Runboard.com
Слава Україні!
Community logo


runboard.com       Sign up (learn about it) | Sign in (lost password?)

Page:  1  2  3  4  5 

 
David Meadows Profile
Live feed
Blog
Friends
Miscellaneous info

The Fountain Of Useless Knowledge

Registered: 09-2003
Posts: 5670
Reply | Quote
The Signature Strat


When you get a Ritchie Blackmore "signature" strat, what exactly do you get? I assume it's not just a standard strat with a signature on it. Is it a copy of a custom-made model that was designed by Ritchie? With his specific neck scalloping or pickup arrangement or whatever?

(I'm not thinking of buying one, by the way! the subject of sugnature instruments came up elsewhere and made me curious about Ritchie's.)

---
"If you are worried that your children are going to read low-quality information, teach them. Teach them what to read. Teach them how to judge information."
Tim Berners-Lee (creator of the World Wide Web)
28/7/2004, 14:22 Link to this post Send Email to David Meadows   Send PM to David Meadows
 
Ritchies Strat Profile
Live feed
Blog
Friends
Miscellaneous info

Banned user

Registered: 09-2003
Posts: 4267
Reply | Quote
Re: The Signature Strat


quote:

David Meadows wrote:

When you get a Ritchie Blackmore "signature" strat, what exactly do you get? I assume it's not just a standard strat with a signature on it. Is it a copy of a custom-made model that was designed by Ritchie? With his specific neck scalloping or pickup arrangement or whatever?

(I'm not thinking of buying one, by the way! the subject of sugnature instruments came up elsewhere and made me curious about Ritchie's.)


 It depends on which one you buy. The Jap model made in 97 is just a Strat with a scalloped fretboard and two Seymour Duncan 1/4 lber's and no middle pickup (cover only). It only comes in Olympic White and has RS's sig on the headstock. The Japs took it upon themselves to add some of RB's changes to a standard Strat along with the large headstock of the 70's.
 Then RB got consulted on the Fender Custom Shop Strat made in America and had them redesign it. They put in large Gibson style frets, the scalloped fretboard, two pickups with the plate modified so they didn't have to use a cover for the missing pickup. They also use Fender Gold Lace Sensor pickups which come closer to RB's 70's sound as opposed to the higher powered Seymour Duncans which resemble RB's 80's sound. The CS Strat also has something all Strats don't have and that is a set neck, just like the Gibsons, which add more sustain and also has the large headstock with RB's signature. They are also selling two versions. A standard and a Roland ready with the synthesizer pickup installed next to the bridge.
 The Jap model cost me $699 USD and the CS (without the syth pickup) cost me $2,700 USD. Since it took two years from my order until delivery, the price had gone up to about $3,500-3,800, however since I has already paid for it, I only paid the original price and also got the first one delivered. Of course, now I have both personally signed by RB on the horn area. His signature on the headstocks included a sketch of a Rainbow which he was adding to his autographs. By the time I got them personally signed, he was sketching a 1/4 moon with his autograph.



---
"Every time she goes Vavoom,
I wiggle in my chair"- excerpt from the book 'Things a Grown Man Should Never Say'.
28/7/2004, 16:25 Link to this post Send Email to Ritchies Strat   Send PM to Ritchies Strat
 
Speed King Profile
Live feed
Blog
Friends
Miscellaneous info

Banned user

Registered: 05-2004
Posts: 1025
Reply | Quote
Re: The Signature Strat


quote:

Ritchies Strat wrote:

quote:

David Meadows wrote:

When you get a Ritchie Blackmore "signature" strat, what exactly do you get? I assume it's not just a standard strat with a signature on it. Is it a copy of a custom-made model that was designed by Ritchie? With his specific neck scalloping or pickup arrangement or whatever?

(I'm not thinking of buying one, by the way! the subject of sugnature instruments came up elsewhere and made me curious about Ritchie's.)


