As conservative as Eric Clapton's playing might be for some, the electric guitar he preferred is timelessly versatile. That’s because the Fender Stratocaster was full of innovations when it was launched in the spring of 1954. In retrospect it could be described as something like the iPhone of electric guitars.
Birth of an icon: 1954 Fender Stratocaster serial number 0102, the second one ever made. Photographed at Davidson's Well Strung Guitars, Farmingdale, New York.
Cult Guitar of the 1960s
In fact, the design team at the Californian company is said to have had a guitar from the distant future in mind when they designed the Stratocaster. It was no coincidence that the name of the new model alluded to the lofty heights that could be reached with it. But with the finished product, the clever designers exceeded their wildest dreams. To this day, this sensually curved instrument, which seems to nestle against the player and combines ease of use with elegance, has lost none of its futuristic fascination.
When you buy a Stratocaster, you get a piece of history with it. Prominent guitarists such as David Gilmour, Jeff Beck and Mark Knopfler have ensured through their many years of preference that the Stratocaster has become the symbol of the electric guitar par excellence. However, despite its electronics, which were advanced for the time, and its then-new type of tremolo bar, which recreates the floating vibrato of a steel guitar, it is by no means a Stradivarius. [Note: Fender has always called the Stratocaster’s vibrato arm a “tremolo” unit, a misnomer which has become accepted terminology. Vibrato is a change in pitch, while tremolo is a modulation in volume. – Ed.]
A Fender Vintera II '60s Stratocaster, which duplicates the specs, look and feel of an original 1960s guitar.
The flowing guitar playing of David Gilmour (Pink Floyd) is almost unthinkable without the Stratocaster. Although the great stylist increasingly manipulated its sound with distortion, phasing effects, and compressors, Gilmour has remained faithful to the sound of the Stratocaster to this day, with just a few sideways leaps. However, his best and most famous solo at the end of “Another Brick In The Wall, Part 2” ( from The Wall, 1979) was played on a Gibson Les Paul.
Some guitarists think the sound of the Strat is so beautiful that they leave it unaltered. The New York record producer and studio musician Nile Rodgers has preferred the clear sound of the Stratocaster since the first hits of his disco band Chic. With his percussive guitar playing, the former jazz musician has left his mark on songs as diverse as David Bowie's “Let's Dance” and “Get Lucky” by Daft Punk.
Despite having illustrious players such as Buddy Holly, Hank Marvin (The Shadows) and The Beatles, sales of the Stratocaster initially failed to meet Fender's expectations. In the mid-1960s, the Stratocaster also fell out of favor amongst guitarists. Its bright, biting sound did not meet the needs of the British blues bands who were popular at the time, who preferred the denser tone of other, heavier instruments such as the Gibson Les Paul.
If it hadn't been for Jimi Hendrix, who made the Stratocaster his favorite guitar, it might have become a museum piece. Hendrix abused the tremolo arm of his Stratocaster to get previously unheard effects out of it, he explored the sound possibilities offered by the three pickups with the easy-to-operate switch, and took advantage of the light weight of the slim guitar body to strike wild poses on stage. In short: the Stratocaster was made for the virtuoso and showman Hendrix.
Under Hendrix's influence, Eric Clapton soon also played a Stratocaster and gave Stratocasters as gifts to colleagues including Pete Townshend and Stevie Winwood. In the mid-1970s, Jeff Beck also made the switch from the Gibson Les Paul to the Stratocaster: on the back cover of the LP Wired (1976), the inventive virtuoso can be seen with a Les Paul for the last time. On the front of the album, Beck is already posing with a white Stratocaster.
Crisis and Takeover
During this time, the cult around the Stratocaster, which was often copied by other companies, got rolling. This was despite, or perhaps because, the Fender company was in crisis. The takeover by media giant CBS in 1965 had led to a decline in production quality, which caused great damage to the company's reputation – and boosted demand for older Stratocasters.
It was not until 1985, after the company was sold to a new group of investors, that Fender managed to turn things around. Today, the completely restructured company offers a wide range of Stratocaster variations to cover every need of Stratocaster enthusiasts. New models are constantly being brought onto the market in various price ranges, and classics such as Rory Gallagher's original badly-damaged early 1960s Strat are faithfully reproduced, complete with extensive paint damage. The Fender Custom Shop offers models for professionals and enthusiasts. The company benefits from its modular production concept: the individual parts of the Stratocaster can be easily replaced or upgraded. This allows an instrument to be able to evolve with its owner.
Auction Prices
Probably the most famous Strat of all time is Eric Clapton's “Blackie” which also adorns the cover of his most commercially successful album, Slowhand (1977). Clapton assembled Blacky from three different Stratocasters which he bought for about $200 to $300 dollars each in the US in 1970. In the summer of 2004, he had “Blackie” auctioned off for just under a million dollars. The money went to the Crossroads Centre, Clapton's drug and alcohol rehabilitation facility in the Caribbean.
Famous Stratocasters are now considered a good financial investment. David Gilmour recently sold his black Strat, built in 1954, for around three million pounds. The proceeds went to a non-profit organization that fights climate change.
However, an illustrious provenance is no guarantee that a guitar will find a solvent buyer. Dweezil Zappa tried unsuccessfully for a long time to get rid of the Stratocaster that his father Frank Zappa had extensively repaired after Jimi Hendrix set it on fire at the 1968 Miami Pop Festival. You can't fiddle with a collector's item too much – even if it seems to come from the future.
Here are 10 songs that would be unthinkable without a Stratocaster. (Click on the links to listen.)
Buddy Holly and the Crickets – “Peggy Sue” (1957)
The Shadows – “Apache” (1960)
The Beatles – “Nowhere Man” (1965)
The Jimi Hendrix Experience – “Purple Haze” (1967)
Pink Floyd – “Money” (1973)
Eric Clapton – “Wonderful Tonight” (1977)
Dire Straits – “Sultans Of Swing” (1978)
David Bowie – “Let's Dance” (1983)
Red Hot Chili Peppers – “Californication” (1999)
Daft Punk Featuring Pharrell – “Get Lucky” (2013)
Nick Joyce is an arts writer and a practicing rock musician. He holds a degree in psychology from the University of Bristol and currently lives with his family in Basel, Switzerland. The above article on the Fender Stratocaster is an adaptation of a piece originally published in German in early 2024.
Header image: a breathtaking bevy of all-original red 1950s and 1960s Fender Stratocasters at Davidson's Well Strung Guitars, Farmingdale. Yes, those are originals, not reissues. Courtesy of Frank Doris (who also took the photo of the 1954 serial number 0102 Strat).
