Fender Artist Stratocaster Eric Clapton Black

What we say:

Eric Clapton's signature Stratocaster is so useful and well thought out that other celebrity players like Pete Townsend choose it to tour with on a nightly basis. There are quite a lot of distinguishing features on hand here, all designed to make this guitar extremely useful for the pro player.

Chief amongst these is the active mid boost, controlled with the second tone knob. This boost almost turns your mild-mannered Strat into a beastly high output rock monster! Otherwise the pickups on here are vintage voiced noiseless units, a replacement from the previously used Lace Sensors.

Interestingly, the tremolo unit, whilst being fully functional in theory, has been blocked off underneath with a piece of wood at Clapton's request. It's an simple matter of pulling the block out if this spoils your whammy bar fun though!

The neck is also a departure compared to most Stratocaster models: this has a typical 9.5" radius across the front but a relatively unique "shallow V" carve at the back. It seems a bold choice until you play it and find out it's really comfortable and promotes lots of playing without fatigue. Overall it's a tremendous instrument, again not just for Clapton fans. However, if you do worship at the temple of Eric, this is a no-brainer and of course if you choose this finish, you'll be buying you own version of "Blackie".