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Post by guitarsam on Jul 19, 2011 13:11:20 GMT
Hi,
As I was born in the 1960's, Stratocasters were fairly commonplace by the time I was old enough to take notice and become interested in one. I can remember instantly taking to the sleek look,
but it wasn't until a little while after that I first heard and saw Hank Marvin and became hooked on the sound (and THAT colour!)
I have heard a few of the older guitar players I know say that the first time they saw a Strat, they thought it looked like something from outer space, or at the very least, like no other guitar of the time. I think Hank & Bruce even said similar things in interviews.
I would be interested hear from some of you fellow forum members who were around in the '50's & '60's, what were your first impressions of the Stratocaster.
I have an uncle who says that in the '50's, just seeing any solidbody guitar in the flesh was a novelty.
So, any thoughts on your first encounter with a Strat?
Come on! Let's get a good thread going here.
(Pardon my stupidity if this has been covered before).
Regards,
Scott
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Post by sixchannel on Jul 19, 2011 13:43:11 GMT
Having gone the archtop route in the late 50's, I was terribly un-impressed with the harsh, jangly sound that was Buddy Holly.  I thought the guitar was an odd shape for a guitar as well as sounding horrid. Then I saw The Shadows on the old B&W TV !! The sound was quite different and all of a sudden it was a wonderful guitar ! lol !! (Well, I was only 14 and fickle). I had no idea what the colour of the guitar was - it COULD have been black and white for all I knew - and it was the music press and album sleeves that showed me it was Red - but NOT Fiesta Red. Find me an album sleeve that showed Hank with his 34346 in salmon pink/fiesta red! It took 2 years plus before I actually owned one, although I played one (when I could get away with it) at Barratts most Saturdays. I once got shoved off the nice warm seat that was the top of a 1962/3 AC30 whilst plonking on a sunburst 62 in favour of a curly headed guy who, apparently, wanted to buy one. Dont know if he ever did buy one, but Tony Hicks of The Hollies took my place and he was (and still is) a great player. cheers ian |
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Post by Charlie Hall on Jul 19, 2011 13:44:02 GMT
The first Strat I saw in real life was a brand new one in Fiesta Red in Millers' shop window in Sidney Street, Cambridge. This would have been around 1961. I was surprised at how plastic the pickguard and pickup covers looked, after the impression I had from seeing Buddy Holly's Strat on the front cover of The Chirping Crickets album.
Regards,
Charlie
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Post by twang46 on Jul 19, 2011 14:37:50 GMT
The first one I saw was just before Xmas 1960, it was bought by one of the local businessmen for his son to learn to play properly on !! The colour was white with a rosewood board (in a tweed case) & the first thing Joe did with it was to slip on the frosty ground & fling the guitar flat on the pavement !..... fortunately the case did it's job & the guitar survived ok  Last I saw of it was 1964...... painted red Cheers Dick |
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Post by DaveC on Jul 19, 2011 15:47:36 GMT
Ian,
Was that Barratts, Oxford Road, Manchester?
DaveC
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Post by glyderslead on Jul 19, 2011 18:09:48 GMT
Hi all,
Well, if we're all going down memory lane, my first sighting of a Stratocaster in the flesh (or is that in the wood?) was hanging in the centre of the window of the late J60 Music Bar in the East End of London where I lived. Yes, like many others I stood and leered for a long time before reality set in. I just could not afford one of these at the price of £185gns or there abouts. I had made do with a Spanish style flat top with part of the sound hole cut out to take a pick up, I had endured using a an arch top similarly carved and modified, I had suffered a "Broadway" twin pickup solid and decided I would have to continue to make do.... and got a Hofner V3 (172) that I could afford, at less than a third of the price. That's the guitar I used at the Shenstone Park Rock Festival in 1963. Still got it and I still belive Hofner made a big mistake in not spending another 10shillings on wood and effort to make it a superior guitar - they had the capability. Perhaps they thought solid body instro's were only going to be a temporary phase so why bother. Since then, besides other brands, I have aquired a 1970's 3 bolt Fender, a 1984 mij squire, a couple of Elite Strats and Ian - sixchannels - cij Fender, my first in fiesta red. By the way Ian if you read this, I used it last Saturday for a short set of 8 and it is playing really well.
No doubt about it; the late Mr Fender did design and create something rather special.
