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Hatsubai « Cool tone, great color »
Published on 10/10/11 at 14:28Chris Rea was never a really popular strat player for whatever reason, and as a result, I've only seen one of these enter the shop. I think it was one that somebody imported from Europe, to be honest. I'm not entirely sure. The guitar was made in Mexico vs the standard American made sig models you normally see. It features a poplar body, a maple neck with a rosewood fretboard, 21 frets, dot inlays, vintage tremolo, three single coils, one volume, two tones and a five way switch.
UTILIZATION
The guitar reminded me of an old school Fender, and I guess that's the entire vibe they were going for. Chris' original guitar was based off of a 60s strat, I believe. The overall weight of this, however, was big. It seemed to be heavier than most Strats, and I question how good the poplar was that they chose for this guitar. The frets needed some attention, and it was the standard Mexico fretwork that I tend to see on guitars. It's half way decent, but it really needs a good fret level and recrowning. The neck joint was tight, so no issues there. I'd replace the nut with something a bit better than the synthetic crap that the MIM guitars tend to come equipped with, but all in all, it was decent.
SOUNDS
The guitar had some Hot Rails in all three positions. I believe Chris uses these on his guitars, but I'm not entirely sure. I know he uses some sort of Rails pickups that are beat up quite a bit. The Hot Rails in the bridge was super fat sounding. I really enjoy this pickup in strats where you want that humbucker sound but don't want to swap pickguards or route the bridge pickup route out. It's not the most dynamic pickup in the world, but it goes high gain well. The Hot Rails middle was totally useless as it was just too hot to do anything worthwhile when it came to the in between positions. The Neck one was real cool as I could get super fat lead tones, and the guitar was bright enough to where the fatness wasn't overly muddy.
OVERALL OPINION
The guitar is cool, but you can get a lot of better strats out there. These are hard to find, especially in the states. Like I said, I believe it was imported and was never for sale here in the US, but I could be totally wrong. If you like the color, I guess it's worth looking into. One thing's for sure, you don't see many poplar strats out there today.
UTILIZATION
The guitar reminded me of an old school Fender, and I guess that's the entire vibe they were going for. Chris' original guitar was based off of a 60s strat, I believe. The overall weight of this, however, was big. It seemed to be heavier than most Strats, and I question how good the poplar was that they chose for this guitar. The frets needed some attention, and it was the standard Mexico fretwork that I tend to see on guitars. It's half way decent, but it really needs a good fret level and recrowning. The neck joint was tight, so no issues there. I'd replace the nut with something a bit better than the synthetic crap that the MIM guitars tend to come equipped with, but all in all, it was decent.
SOUNDS
The guitar had some Hot Rails in all three positions. I believe Chris uses these on his guitars, but I'm not entirely sure. I know he uses some sort of Rails pickups that are beat up quite a bit. The Hot Rails in the bridge was super fat sounding. I really enjoy this pickup in strats where you want that humbucker sound but don't want to swap pickguards or route the bridge pickup route out. It's not the most dynamic pickup in the world, but it goes high gain well. The Hot Rails middle was totally useless as it was just too hot to do anything worthwhile when it came to the in between positions. The Neck one was real cool as I could get super fat lead tones, and the guitar was bright enough to where the fatness wasn't overly muddy.
OVERALL OPINION
The guitar is cool, but you can get a lot of better strats out there. These are hard to find, especially in the states. Like I said, I believe it was imported and was never for sale here in the US, but I could be totally wrong. If you like the color, I guess it's worth looking into. One thing's for sure, you don't see many poplar strats out there today.