 It depends on which one you buy. The Jap model made in 97 is just a Strat with a scalloped fretboard and two Seymour Duncan 1/4 lber's and no middle pickup (cover only). It only comes in Olympic White and has RS's sig on the headstock. The Japs took it upon themselves to add some of RB's changes to a standard Strat along with the large headstock of the 70's.
 Then RB got consulted on the Fender Custom Shop Strat made in America and had them redesign it. They put in large Gibson style frets, the scalloped fretboard, two pickups with the plate modified so they didn't have to use a cover for the missing pickup. They also use Fender Gold Lace Sensor pickups which come closer to RB's 70's sound as opposed to the higher powered Seymour Duncans which resemble RB's 80's sound. The CS Strat also has something all Strats don't have and that is a set neck, just like the Gibsons, which add more sustain and also has the large headstock with RB's signature. They are also selling two versions. A standard and a Roland ready with the synthesizer pickup installed next to the bridge.
 The Jap model cost me $699 USD and the CS (without the syth pickup) cost me $2,700 USD. Since it took two years from my order until delivery, the price had gone up to about $3,500-3,800, however since I has already paid for it, I only paid the original price and also got the first one delivered. Of course, now I have both personally signed by RB on the horn area. His signature on the headstocks included a sketch of a Rainbow which he was adding to his autographs. By the time I got them personally signed, he was sketching a 1/4 moon with his autograph.




 emoticon Are you trying to tell me, that the Squier Strat (white) that the guy in the music shop sold to me for £90 is not an exact duplicate of Blackmores???? No wonder it doesn,t play properly.
28/7/2004, 16:49 Link to this post Send PM to Speed King
 
BlackerThanNight Profile
Live feed
Blog
Friends
Miscellaneous info

Purple fan

Registered: 11-2003
Posts: 1600
Reply | Quote
Re: The Signature Strat


It doesn't matter which version of Ritchies "Signature" Strat you buy NOT a single one of them bear anything other than a passing resemblence to his own guitars. Yes, your signature strat will look vaguely like Ritchie's guitar and yes it's a Fender Strat, but that's as far as it goes.

A very basic example of this can be seen in Ritchies current stage guitar. It's NOT actually White at all and it probably never was. It looks yellow, but infact it's a natural wood with a tinted glaze over the top of it which makes it look yellow/cream. The guitar body is a reasonable age, becuase the finish has started to 'check' which means it's got crack in it which only appear with age. Current so called "blonde" and "MAry KAy" strats have similar finishes. So why is Ritchie's "Signature" Strat produced in "Fridge White" it's nothing like the colour of his. YJM strats are done in so called Vintage White which is a yellow/cream white, whoich is closer to the colour, but it's not the same "tinted" varnish effect at all.

1) The scalloping on the Japanese version, supposedly was taken from the neck of his strat, but you'll find it was not cut as deep as Ritchies, because if it was they'd struggle to sell the guitars, because most guitarists would hate it and find it un-playable. The same is also true of the YJM guitars as well. Ritchie's neck is scalloped with more exhagerated cuts and they are deeper.

2) Yes Ritchie used Seymour DUncans and Lace Sensors. He still uses LAce Sensors today. However, if you think they are the stock factory pickup, try again. Lace offer a complete custom service which is available to any who is prepared to pay for it, where upon they will wind anything you want to get a sound or tone from a pickup. You'll find that Ritchie has made very good use of that service. So the signature strat with the standard Gold Lace Sensors, is basically a lookie-likie but NOT a soundie-likie at all.

3) There are things under the scratchplate on the Masters own guitars which DO NOT get put into the "Signature" versions at all. These are custom designed circuits which boost the mids and highs in the signal and allow blending between the stadard sound and the "treated" sound. THese are not crude boosters like the mid-boost in the Clapton Signature guitar. Watch how Ritchie carefully positions his volume control, he's feeling for the centre detent position causing circuit bypass adn a thinner sound, then he rams it full up and suddenly he's got lot's of mids. Notice how the "warble" between the neck and bridge pickup is hugely exhagerated on Ritchie's guitar. Now try that on your "signature" version.....funnily enough it sounds NOTHING like Ritchie!!!

4) The $4,000 Custom Shop set Neck strat is even more of a laugh for Fender. No doubt a nice instrument, but worth the price......NO CHANCE. The body and through neck will be costing Fender about $200 maximum to produce, the hardware and electrics cost them another $200 maximum, the labour might cost them another $200, so now we're at $600 maxed out........and you'll pay $4,000, it's a complete joke. TO have the guitar handmade here in the UK exactly to the Fender Specification, by a real luthier is £900( minus Ritchie's signature of course ) I have had quotes! So to buy that instrument for $4,000 you'd need your head tested. There was even a Japanese version of the set neck around for a while, although discontinued now and it was less than £1,000 I seem to recall.

