Fender Eric Clapton Stratocaster

The Clapton signature Stratocaster is the most powerful Humbucker guitar in the world. I love it because I play very hard Heavy Metal. With its stacked Humbuckers and Incredible 25 DB mid boost its 17 times more powerful than a Gibson Les Paul Humbucker wise. Even with the boost Off its more powerful than a Gibson Les Paul as it has its stacked Humbuckers and electronics making it have 12 DB mid boost with the boost turned Off. A Gibson Les Paul at its maximum has 11 DB mid boost. But for my type of music its perfect. You wont find anything sounding like a Stratocaster in this guitar Thats for sure, but Thats the way Clapton wanted it after playing a Stratocaster between 1974 and 1985. But big Thumbs up for the most powerful Humbucker guitar in the world. Nothing Will ever get close to the Humbucker power in the Clapton signature Stratocaster.

I didn't purchased an EC Strat yet, because it's an American-made model. USA Strats are well crafted, but unfortunately, the prices remained too high.

This Strat was faithfully fashioned after the legendary "Blackie", but it was loaded with the Elite Strat's active circuiry. It has 25dB of midrange boost gain, Gold Lace Sensor single-coils and a factory-blocked vintage-style tremolo bridge (Three Vintage Noiseless single-coils replaced the Lace Sensors at the beginning of 2001). But if you want to upgrade your EC Strat with the priceful American Deluxe/Plus features, you can replace the Gold Lace Sensor pickups with three different coloured sensors: Blue, Silver, Red. They offer the widest palette of tonal variations as you did expect from a Strat, along with the powerful TBX and mid-boost circuits. Schaller hardware (straplock buttons and locking tuners) are standard, and, ironically, a Fender/Floyd Rose Deluxe double-locking tremolo with polished steel saddles and snap-in arm and an LSR roller nut completes the package with Fender Original Bullet 1550 strings (10-46) and an American Deluxe neck with detailed nut and fret treatment and abalone dot markers, coupled with Clapton's signature stamped at the headstock's corner.

Nothing, except for the missing active/passive toggle switch to preserve battery power consumption. This feature, found on the Richie Sambora model, was extremely useful when your battery was dead. Sadly, I'm afraid that Fender's R&D guys hadn't more enough time to install a similar one on the Clapton/Guy signatures and to the Mexican Deluxe Powerhouse model. But you can eventually send an e-mail to Fender to fit an active/passive toggle switch on these guitars.

Excellent craftsmanship and flawless quality. It looks like a vintage Strat, but it becomes a solid rock guitar when you play it with the mid-boost and TBX controls cranked up to the full and your favorite amp's "distortion" effect activated for a great humbucker sound and the awesome, punchy overdriven sound that Clapton was best known for.

The Clapton Strat was certainly an excellent instrument and unlike other many traditional Strats, it was the first signature guitar in the Fender line that share the peculiar Elite active electronics. Another signature model featuring the same powerful active circuitry was undoubtedly the Buddy Guy Strat, who had either brown shell or pearl white pickguards fitted and was designed to meet the huge needs of a real hot blues machine like Buddy Guy himself.

This review was originally published on http://www.musicgearreview.com

This guitar is just flat-out ripping shredding instrument that can go left right upper down is probably the most versatility then any other guitar on the planet. The balance weight and feel of this guitarist is the simple arranged and designed almost to perfection. There hasn't been a whole lot of extra features that really changed the dynamics of the car overtime but there has been a few modifications but still retains most of the inherent true nature of this instrument.


UTILIZATION

Neck Shape: Soft "V" Shape
Number of Frets: 22
Fret Size: Vintage Style Frets
Position Inlays: Black Dot Position Inlays
Fretboard Radius: 9.5" (24.1 cm)
Neck Material: Maple
Neck Finish: Satin Urethane
Nut Width: 1.650” (42 mm)
Scale Length: 25.5" (64.8 cm)
Headstock: Artist Signature on Headstock
Neck Plate: 4-Bolt Neck Plate with Micro-Tilt™
Truss Rod Nut: 1/8" American Series Nut
Electronics
Pickup Configuration: S/S/S
Bridge Pickup: Vintage Noiseless™ Strat® Pickup
Middle Pickup: Vintage Noiseless™ Strat® Pickup
Neck Pickup: Vintage Noiseless™ Strat® Pickup
Pickup Switching: 5-Position Blade: Position 1. Bridge Pickup, Position 2. Bridge and Middle Pickup, Position 3. Middle Pickup, Position 4. Middle and Neck Pickup, Position 5. Neck Pickup
Special Electronics: Active Electronics
Controls: Master Volume, Tone 1. Master TBX™ Tone Control, Tone 2. Master Active Mid Boost (0-25dB). Mid boost kit
Hardware
Hardware: Chrome
Bridge: American Vintage Synchronized Tremolo
String Nut: Synthetic Bone
Switch Tip: White Switch Tip
Tremolo Arm/Handle: American Vintage Tremolo Arm

