Let’s see those Super Strats!

I've never figured any Ibanez to be a Strat, let alone a Super Strat. Yeah, it does have kinda the same shape, but does that make them Strats too?
I reckon YMMV.

I think this is the closest I got. The Evil Strat:
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Ibanez Edge Pro trem, locking tuners (probably redundant since I got a locking nut now I think about it), a Warmoth body, neck somewhere off Ebay, Chrome Lace Sensor red/silver dually humbucker for the bridge, Lace Sensor silver single coil for the middle, Fernandes Sustainer system for the neck. Les Paul toggle kill switch in the lower horn, as is a tiny push button kill switch next to the volume knob. The lower tone knob is part of the Sustainer controls so I guess only tone knob for all the pickups to control them and in the darkness bind them. Below the trem sits a Zvex Fuzz Factory clone circuit so I can do Matt Bellamy style fuzzy oscillation madness. This was basically the first custom build guitar for me, although I did source all the parts myself and only had the painting and assembly done for me. After that I got into actual guitar building myself.

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iaresee said:
I guess this counts then? Though I don't consider it a superstrat, really. More just...weird.

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IMHO, the single coil size bridge pickup seems less superstraty to me than a full size one. If it had a full size bucker, I would argue to death that it was indeed a superstrat.
 
guitarnerdswe said:
IMHO, the single coil size bridge pickup seems less superstraty to me than a full size one. If it had a full size bucker, I would argue to death that it was indeed a superstrat.
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People are posting the most non-Straty guitars here, whose only resemblance to Strats is like an APC or mechanized artillery piece has to a tank, because they all have tracks. It's an actual Strat, it's a humbucker, to me it passes.
 
Muad'zin said:
People are posting the most non-Straty guitars here, whose only resemblance to Strats is like an APC or mechanized artillery piece has to a tank, because they all have tracks. It's an actual Strat, it's a humbucker, to me it passes.
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Dude, a Super Strat is a strat style guitar (body style, scale length) with a bridge Humbucker, specs to improve performance from a stock Strat, and as of the 80s a double locking tremolo.

The idea of the Super Strat goes back to the late 70s and was the marriage of Gibson tone and playability with Fender features along with mods to improve tuning stability.
Capt Nasty said:
It has always been my understanding that the mods players were making in the late 70s were : larger frets, lower action, thinner neck, flatter fretboard radius, bridge humbucker, and (eventually) double locking tremolo.

Wayne Charvel thought it was crazy to mod brand new guitars and wondered why someone could not just produce a brand new strat that had the specs that players wanted. Charvel decided to do just that and the “super strat” concept grew from there.

Double locking tremolos were not available for use on the first super strats.
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There was only one post in this thread that I would say had no super strats in it.

Also, yes an Ibanez RG is a Super Strat. It was Ibanez’s answer to Jackson, Charvel, Kramer, ESP, etc. Next are you going to try to say that Charvels are not Super Strats, when it was Charvel that defined what a Super Strat is?

The first widely recognized superstrat and the guitar that started a movement: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frankenstrat

Note that the body and neck were sourced from Wayne Charvel. Charvel was literally the epicenter of the superstrat explosion. He was sourcing and/or building for EVH, George Lynch, and the players who started the 80s shred era.
 
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Capt Nasty said:
Dude, a Super Strat is a strat style guitar (body style, scale length) with a bridge Humbucker, specs to improve performance from a stock Strat, and as of the 80s a double locking tremolo.
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This.

To flesh this out in slightly more detail, I would say....

The "Strat"-type guitar is picked out by what distinguishes it from the "Les Paul" and "Tele" types:
  • solid body, not hollow or semi-hollow;
  • two horns/cutaways, not just one (the upper "horn" being longer than the lower);
  • tremolo, not hardtail;
  • 25.5" scale length, rather than 25" or shorter;
  • Strat-style pickguard, rather than LP, Tele, or none;
  • More than 3 pickup sounds available (typically on a blade switch)

Not every "Strat" has all of the above, but to really be in the "Strat" namespace it needs to have a large majority of those details.