5) Ritchie's guitars are set-up properly, so that they will play as well as they possibly can play. To do this properly takes time, requires a good ear and a very clear idea of personal preferences in playing styles. So Ritchie's own guitars are setup buy him for him. The standard out the factory Strat even the more expensive "Signature" and even Custom Shop "Signature " guitars are NOT setup to an optimum playing level. Frequently they are barely properly setup at all. Th eUSA one being the worst. The Japanses strats are usually much better quality and setup. I've frequently seen brand new guitars both Fenders and Gibson costing £1,000s where the setup was so poor that they were effectively unplayable. Typically they will have uneven frets which need dressed before the guitar will even begin to play well. The music shop just takes them out the box and hangs them up till you come and buy them, then you've got the problem to set them up right( assuming you know how and lots of 'guitar players' haven't got a clue! )

SO

When you buy a Ritchie Blackmore Signature Strat or indeed ANY of these Signature Instruments( the Hendrix one being the best laugh, he was dead 20 years before his signature model arrived, so maybe there was divine intervention with the design of it !!! ) you are buying nothing more than a standard guitar which looks vaguely like the original, but otherwise the only thing it has in common with it is that its also a Fender or a Gibson or whatever it might be. It will NEVER EVER sound like the original at all, or make you sound like the original. But you do get a stuck on transfer of the artist signature, now that must be where the real value is, that's where the extra $1,000's worth of value is contained.........eh NOT !

The Tony Iommi Signature Gibson is a good example. MOstly Tony Iommi used custom made SG shaped guitars made by PAtrick Eggle and in fact didn't use Gibsons at all. Suddenly Gibson and Iommi decide to design a pickup called the Tony Iommi Humbucker and they make a guitar to fit it!!! It's jsut pure marketiing hype from start to finish.

Signature AMPS are just the same. ENGL did the Ritchie Blackmore Signature Amp. There is as far as I know only one German gig where Ritchie actually used one of the "Signature" amps, in fact he may not have used it at all, but it was on display in his rig. Beyond that he used an ENGL but NOT his own "signature" model, a different model from the ENGL range( Savage 120's )!!!

Marshall produce the Zak Wylde Signature amp, but it's common knowledge that the only part of the amp that Zak uses is the power amp, becuase the pre-amp is so crap, Zak's unatural sound( and who'd want it anyway??!!) comes, not from the amp, but from the battery of effects pedals he uses and the EMG pickups in his guitars,and then puts into the amp power stage . His signature amp has the same power stage as all the same model marshalls which are loads cheaper, so buying his 'signature' amp is an entire waste of $$$.

It's all just marketing and another way to extract yet more $$$ from the loyal fans who want to reproduce the sound they heard. Sadly very little of what you hear at gigs is produced from the equipment you can see on stage so buying that same gear will NOT guarantee you that same sound at all.



Last edited by BlackerThanNight, 28/7/2004, 22:54
28/7/2004, 22:42 Link to this post Send Email to BlackerThanNight   Send PM to BlackerThanNight
 
englishrob Profile
Live feed
Blog
Friends
Miscellaneous info

Purple fan

Registered: 10-2003
Posts: 443
Reply | Quote
Re: The Signature Strat


quote:

BlackerThanNight wrote:


1) The scalloping on the Japanese version, supposedly was taken from the neck of his strat,



It was. While we were on tour in Japan, I had to take the guitar to Fender in Tokyo.

Rob
29/7/2004, 10:16 Link to this post Send Email to englishrob   Send PM to englishrob
 
BlackerThanNight Profile
Live feed
Blog
Friends
Miscellaneous info

Purple fan

Registered: 11-2003
Posts: 1600
Reply | Quote
Re: The Signature Strat


quote:

englishrob wrote:

quote:

BlackerThanNight wrote:


1) The scalloping on the Japanese version, supposedly was taken from the neck of his strat,



It was. While we were on tour in Japan, I had to take the guitar to Fender in Tokyo.

Rob



Yep and Fender Japan, put it on a CNC machine, traced it's contours and had all the cutting data stored in their computer, they then made a test neck, realised that the scallops were way deeper than would suit the "average Joe" so they adjusted them to give the general appearance without being quite as brutal as the original. It makes sense. There's no point for Fender to produce a guitar that "average Joes" can't play becuase if they can't play it they won't buy it and so it won't do what it's supposed to, which is to make moeny for Fender and the Artist. After sorting the neck to suit the 'average Joe' while still being scalloped,they can turn them out by the 1,000's if required.

Apart from anything else, Ritchie claimed to do his own scalloping work to each guitar, so in theory no two of Ritchies guitar neck could be exactly identical anyway, so again the "signature strat" is just an approximation of the Artisits instrument rather than an exact replica.

