![Fender American Standard Stratocaster [2012-2016]](https://img.audiofanzine.com/img/product/normal/1/4/148231.jpg?fm=pjpg&w=300&h=218&fit=max&s=730659659d5daa565f68df9ee592a7ad)
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Mythrandir1 « A classic that will live on forever »
Published on 05/04/15 at 11:33
Best value:
Correct
Audience:
Anyone
I received this guitar as a gift and it feels like a holding a piece of music’s history in my hands. The Fender Strat has been an iconic guitar for over half a century now, making its presence known in all music genres and there certainly is a reason for that. This is a highly versatile guitar used anywhere from blues to punk rock and it lives up to its reputation when it comes to good quality and tone.
While the Strat certainly is an amazing guitar, I modified mine quite a bit and I shall also discuss my modifications on top of how the stock guitar performs. I have changed the potentiometers, even eliminated one of them entirely, somewhat changed their designated locations and I also modified the body itself in order to have a humbucker pickup in the bridge position, instead of the stock single coil. Some may say that I have desecrated a “perfect” guitar, but to me it is a tool that needed to be shaped to suit all me desires and requirements. Part of my modifications were made in order to add even more versatility and more beefiness to the sound, but a few mods I chose to make because of a couple of issues I had and I just couldn’t get around them.
Features
This is the most iconic guitar known today with its alder body and bolt-on maple neck giving you the renowned Fender Stratocaster tone while also keeping the instrument fairly light and maneuverable when compared to many other guitar types. Its low weight is indeed a big plus for me, giving me the ability to play for extended periods of time without a problem. I usually switch to this guitar if my shoulders and back get tired from my Les Paul and then I can continue practicing without enduring more pain and fatigue.
The guitar comes standardly equipped with 3 single coil pickups, the neck one giving you a warm, rich, bluesy sound that made the Strat famous and the bridge pickup offering you a trebly tone, richer in mids and highs but severely lacking in the beefiness and depth that comes from a humbucker. The middle pickup I did not like on day 1 and I haven’t used it since. I simply can’t find any use for that pickup when the neck and bridge pickups give you absolutely everything you need.
The Strat has a 5 way switch allowing you to use all 3 pickups individually, as well as in combination, while also giving you 2 tone knobs and a volume control. To my knowledge the potentiometers used for tone and volume controls are of 250k and for me they didn’t quite offer all the control I wanted over the tone. I am not a tech and I can’t be sure whether it was because of the quality of the pots of because of their value. I simply replaced them with Fender 500k potentiometers and now it feels as if I have far more control over volume and tone. Now I can make subtle changes with a gentle turn of the knob and I will certainly feel the difference.
While changing these potentiometers I also took care of the main problem that bothered me since I grabbed this guitar. The volume pot is extremely close to the strings and this bothered me for two reasons. Firstly, when strumming hard and simply having fun, I started hitting that knob by accident and slowly changing my sound until completely muting the guitar. Secondly, that volume knob was very much in my way when palm muting power chords. Some say you can get used to that aspect and work around it, but I just couldn’t… the knob was simply in my hand’s way and it made me lose dexterity when I had to down stroke palm-muted power chords rapidly. To solve that problem, I simply eliminated one of the tone knobs which I didn’t really need and I moved the volume pot where the middle tone knob used to be. Having it there I can still quickly have control over the volume knob in the middle of a song, while also having my hand free to palm-mute with no obstructions in the way and now I am also no longer hitting the knob when strumming too aggressively. Now my guitar has 1 tone knob and the volume knob, both out of my way, while also being in reach when needed, and they both can shape my tone and sound profoundly with slight adjustments.