Now, once it's a "Strat" it can also be a "Super Strat" in the ways that Capt. Nasty described. That is: It becomes "Super" if it has at least one humbucker pickup sound (usually the bridge), plus some of the following technological/performance advantages not available in the 60's:
  • locking nut or tuners (+improved nut/trees);
  • locking trem;
  • a sculpted heel and deep lower cutaway;
  • 24 frets;
  • extra sounds/capabilities available via extra switching;

It can lose the pickguard and still qualify as a "Strat" and thus as a "Super Strat"; but if it loses the "two horn" shape (or if the two "horns" are closer to SG shape) then it no longer qualifies.

The classic example of a "Super Strat," then, is probably something like Steve Vai's Ibanez Jem models. It's definitely in the "Strat" genre by virtue of its shape, its pickguard, its scale length, its blade pickup selector, and the presence of a whammy bar. And it's "Super" by virtue of the locking nut and trem, the fancy cosmetics and "monkey grip," the 24 frets, and the humbuckers replacing the bridge and neck pickups.

A guitar that has only one of the "Strat" hallmarks but lacks the others is not a "Strat";
A guitar that has only one of the "Super" hallmarks but no more is probably better described as an unusual strat, but not a "Super Strat."

Consequently, the example given by iaresee, above (a normal Strat with a single-coil-sized humbucker in the bridge) isn't enough to qualify as a "Super" Strat. But add an upgraded trem and locking nut, and give it a fancy non-stock pickguard or finish, and now we're getting in the ballpark.
 
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Fro said:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superstrat
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From that same article: There is no formal definition of a superstrat;[3] the categorisation is still largely left to popular opinion and depends greatly on the artist(s) associated with a particular model and how it is marketed.

Ergo, what I figure a Super Strat to be is just as good as any. Which means that in my head canon Ibanez guitars are not Super Strats, in yours they are and iaresee's Strat with a puny hot rail is also one. So basically it means nothing so we might as well rename this thread post your favorite shred guitar. :p

And to me there is nothing Strathy about a Jem, because a Strat is a thing of beauty, whereas a Jem is thing of beauty that is not.

I'm just messing with you guys, but I do think it wouldn't hurt to narrow down the definition to something that clearly recognizable looks like a Strat. And the Jem has been evolved so far away from the Strat that its a new species. The only thing it has in common is in having two horns, a pick guard and possibly the same scale. But by that reasoning velociraptor and tyrannosaurus rex are the same species as well.
 
Hellbat said:
I think people need to spend less time bitching about what is or isn’t and more time posting pictures of guitars. ;)
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Without a clear definition we might as well rename this thread post your guitars and then we can do just that.
 
Muad'zin said:
And to me there is nothing Strathy about a Jem, because a Strat is a thing of beauty, whereas a Jem is thing of beauty that is not.
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Full disclosure: 25 years ago, my drummer bought me a 1975 Strat. He instated I never play my Ibanez in public ever again. He can't stand the look of it. Although I do still have the Ibanez, it's the '75 Strat the gets played. What can I say?
 
Muad'zin said:
From that same article: There is no formal definition of a superstrat;[3] the categorisation is still largely left to popular opinion and depends greatly on the artist(s) associated with a particular model and how it is marketed.

Ergo, what I figure a Super Strat to be is just as good as any. Which means that in my head canon Ibanez guitars are not Super Strats, in yours they are and iaresee's Strat with a puny hot rail is also one. So basically it means nothing so we might as well rename this thread post your favorite shred guitar. :p

And to me there is nothing Strathy about a Jem, because a Strat is a thing of beauty, whereas a Jem is thing of beauty that is not.

I'm just messing with you guys, but I do think it wouldn't hurt to narrow down the definition to something that clearly recognizable looks like a Strat. And the Jem has been evolved so far away from the Strat that its a new species. The only thing it has in common is in having two horns, a pick guard and possibly the same scale. But by that reasoning velociraptor and tyrannosaurus rex are the same species as well.
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You are entitled to be wrong...
 
Here's another one:
90-geertstratface.jpg

89-geertstratsidetreb.jpg

88-geertstratback.jpg
 
MisterE said:
Here's another one:
90-geertstratface.jpg

89-geertstratsidetreb.jpg

88-geertstratback.jpg
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Aren't you afraid the bottom stud is going to tear out? As a luthier I know would say, not a lot of meat between that stud and the routing for the bridge pickup. Other then that a thing of beauty.

unix-guy said:
Beauty! But I'm not a fan of pickup rings for single coil pickups.
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Visually I don't like them either, on the other side it beats having to use woodscrews.
 
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