Ultimate STRATS

The Strat is the most famous electric of all time - the original guitar for all seasons. But which version represents the pinnacle of its evolution? We take a deep dive into Leo's masterpiece, in the company of experts, to try to find an answer...

- Jamie Dickson

Ever since its launch in 1954, the Fender Stratocaster has been, at once, the most recognisable electric in the world and the most mercurial. While Telecasters tend to deliver a somewhat familiar ride every time you pick one up, when you try a Strat for the first time it’s harder to predict whether it will be light, pristine and bright – or dark, warm and gutsy. That’s partly because, beneath the skin, the model has changed like a chameleon through the different phases in its evolution.

With the model’s eighth decade in production just around the corner, we began thinking about whether it’s possible to crown a particular point in the Strat’s storied life where it had reached perfection, the peak of its evolution as a design. A point before which everything was a work in progress – and after which everything was merely a variation on a theme. To help us answer this slippery question, we enlisted the help of some true Strat aficionados to try to identify the point at which the model reached its apex – if that exists in any meaningful sense – while gaining fresh insights into this timeless design.

Since we ran a detailed comparison between vintage guitars and their Custom Shop counterparts back in issue 443, we’re going to exclude reissues from the reckoning, since they are essentially just modified copies of the original kit. If modern Strat tone is your thing, you’ll find guides to contemporary visions of Fender’s Strat elsewhere in this feature. Here, however, we’re going to look at the seminal early decades of the Strat’s evolution and see if we can chart where the original seed of Strat design reached its zenith.

IN THE BEGINNING