Leaderboard

Well, my initial guitar heroes were Buddy Holly, Hank Marvin, Scotty Moore and the players from the 50s and early 60s so I had no ambition early on for 'Liquid runs' (that came much later)... and was more about clean, reverb drenched rhythm initially or purely melody (like Hank). Then I started to do both rhythm and lead together like Buddy. I used the flatwounds on a strat originally as they were the same strings I used on my first guitar (a hollow body ply wood thing with an action you could put a whole finger underneath). I did move from the flatwounds after a year or so on the strat to a 'standard' 10-46 for the next 15 years, but as RSI started, I went to a 9.5 set, then 9.0s, now on 8-38 sets. I don't find I get much of a different tone on my Esquires whichever string I use, although it definitely needs technique adjustment. I might do that though and set my current strat to a 'standard' setup and use that as a base.

These don't sound, to me, the most appropriate for a Strat, at least for obtaining the more typical Strat tones. A set of ordinary light 10-46 would be my starting point (I'm not particularly fussy about make, or even gauge, normally; this is just the String 101 suggestion...). Those flat-wounds would certainly produce 'better' jazz vamping tones, and would sit well on many of my arch-tops; a Strat would be good with them on, but not for 'typical' Strat tones, is all. Put a set of Ernie Ball Light on, to try..? These will require a quite different 'touch', compared to flat-wounds, so right-hand technique should be adapted as a consequence. Any help..? (Disclaimer : apart from being a drummer, my guitar playing is very limited, and much more suited to fake 'jazz' stuff. Liquid runs à la Steve Vai are far from my repertoire. On the other hand, Our Eldest plays well, but not on Strats specifically...)

As it happens I don't ... These days I am the only guitar player in our group of friends and the others I know in the area are are Gibson players. Used to be that every man and his dog played guitar, but I was always in demand because I also played bass. Now the other way round. We have another 5 bass players in our little area and I am the only guitarist who doesn't only play punk... I do know a good guitar teacher, so might take a visit to him to discuss the finer points of tone. I do still have a strat in the cupboard and without strings so I could take my stuff over there. He is a PRS player, and is very experienced played around a lot. My use of very light strings is relatively recent, only the last couple of years due to increasing discomfort with RSI. I used to use flatwound 12s and gradually got lighter and lighter over the years.. Maybe it isn't that the strat sounds bad, maybe it is because of the tone that I have in my head (which fits nicely with the Tele) that I am trying to get from a strat. Perhaps I am being a little unfair.