I think the problem with a lot of the Signature stuff that's produced is that the inference or implication in the marketing hype is that the Artist actually uses the same item, when in reality they frequently do not and would not. To a degree common sense would tell you it wasn't likely that the Artist would use the stuff, but that's the way they market the whole thing.

So Rob, were you involved in any other aspects of the "Ritchie Signature " programme, like the ENGL amps for instance, or the $4,000 Set neck ( rip-off ) sorry I mean Strat!!
29/7/2004, 13:28 Link to this post Send Email to BlackerThanNight   Send PM to BlackerThanNight
 
englishrob Profile
Live feed
Blog
Friends
Miscellaneous info

Purple fan

Registered: 10-2003
Posts: 443
Reply | Quote
Re: The Signature Strat


quote:

BlackerThanNight wrote:


So Rob, were you involved in any other aspects of the "Ritchie Signature " programme, like the ENGL amps for instance, or the $4,000 Set neck ( rip-off ) sorry I mean Strat!!



Nope...I had nothing to do with them. You can't pin it on me emoticon lol.

Rob
29/7/2004, 14:56 Link to this post Send Email to englishrob   Send PM to englishrob
 
Strabo1 Profile
Live feed
Blog
Friends
Miscellaneous info

Purple fan

Registered: 04-2004
Posts: 24
Reply | Quote
Re: The Signature Strat


I wouldn't be surprised if the Signature strats with Ritchie's name on them differed significantly from those used by Ritchie himself (although he did bother to pose for a few promo pics with the set-neck version, so he presumably owns one, even if he doesn't use it). And BtN is simply right when he decries the set-up of many guitars sold for big bucks; those which are not actively out of whack still need setting up for the player who is going to purchase them.

Set-up is as personal as clothing: a very few people can wear something off the rack and make it look tailored, most people need a few adjustments and the best solution - if not the cheapest - is to have it made from scratch to fit perfectly. Which perhaps takes us back to the attenuated scalloping by the Japanese custom shop - by the same analogy, they realised that Ritchie's "inside leg measurement" was not going to fit everyone.

I have made myself a Strat which looks very similar to a RB Sig strat, but has 3 Bill Lawrence pickups and a 4-bolt, thick U-profile, lightly-scalloped birdseye maple neck. All told it cost me about EUR500, and looks the part - but it's not set up like Ritchie's; it suits ME. I'm now getting started on a Rory Gallagher strat. I reckon it'll cost about the same for the bits, so I'll have two guitars I want, perfectly set up for my playing style, and will have saved about $5k in the process.

The signature series is intended to separate people from their money - I quite like having a strat which looks a bit like Ritchie's, but the only signature I want on the PLAYING aspects of my guitar is my own.

Mind you, tosser than I am, I couldn't resist sticking a strap button on the front of the headstock.. (but only with superglue, as I couldn't bear to put a screw-hole through a finish which had taken me three weeks to spray and polish..)
29/7/2004, 15:17 Link to this post Send Email to Strabo1   Send PM to Strabo1
 
Ritchies Strat Profile
Live feed
Blog
Friends
Miscellaneous info

Banned user

Registered: 09-2003
Posts: 4267
Reply | Quote
Re: The Signature Strat


quote:

Strabo1 wrote:

I wouldn't be surprised if the Signature strats with Ritchie's name on them differed significantly from those used by Ritchie himself (although he did bother to pose for a few promo pics with the set-neck version, so he presumably owns one, even if he doesn't use it).


 The last two shows I've seen BN, RB has played the set neck Strat.



---
"Every time she goes Vavoom,
I wiggle in my chair"- excerpt from the book 'Things a Grown Man Should Never Say'.
29/7/2004, 16:32 Link to this post Send Email to Ritchies Strat   Send PM to Ritchies Strat
 
Strabo1 Profile
Live feed
Blog
Friends
Miscellaneous info

Purple fan

Registered: 04-2004
Posts: 24
Reply | Quote
Re: The Signature Strat


There you go - now even RB uses a guitar with a set up different from the "original". Or maybe he has had it altered to resemble the one it was copied from in the first place..

I saw BN in Reading last November and he played a white strat which, whilst battered, could have been a Signature model. There was at least one deep rout in the back (I saw it on a rack after the show), so who knows what else has been done to it?
29/7/2004, 17:26 Link to this post Send Email to Strabo1   Send PM to Strabo1
 


Reply

Page:  1  2  3  4  5 





You are not logged in (login)