Strat!

With the advent of my decision to discontinue the Jazzmaster project, I've gone back to looking at my Strat and its status.

I know I can't possibly resist continuing to do mods and projects (and why would I?) but I am planning on scaling back both scope and investment. Thus, I will be doing some inexpensive (and some free) mods to the old Strat.

I'll post an entry when I finish a mod, but here are some of the things I'm planning on doing:

1. Add a switch to add in neck (or bridge) pickup in any lever setting (7-tone mod)
2. Remove the paint and stickers from the neck heel and cavity
3. Sand off the paint on the tremolo block and where the block sits on the body (Eric Johnson)
4. Add a Floyd Rose-style bar string retainer to the headstock
5. Upgrade shady saddles to GraphTech saddles
6. Block the tremolo properly (I've got a little piece of maple already for this!)

I've also got a weird strat pickup.. from a Squier Bronco Bass that I replaced the pickup on. It's a standard Strat size (or very close), but it has bar magnets underneath, like a P-90. I've only heard it when it was on the bass, but it might make for an interesting experiment in the bridge position of the Strat!

Side Note: The Strat looks remarkably like the one Ted has in Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure.

Jazzmaster status

So, after getting the Jazzmaster project finished(ish), I had the chance to finally play it.


Unfortunately I wasn't really blown away. It certainly didn't sound bad, and it had a distinct airy quality to it (probably because of the floating bridge system), but it wasn't as breathtaking as I had imagined it to be.

Also, it had a very... complicated feel to it, and a little delicate, with all its strangely suspended parts and whatnot. I took it in for a setup from Drum City/Guitar Land, which helped somewhat.

I've decided that probably this Jazzmaster is too much guitar for me right now... and that I will probably part it back out and try to get most of my investment back. I'm not very disappointed, as the project itself was quite fun. But as part of my new focus I will probably be disassembling this bad boy in the near future.

Reboot

Recently several things finally came to my attention; things I knew but that weren't really sinking in.

First, that amps are equally (or perhaps more) important than a guitar in terms of the tone you will get; no matter how sweet of pickups or exotic woods I combine, I need a good amp or its going to sound mediocre.

Second, a guitar is a wood instrument that picks up vibrations using magnets and metal strings... and pickups and electronics can only change that primary tone so much. A shitty piece of wood that doesn't resonate well is going to still be shitty regardless of futuristic accoutrements. And you really need to pick up a guitar and mess around with it to see if it has what it takes.

Thirdly, I've realized (obviously) that I am putting too much energy into all these silly projects and not actually playing the guitar enough. What really counts for guitar is a good player and a good song; all this other stuff is thoroughly secondary to that.

So I will still be continuing my project blog, but the scope will be scaled back; probably more like little modifications to my strat, etc, as well as random ideas, thoughts, and inspirations about music.

I'm planning on starting on doing effect pedal mods; these should take a lot less investment and be more fun for how much work they require.

Publish Post

Thats the news folks. Until next time.

Jazzmaster

I am pretty far along on my Jazzmaster project, which I started a long time ago and have been sitting on a bit.

I snagged a Sunburst AVRI Jazzmaster body off of Ebay that had some cosmetic body damage; the whole thing was parted out but I just purchased the body. I slowly ordered the electronics, switches, and a gold anodized pickguard from Allparts, while doing plenty of research regarding the Jazzmaster in general.

Here is a little mockup I made using the Offset Guitar Forum's tool:
I have some Jazzmaster pickups from Jason Lollar arriving soon (today, hopefully) along with some miscellaneous parts early next week. The neck and tuners are the primary thing left to acquire.

I'll update further as I start to assemble it.

Fretless P Idea

Well, I just don't like to tone of my Mexican Jazz Fretless I got, so it has been posted for sale on Craigslist.

Now I'm looking to build a new fretless; a precision with an unlined fretboard is my current plan. I am thinking of using my existing black fender P-bass body with a black pickguard and a Warmoth P-bass neck with an unlined Pau Ferro fretboard.

It will probably look a bit like this:

http://www.avenue-guitars.com/Viewing/Basses/Fender%20FL%20PBass.JPG

Side Note:

If anyone is wondering why I am into this right now, just check out this link of this washed up 80's bass player dude rockin' out on his fretless:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XsVLOJDX-fM