point across.