Strat resonance

[iekobrid]

For years I've heard/read guys talk about the importance of testing the acoustic resonance of electric guitars in stores. "I always play it for a few minutes before I even plug in, just to hear the body wood vibrate. If there's no resonance unplugged, it would sound dead through an amp too!" so on and so forth.

With a fixed bridge guitar, I'll usually do a few quick hammer-ons to get a sense of whether it 'projects' well.. has good 'snap' to it. But lately I've been wondering -- how are you supposed to gauge the unplugged resonance of Stratocaster style guitars, where the cavity and springs in the back act like a reverb tank? If anything, I've found that cheaper MIM and Squier strats tend to sound much louder and brighter unplugged than more expensive MIA models, which often sound quite dull and lifeless unplugged. Does that mean the higher end models are transferring more mechanical energy from the strings to the wood instead of the trem springs? If so, is that good, bad, or irrelevant?

 

[006]

FWIW the MIM Fender Strats are made to the same specs as their American counterparts. Just cheaper labor, hardware and woods usually... I had, at one time, about 4 USA Strats, my first guitar was a MIM Standard, still have it and it still plays/sounds great. I have another MIM I got last year, a 50th Anniversary Tex-Mex, again, just a great axe. I no longer have those USA models I once owned, but I did get a 25th Anniversary USA Strat that was my grandfather's. After having the 25th setup professionally, and the two MIMs I set up myself...I prefer the MIMs much more. I love Strats, but so far I've never really been impressed with the USA models I have played, and owned, in comparison to the MIM models I have played and owned. Lots of guys take MIM Strats and just swap the neck and pickups out too. Think about that one.

Just for conversation's sake

~006

 

[tobin1]

Strats are tricky, when my dad owned his music store we would even get some Squiers that sounded better and had a better stock setup than some 500$+ more American strats. But regardless of that, my 40th Anniversary strat plays better and sounds brighter than any strat ive ever touched...But at the same time, I have a friend that swears by his Mexican, and doesn't really like mine

What im getting at, is that when it comes to strats I would play it extensively before you purchase one, because there may be another that fits you better.

 

[grywolf627]

^^ I second that. I've played around on different strats over the years. But my '97 American Strat Deluxe Plus was (sold it recently) one of the nicest playing and sounding guitars I've ever had...straight from the factory.

 

[iekobrid]

FWIW the MIM Fender Strats are made to the same specs as their American counterparts. Just cheaper labor, hardware and woods usually... I had, at one time, about 4 USA Strats, my first guitar was a MIM Standard, still have it and it still plays/sounds great. I have another MIM I got last year, a 50th Anniversary Tex-Mex, again, just a great axe. I no longer have those USA models I once owned, but I did get a 25th Anniversary USA Strat that was my grandfather's. After having the 25th setup professionally, and the two MIMs I set up myself...I prefer the MIMs much more. I love Strats, but so far I've never really been impressed with the USA models I have played, and owned, in comparison to the MIM models I have played and owned.

A good used MiM is definitely what I'm shooting for. If I saw a Jimmie Vaughan Tex-Mex for under $400, I'd buy first and ask questions ("Do I actually like a soft-V neck?") later.

What im getting at, is that when it comes to strats I would play it extensively before you purchase one, because there may be another that fits you better.

Oh, absolutely. The thing is, the store nearest my job has roughly a dozen used Strats at any given moment, covering a pretty wide range of ages and original price points. They'll have a '57 RI next to a Warmoth homebuild next to a Jeff Beck signature; some may have been set up professionally in the past month, others might still have the same strings the factory put on.

I rarely have more than 15-20 minutes once a week to pop in there, so I was hoping I could filter out the dogs quickly with the same informal hammer-on resonance test I use to determine, say, which of three seemingly identical Les Pauls to concentrate on. But those trem springs mess with mah equations, man.

Is a strat that's loud n' lively unplugged still sitting on the shelf usually a winner when you plug it in, or is that pronounced acoustic resonance (thanks to the springs) actually the sign of a lousy strat *, or is there no rule of thumb at all?

* [the opposite of what tends to be true of fixed bridge guitars]

 

[Metaltastic]

"Do I actually like a soft-V neck?"

Blecchh, on that note, I just had my first taste of this on a Dean USA Splittail (IMO one of the ugliest guitars ever btw ) I played this past weekend, and hated it - it just dug into my thumb unpleasantly; why anyone would want a point on the back of the neck escapes me :Smug:

 

[iekobrid]

I go back and forth on the vee. Years ago I played a Clapton sig and it was easily the most comfortable neck I'd felt to date. Last week I played one again and after 10 minutes my arm went numb. Go figure.

 

[AudioPhile777]

Blecchh, on that note, I just had my first taste of this on a Dean USA Splittail (IMO one of the ugliest guitars ever btw ) I played this past weekend, and hated it - it just dug into my thumb unpleasantly; why anyone would want a point on the back of the neck escapes me :Smug:

It's called blues... some people (myself included) like to wrap their thumbs up over the the top of the fretboard... personally I like being able to fret chords this way... though, i'm not much a fan of soft V necks... I do like really thick D shaped necks for this purpose...

 

[Kazrog]

The best Strat I've played was the Eric Johnson signature model in the store. Sounded great unplugged, as well as through the Fender Supersonic amp I tried it out through. No other American strat would really interest me honestly.

The import strats and squiers can sometimes sound better than expensive American ones. You really have to try out a lot of strats. I remember hearing a story where Steve Vai was searching for the "ultimate" strat, at any price, in all the music stores in the Los Angeles area. He tried out tons of new strats, as well as vintage strats that commanded up to $25,000, and ended up going with a cheaper, brand new import strat because it sounded better than all the others.

My only strat is a Fender Roland-Ready strat, which makes a decent MIDI controller but a terrible guitar. Someday I may get a better strat, but it's not a sound I need very often.

 

[Metaltastic]

My only strat is a Fender Roland-Ready strat, which makes a decent MIDI controller but a terrible guitar. Someday I may get a better strat, but it's not a sound I need very often.

Ooh, now THAT is fucking awesome, I'd love one of those to screw around with. It's not the MIDI functionality that makes it a terrible guitar though, right? It just happens to be a bad Strat for whatever reason?

And Audiophile, yeah, I see where you're coming from, but at least a D-shaped neck doesn't have a freakin' point, which was what irked me. Still, give me a standard thin any day! (although I also LOVED the feel of the asymmetrical Wolfgang neck, viewable on the same page, when I played my friend's)