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Post by brian on Jul 19, 2011 19:36:29 GMT
I saw the buddy holly show a few years ago at the wolverhampton grand theatre
i cant remember the guys name who did buddy but he was amazing
you just had to tap your feet. great old raw rock n roll and a fantastic show
and yes the buddy holly strat was there too not the real one though
did you see this show. will try to put pic on next thread. brian
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Post by joeboy on Jul 19, 2011 20:37:20 GMT
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Post by harley on Jul 19, 2011 21:13:32 GMT
Hi Robert
i just watched quite a few of his vids. He has even got all of Buddys movements and mannerisms off to a fine art. great stuff
regards
Ian
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Post by chrishampton1981 on Jul 19, 2011 22:21:32 GMT
Hi chaps!
I think some of my first sightings of a Strat were on Top Of The Pops but the one that really made me want one was when I watched Pink Floyd's concert film "PULSE" which was from their concerts at Earl's Court in 1994 on the tour behind The Division Bell. David Gilmour was using a 1983 '57 re-issue candy apple red Strat which had a maple neck, a shortened tremolo arm and EMG active pickups. Such a nice guitar and I just wanted one right then.
Kind Regards
Chris
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Post by cainy on Jul 20, 2011 1:59:26 GMT
Hi all, my first sighting was of Buddy Holly and his Strat but when I saw Hank's and heard the sound, that was for me, I had to beg and plead with my dad to stand guarantor for me to buy it on the never-never, so it was 1961 when I bought my Fiesta red Strat, it was January so it may have been a 1960 model, I never looked, then of course I needed an amp and it had to be a Vox AC30, again I pleaded with my Dad and got one in 1961, it had the treble booster knobs cut into the back on a white panel, I used it in my group and it never put a foot wrong, it was gigged all over the north of England, I could not afford a good echo like a Binson baby so like a lot of players then I bought a Watkins Copicat which did the trick and I felt on top of the world, it was all happening way back then and in a small way I was glad to be part of it, hope I havent bored you all too much, Brian.
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Post by didier on Jul 20, 2011 8:26:21 GMT
As far as I can rember, the first Start I saw, was the on the first Shadows' LP cover. Soon after I started looking at what could be seen in musical instrument shop windows, a few had sunburts Strats (with flatwound strings), but there was always too many zeros at the right of the price tag.
Not long after I saw Hank's one when attending a Shadows' concert at the Paris Olympia (1961). Curiously enough, Bruce was playing a white Telecaster. It must have been a borrowed one.
Didier
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Post by noelford on Jul 20, 2011 9:27:20 GMT
This has brought back a few memories – please forgive me if I ramble a bit...
I believe I saw my first Strat at Nuneaton Co-op Hall in the late fifties or beginning of the sixties. Every weekend, the Teen Beat dance was organised by Reg Calvert, manager of The Fortunes, Screaming Lord Sutch and many others, all of whom played at the dances. Reg was later to become owner of Radio City and was shot dead (in self defence) by Radio Caroline owner, Oliver Smedley.
Reg had a large stable of musicians, who lived at his place near Rugby and he would manufacture a variety of groups using permutations of those musicians. So, on a bill featuring eight groups, you would find they were all made up of the same seven or eight people!
One of Reg's artistes was Buddy Britten, a Buddy Holly tribute act (Buddy Britten and the Regents went through quite a few changes and ended up – without Buddy as lead singer – as Johnny Kidd and the Pirates). Buddy played (and played very well) a white Strat.
Strangely, that was NOT the defining moment it should have been and, even though I loved the Shads, I never hankered after a Strat. I was, in fact, for years, strictly a Gibson man. I only bought my first Strat, an American Vintage series) in 2004 and my second, a Custom Shop Masterbuilt, in 2009.