SOUNDS

This guitar features three single coil pickups a volume control knob and two tone control knobs. In addition to that you have a five way pick up the selector which allows you to pick up each pick up as well as the two positions on the outside of the middle pick up. It's a pretty self explanatory and feature wise guitar.

If you've ever played if Strat then you know it exactly what you're getting get from this instrument. You're getting get a room full of and I feel that is on compost. The tone is guitar sounds fantastic and pretty much any amplifier so you put it in a clean amplifier all the way between modern high gain amplifier instruments going to sound great. It takes pedals well so if you have any rack unit with effects or whatever, this guitar will sound fantastic.

OVERALL OPINION

Overall this is a cool guitar for someone who is a Eric C fan. If you are not there are many other Fender Strat models to choose form and you will be happy with pretty much and of those models. This is a cool guitar for the EC lovers out there and there are a lot of them out there. I personally am not not a EC fan so this guitar doesn't appeal to me but I do appreciate the sound that it produces and the look as well. So if you are an EC fanboy than this may be something that you want to look at for you guitar collection.

The Fender Strat is a great sounding instrument that has a variety of tones with a large amount of tonal appeal. You can gets o many tones out of this one guitar. This is one of his guitars and really adapt to whatever you're getting it. However they really retain that nuance in tow that is distinctly a fender Stratocaster sound. They won't hide the they are especially in the next position where they are very distinguishable from any other instrument. You can immediately tell a fender Stratocaster guitar in the back position over any other guitar out there. Very distinct tone and a property that sounds like nothing else.

UTILIZATION

Neck Shape: Soft "V" Shape
Number of Frets: 22
Fret Size: Vintage Style Frets
Position Inlays: Black Dot Position Inlays
Fretboard Radius: 9.5" (24.1 cm)
Neck Material: Maple
Neck Finish: Satin Urethane
Nut Width: 1.650” (42 mm)
Scale Length: 25.5" (64.8 cm)
Headstock: Artist Signature on Headstock
Neck Plate: 4-Bolt Neck Plate with Micro-Tilt™
Truss Rod Nut: 1/8" American Series Nut
Electronics
Pickup Configuration: S/S/S
Bridge Pickup: Vintage Noiseless™ Strat® Pickup
Middle Pickup: Vintage Noiseless™ Strat® Pickup
Neck Pickup: Vintage Noiseless™ Strat® Pickup
Pickup Switching: 5-Position Blade: Position 1. Bridge Pickup, Position 2. Bridge and Middle Pickup, Position 3. Middle Pickup, Position 4. Middle and Neck Pickup, Position 5. Neck Pickup
Special Electronics: Active Electronics
Controls: Master Volume, Tone 1. Master TBX™ Tone Control, Tone 2. Master Active Mid Boost (0-25dB). Mid boost kit

SOUNDS


I really love the tone of these instruments primarily in a good hard rock amplifier setting. Whether that be a Marshall amplifier, Mesa boogie, or Bogner amplifier the guitar sound is fantastic. As long as you get some good overdrive whether that be a medium gain overdrive setting all the way to a high gain setting it is really good to give you a nice sustain, but they don't stop there, if you're playing them in a good clean fender amplifier.... you're going to get a sweet clean tone that is very addictive. No matter what you're playing with this guitar is going to sound fantastic.

OVERALL OPINION


You can find these guitars new right around $1300 or so. That's very good price for American built guitar that is extremely versatile and a signature series. These instruments have a great tone and a great feel and allow the dynamics of the player to give their honest playability. They're available to play and I highly recommend any guitarist out there to own one of these at some point in their career. These are great guitars for recording is well and they sound even better and a live band situation.