Modifying and rewiring this guitar is extremely simple and everyone can do it without worrying too much. In the end the guitar is a tool and it should be shaped precisely for your hand and that is exactly what I did. I play a high variety of rock and metal sub-genres and I needed a deeper, thicker sound from my guitar. The stock single coil pickup didn’t give me that so I took my guitar to a luthier to modify the body of the guitar so I can fit in a regular humbucker pickup. I was afraid to work on the wood myself and using a professional’s help was a great idea. Now my guitar has all the features that I can possibly want and I can play comfortably without any kind of annoyance. Nothing else needed changing, the tuning pegs and the bridge system are working perfectly, and the guitar stays perfectly in tune. I only needed to file the nut a bit more because I use a slightly thicker string gauge meant for Eb tuning or Drop D.
Sound
I play a wide range of music, but I mainly focus on hard rock, punk/ pop punk and progressive metal. The Strat certainly handles them well, it is perfect for hard rock and punk but its stock setup didn’t offer me the right sound for any kind of metal where I need my tone to be chunky and full. The stock pickups work wonderfully with an overdriven amp and with distortion as well, however, the bridge pickup simply lacks the high output and beefy tone of a real humbucker. They will give you an amazingly rich, clean sound and even a high quality hard rock tone, rich in middle and high frequencies, but they kind of lack in the low end of the sound. I solved my problem with a Seymour Duncan SH5, which makes the guitar truly stand out and even improving and boosting its natural treble, making it easier for you to adjust your tone precisely and get even more sustain out of the guitar.
I didn’t have much trouble with static sounds, sympathetic vibrations or any weird humming sounds, especially after replacing the bridge single coil pickup with the humbucker. The bridge single coil caused a slight humming sound for me, which became even more obvious when using distortion but this is quite a natural occurrence with this type of pickup. After replacing it with the humbucker, the hum vanished completely.
The Strat with its standard setup did offer wonderful tones but to me it was somewhat still lacking because it didn’t have that humbucker. You can still get nice sounding natural and pinched harmonics as well as dead notes but they aren’t quite as full and expressive as with my Les Paul. After getting rid of the single coil and adding the SH5 in its place however, everything changed. All the sounds became more pronounced and richer in frequency. The harmonics felt more powerful and alive, while the rhythmic dead power chords truly began to shine and add to the overall beat with their thick, chunky sound.
When it comes to having a clean sound, the neck pickup is simply perfect. The well-known Fender tone certainly does its job and it will give you the warmest, fullest clean sounds for all those blues riffs and more. I use this pickup rarely, but when I need to play a clean song I certainly go to this guitar. My main guitar, the Les Paul just can’t quite match the Stratocaster’s warm and rich sound when it comes to playing clean on the neck pickup. Every note is pure and rings out clearly without any kind of interference, making it a joy to relax a bit after all those powerful and aggressive riffs.
Guitar Setup and finish
My Strat needed to be setup because the intonation was a bit off and the action was setup way too high. The truss rod however, was in perfect place, there was no need for an adjustment and I never experienced any kind of buzz caused by an uneven frets or the truss rod. Setting the guitar up was easy and painless and didn’t take much any kind of work or professional help.
The finish on this guitar seems to be of high quality because I banged it several times against furniture mainly and the paint did not chip away and there are still no scratches on it. The guitar is easy to clean and you can maintain it’s lovely shine without being worried of damaging it.
Reliability and Durability
This Stratocaster is highly reliable and you can perform live without any kind of concern. This guitar is good for beginners as well as for live gigs, guaranteed not to fail you and its light weight will keep you going for hours. It seems to be solid, it has no neck dive issues and if you take good care of it, it should play well for decades to come. Like with any guitar, you should make sure to invest in decent strap locks because the stock ones can easily slip out when playing, this is its only “vulnerability”, which actually goes for any kind of guitar.