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Post by sixchannel on Jul 20, 2011 9:51:02 GMT
Ian, Was that Barratts, Oxford Road, Manchester? DaveC Most certainly was Dave. Saturdays we used to get the 15 bus to Oxford Street and window lick at Reno's, Johnny Roadhouses and Barratts. I know its off topic but I remember being in Reno's and on the wall was an all black Burns Black Bison (stereo ??). At the time I thought it was the best looking guitar I had ever seen but thought it "sounded funny". And at Johnny's, they had got in the Bird all-valve amps - big square boxes that weighed a ton - and I marvelled at how the reverb echoed in the speaker if you lifted the amp up by a corner a couple of inches and dropped it back down. I know, I know!!! But at Barratts you could almost always get to play something in the shop most Saturdays, especially if you were an OK player. When I decided on a Strat (to go with my Harmony 75 that I had already bought the year before) I played a few in the shop before choosing the one I wanted. They all played different, which I thought was odd. The one I chose had "that sound" and I kept it until 1975, when I sold it for next to nothing.   cheers ian |
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Post by sixchannel on Jul 20, 2011 9:57:48 GMT
Hi all, I have aquired a 1970's 3 bolt Fender, a 1984 mij squire, a couple of Elite Strats and Ian - sixchannels - cij Fender, my first in fiesta red. By the way Ian if you read this, I used it last Saturday for a short set of 8 and it is playing really well. Hi Good to hear that my (ex-my) CIJ Strat is giving good service. cheers ian |
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Post by brian on Jul 20, 2011 10:48:53 GMT
Hi Joeboy, no it wasnt this show, the show i saw included all the other inpersonators who were killed in the plane crash . No disrespect to this guy but it does not compare to
the show i saw, The Buddy Holly Story, it was absolutely electric from start to finish. Regards Brian
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Post by Tone on Jul 20, 2011 12:15:23 GMT
After hearing Apache for the first time in 1960 (played on a Dansette record player in the local youth club) I became hooked on Shadows music but I didn't see a real Strat up close and personal until a year or so later. That was in Kitchens music shop in Leeds and they had two on a revolving stand among the hollow bodied electrics. One was sunburst and the other was either Lake Placid or Daphne Blue. I used to stand and drool over them for hours and I can still remember the price tag - 153 guineas which, for all you youngsters, is £160.75. I started my first job around that time which paid £6 per week so buying a Strat was totally beyond my reach. Like Glyderslead (post #5) I bought a Hofner V3 (second hand) for about £20 and I kept that for many years but always thought "One day.......". I didn't manage to get a real Strat until 1986 and that was a second hand sunburst bought privately for £150 which was a real bargain.
I now have 6 Strats and I still get that magic feeling every time I pick one up. I love them all!
Cheers.
Tony
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Post by DaveC on Jul 21, 2011 10:01:19 GMT
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Post by mrjc on Jul 21, 2011 13:54:33 GMT
Hi everybody,this is my first post and I cant think of a better one to start with! I was about 14 when my dad realised that my playing had improved quite a lot and agreed to buy me a new guitar,The one I was using came from an advert in the paper,a bit Les Paulish in shape but nothing more than a painted plank!! We could have gone to a local music shop I suppose
but I insisted that we go to Jenning's in the Charing Cross road in London, because I had heard from those in the know that, that was the place to see Fenders. after a long journey on the tube from morden (northern line ) we walked into the shop, I can still remember the smell !,It was great, the window and one wall was all Fender,anyway I said to the salesman which guitar does Hank B Marvin use, always a stickler for correctness! the guy turned to the wall and took down this guitar and said this is the one you want son,I looked at him and said, I thought Hank's guitar was red, this is pink! he said I can assure you that this is the one and with that he handed me the guitar and went to the back of the shop and came back with a catalogue, he opened it up at the last pages and there was a picture of the guitar, and the colour was described as Flamingo Pink. I still wasn't convinced,but he plugged it into a vox amp AC30? and it was fantastic, everything I ever wanted, after about 10 minutes or so I could see my dad was impressed, so he said to the salesman,yeah, that seems ok, how much is that then,£166 guineas he said,that was the first time I heard my dad swear,do f##king what,he said,I don't earn that much in a year !! So I ended up with a $40 Vox Contour or something,but at least It was Red, It was only in later years that I read In The Shadows first book, that Hank describes the colour of his guitar as Flamingo Pink. I hope this hasn't been to laborious , but with just a few weeks to go before I retire, It was nice to rekindle some old memories.
MR- JC
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Post by asimmd on Jul 21, 2011 17:37:58 GMT
My first guitar was an Antoria,same one that Hank had.
I think my first sight of a Strat was either on a Shadows TV appearance,or the cover of their first album.
I know they did the London Palladium a lot,and I would always be allowed to stay up to watch,Oh happy day's.
Alan
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Post by solidlg on Jul 21, 2011 17:46:22 GMT
Hi All,
After battling along with a Broadway guitar and then a neck twisting Rossetti ( 3 pickup ) Strat lookalike for the first year of my attempt to play, and figuring that I would never be as good as Marvin, despite playing all the Shads numbers ( in the wrong position of course ) I managed to get my Dad to accompany me to Marshalls on Hanwell Broadway, near Ealing, where every guitarists wet dream hung on the wall, blimey what confusion entered my simple brain.
My Dad being an ex Royal Horse-guards French Horn player and Kings trumpeter told me to try every guitar that I could, as he felt I would just know what felt right for me, and I did them all, Strats - Tele's - Jaguar - etc etc and ended up in love with a ES-335 and a Gibson amp, all paid for by Dad on the condition I learned to sight read through a music professor or I would pay him back every penny, needless to say I paid him back every penny, and then in the band it went from 335 to Telecaster to SG Special to Danelectro - then back to the Tele and finally 30 years of Strats..... crikey wonderful.
Steve
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