Overall Impression
I received this wonderful instrument as a gift, loved it instantly and with a few personal modifications I tailored this guitar to fit my tastes precisely. It is easy to maintain and to modify, with many high quality options and upgrades out there for all of you who enjoy truly making a guitar your own. I would recommend this Stratocaster to absolutely anyone looking for a versatile guitar and it should be noted that it plays perfectly well with its standard components. The modifications I made were purely because of taste and personal desire to improve it based on how I like to play. While this guitar is truly a gem, I wouldn’t recommend it to people focusing more on the Metal side, especially when it comes to death metal and other such heavy sub-genres because its stock bridge pickup isn’t quite designed for that sound.
While the Strat certainly is an amazing guitar, I modified mine quite a bit and I shall also discuss my modifications on top of how the stock guitar performs. I have changed the potentiometers, even eliminated one of them entirely, somewhat changed their designated locations and I also modified the body itself in order to have a humbucker pickup in the bridge position, instead of the stock single coil. Some may say that I have desecrated a “perfect” guitar, but to me it is a tool that needed to be shaped to suit all me desires and requirements. Part of my modifications were made in order to add even more versatility and more beefiness to the sound, but a few mods I chose to make because of a couple of issues I had and I just couldn’t get around them.
Features
This is the most iconic guitar known today with its alder body and bolt-on maple neck giving you the renowned Fender Stratocaster tone while also keeping the instrument fairly light and maneuverable when compared to many other guitar types. Its low weight is indeed a big plus for me, giving me the ability to play for extended periods of time without a problem. I usually switch to this guitar if my shoulders and back get tired from my Les Paul and then I can continue practicing without enduring more pain and fatigue.
The guitar comes standardly equipped with 3 single coil pickups, the neck one giving you a warm, rich, bluesy sound that made the Strat famous and the bridge pickup offering you a trebly tone, richer in mids and highs but severely lacking in the beefiness and depth that comes from a humbucker. The middle pickup I did not like on day 1 and I haven’t used it since. I simply can’t find any use for that pickup when the neck and bridge pickups give you absolutely everything you need.
The Strat has a 5 way switch allowing you to use all 3 pickups individually, as well as in combination, while also giving you 2 tone knobs and a volume control. To my knowledge the potentiometers used for tone and volume controls are of 250k and for me they didn’t quite offer all the control I wanted over the tone. I am not a tech and I can’t be sure whether it was because of the quality of the pots of because of their value. I simply replaced them with Fender 500k potentiometers and now it feels as if I have far more control over volume and tone. Now I can make subtle changes with a gentle turn of the knob and I will certainly feel the difference.
While changing these potentiometers I also took care of the main problem that bothered me since I grabbed this guitar. The volume pot is extremely close to the strings and this bothered me for two reasons. Firstly, when strumming hard and simply having fun, I started hitting that knob by accident and slowly changing my sound until completely muting the guitar. Secondly, that volume knob was very much in my way when palm muting power chords. Some say you can get used to that aspect and work around it, but I just couldn’t… the knob was simply in my hand’s way and it made me lose dexterity when I had to down stroke palm-muted power chords rapidly. To solve that problem, I simply eliminated one of the tone knobs which I didn’t really need and I moved the volume pot where the middle tone knob used to be. Having it there I can still quickly have control over the volume knob in the middle of a song, while also having my hand free to palm-mute with no obstructions in the way and now I am also no longer hitting the knob when strumming too aggressively. Now my guitar has 1 tone knob and the volume knob, both out of my way, while also being in reach when needed, and they both can shape my tone and sound profoundly with slight adjustments.
Modifying and rewiring this guitar is extremely simple and everyone can do it without worrying too much. In the end the guitar is a tool and it should be shaped precisely for your hand and that is exactly what I did. I play a high variety of rock and metal sub-genres and I needed a deeper, thicker sound from my guitar. The stock single coil pickup didn’t give me that so I took my guitar to a luthier to modify the body of the guitar so I can fit in a regular humbucker pickup. I was afraid to work on the wood myself and using a professional’s help was a great idea. Now my guitar has all the features that I can possibly want and I can play comfortably without any kind of annoyance. Nothing else needed changing, the tuning pegs and the bridge system are working perfectly, and the guitar stays perfectly in tune. I only needed to file the nut a bit more because I use a slightly thicker string gauge meant for Eb tuning or Drop D.
Sound
I play a wide range of music, but I mainly focus on hard rock, punk/ pop punk and progressive metal. The Strat certainly handles them well, it is perfect for hard rock and punk but its stock setup didn’t offer me the right sound for any kind of metal where I need my tone to be chunky and full. The stock pickups work wonderfully with an overdriven amp and with distortion as well, however, the bridge pickup simply lacks the high output and beefy tone of a real humbucker. They will give you an amazingly rich, clean sound and even a high quality hard rock tone, rich in middle and high frequencies, but they kind of lack in the low end of the sound. I solved my problem with a Seymour Duncan SH5, which makes the guitar truly stand out and even improving and boosting its natural treble, making it easier for you to adjust your tone precisely and get even more sustain out of the guitar.
I didn’t have much trouble with static sounds, sympathetic vibrations or any weird humming sounds, especially after replacing the bridge single coil pickup with the humbucker. The bridge single coil caused a slight humming sound for me, which became even more obvious when using distortion but this is quite a natural occurrence with this type of pickup. After replacing it with the humbucker, the hum vanished completely.
The Strat with its standard setup did offer wonderful tones but to me it was somewhat still lacking because it didn’t have that humbucker. You can still get nice sounding natural and pinched harmonics as well as dead notes but they aren’t quite as full and expressive as with my Les Paul. After getting rid of the single coil and adding the SH5 in its place however, everything changed. All the sounds became more pronounced and richer in frequency. The harmonics felt more powerful and alive, while the rhythmic dead power chords truly began to shine and add to the overall beat with their thick, chunky sound.
When it comes to having a clean sound, the neck pickup is simply perfect. The well-known Fender tone certainly does its job and it will give you the warmest, fullest clean sounds for all those blues riffs and more. I use this pickup rarely, but when I need to play a clean song I certainly go to this guitar. My main guitar, the Les Paul just can’t quite match the Stratocaster’s warm and rich sound when it comes to playing clean on the neck pickup. Every note is pure and rings out clearly without any kind of interference, making it a joy to relax a bit after all those powerful and aggressive riffs.
Guitar Setup and finish
My Strat needed to be setup because the intonation was a bit off and the action was setup way too high. The truss rod however, was in perfect place, there was no need for an adjustment and I never experienced any kind of buzz caused by an uneven frets or the truss rod. Setting the guitar up was easy and painless and didn’t take much any kind of work or professional help.
The finish on this guitar seems to be of high quality because I banged it several times against furniture mainly and the paint did not chip away and there are still no scratches on it. The guitar is easy to clean and you can maintain it’s lovely shine without being worried of damaging it.
Reliability and Durability
This Stratocaster is highly reliable and you can perform live without any kind of concern. This guitar is good for beginners as well as for live gigs, guaranteed not to fail you and its light weight will keep you going for hours. It seems to be solid, it has no neck dive issues and if you take good care of it, it should play well for decades to come. Like with any guitar, you should make sure to invest in decent strap locks because the stock ones can easily slip out when playing, this is its only “vulnerability”, which actually goes for any kind of guitar.
Overall Impression
I received this wonderful instrument as a gift, loved it instantly and with a few personal modifications I tailored this guitar to fit my tastes precisely. It is easy to maintain and to modify, with many high quality options and upgrades out there for all of you who enjoy truly making a guitar your own. I would recommend this Stratocaster to absolutely anyone looking for a versatile guitar and it should be noted that it plays perfectly well with its standard components. The modifications I made were purely because of taste and personal desire to improve it based on how I like to play. While this guitar is truly a gem, I wouldn’t recommend it to people focusing more on the Metal side, especially when it comes to death metal and other such heavy sub-genres because its stock bridge pickup isn’t quite designed for that sound.