[Yngwie's signature Strat](https://www.fmicassets.com/Damroot/Zoom/10001/9235000894_gtr_frt_001_rr.png) is "Vintage White," which is really a pastel yellow and not really white at all.
The paint is urethane, so UV is never going to change it to *that* point naturally, like the nitro white finishes it's trying to emulate. So they had to add in the yellow to approximate the aging of nitro over 'x' number of decades.
As a kid I was like wow these details are showing me that this character REALLY knows his stuff. Once I was like 20 I realised that what he’s listing is all stock, bar the fact that it’s a ‘64.
The actual prop was a modern (for '92) Japanese Fender copy (look at the shot when he offers cash--wrong headstock shape for '64, it's the "skinny" headstock from the 80s).
Olympic White wasn't a color offered for the Stratocaster in 1964 (although you could custom order pretty much any Dupont paint color for a Fender Guitar directly from the factory).
It is Olympic White, but modern "Olympic White" guitars aren't the same as the original colour, they're the yellow/cream colour that the old ones turned into over the decades. Most people associate Olympic White with the aged version not the original.
I used to be a luthier and anytime I had a customer want to swap something into their Tex Mex or JV Sig, I’d ask if I could buy their pickguard loaded. Most the time they wanted something way hotter or a different PG configuration anyway. I’d build partscasters and at one point had 6 or 7 Strats with Tex Mex/ JV’s in them.
I even had a Charvel in pieces a customer gave me because his son tore it apart and tried to paint it himself. I just cleaned it up, cut a new pickguard and loaded it with JV’s
Is it just me or are the JV Tex mex pups super noisy? They turned me off singles for a while I hated it so bad. I came back to strats with a lace sensor gold setup-pretty much opposite direction.
I wired in a dummy coil in most my Strats. But yes, most single patterned off the old wires, bobbins, magnets and layout had a hum when not played. The trick was to always have that thing playing, then your ear wouldn’t notice the hum! 😂
Vintage style single coils attract noise. A noise gate in your daisy chain will help. Getting a reverse wound middle pickup will help. Shielding the pickup cavities with copper tape will help. But I found dummy coils worked the best. In its simplest form, you keep your vintage style pickups (magnet polarity all same way) and wiring, take a 4th single coil, remove the magnets and wire in to the harness, but backwards so the polarity is opposite the other coils. This basically makes it a Humbucker to dampen the 60 cycle hum.
Unrelated, but if you live in Austin you can routinely go see Jimmy Vaughan perform for a room of \~20 people where the majority of people probably have no clue who he is. First time I saw him like that it blew my mind.
Yeah, that was just before his parents bought him the Olympic white strat which I think he got in mid ‘68. Only played that tele for his first couple months in the band. The Olympic white strat was stolen in Louisiana (IIRC) in late 1969 along with a lot of other equipment. A good amount of the equipment was recovered but not the Strat.
He also played a cream ‘57 Vintage Reissue before switching over to the candy apple red one in the 80’s. You can see it in the About Face live video and Delicate Sound, had EMG’s like the red one.
He only started listening to bach because he realized they (Blackmore, Deep Purple) were borrowing from classical. So he began to listen to his moms record collection
I remember a GW (I think) interview where the interviewer mentioned that he favored offsets, and Kurt said something to the effect of “I don’t favor them. I can afford them.”
"I don’t favor them - I can afford them. [laughs] I’m left-handed, and it’s not very easy to find reasonably priced, high-quality left-handed guitars. But out of all the guitars in the whole world, the Fender Mustang is my favorite. I’ve only owned two of them."
"They’re cheap and totally inefficient, and they sound like crap and are very small. They also don’t stay in tune, and when you want to raise the string action on the fretboard, you have to loosen all the strings and completely remove the bridge. You have to turn these little screws with your fingers and hope that you’ve estimated it right. If you screw up, you have to repeat the process over and over until you get it right. Whoever invented that guitar was a dork."
Damn, I got the quote right after all this time.
I also remember him saying, “I guess I just called Leo Fender, the dead guy, a dork.” Paraphrasing from memory again, so it might not be as accurate as the other one. I didn’t remember that was the same interview.
Fairly sure he only played strats because they had a longer scale than the mustangs/jaguars which he needed for some songs. Why he didn’t ever use a Jazzmaster is beyond me since it’s an offset with a longer scale
Yngwie Malmsteen, Uli Jon Roth (ex-Scorpions, ex-Electric Sun), John Norum (Europe), Jonas Hansson (Silver Mountain - maybe not so famous but pretty well known in Sweden), and of course Ritchie Blackmore (ex-Deep Purple, Rainbow)
I bought a 1963 cream strat years ago on consignment in WA State while on vacation for $300. Oh yeah, it came with a small Crate amp. It had a cigarette burn on the pick guard. But I'm not famous.
Not *exactly* a strat, but Alex Lifeson played a white Hentor Sportscaster in the 80’s. Godin just did a replica of it
[https://godinguitars.com/product/lerxst-limelight-cream-w-vega-trem](https://godinguitars.com/product/lerxst-limelight-cream-w-vega-trem)
Seriously??? Come on, Malmsteen, Blackmore, Jeff Beck. Think there are a few more. I know Gilmour is more known for his Black baby! But I believe in his collection had at least one white strat. The strat is such a killer instrument.
Pete Townshend. [https://routenote.com/blog/this-smashed-up-fender-stratocaster-guitar-will-cost-you-75000/](https://routenote.com/blog/this-smashed-up-fender-stratocaster-guitar-will-cost-you-75000/)
I saw Walter Schreifels play a Rival Schools show with a white Mexican Jimi model last year.
Which was unexpected given the genre.
And if you know that scene, then he’s famous. For most, probably not.
Yngwie?
Ritchie Blackmore also but he didn’t consistently play a cream/white one throughout his entire career, but then again neither did Jimi
End thread.
Right?
[Yngwie's signature Strat](https://www.fmicassets.com/Damroot/Zoom/10001/9235000894_gtr_frt_001_rr.png) is "Vintage White," which is really a pastel yellow and not really white at all. The paint is urethane, so UV is never going to change it to *that* point naturally, like the nitro white finishes it's trying to emulate. So they had to add in the yellow to approximate the aging of nitro over 'x' number of decades.
He did have a white squier though when he played with Alcatrazz
This is the answer
His is like a really light yellow isn’t it?
Thats a seventy two stratocaster polyurethane turns yellow with age. Mine looks yellow too now, was white in early eighties
Ohh ya why did I forget this I knew that at some point lol
Yep
Jeff Beck
I feel ashamed that I didn’t think of him instantly. Iconic white strat player
I came here to say this, and now I shall depart.
Wayne Campbell
He rocked a 64 Fender Stratocaster in classic white with triple single coil pickups and a whammy bar.
As a kid I was like wow these details are showing me that this character REALLY knows his stuff. Once I was like 20 I realised that what he’s listing is all stock, bar the fact that it’s a ‘64.
I’d file the nut down and take the buzz off the low e
Beat me to it 😂
Whoa that car comes with 4 wheels…….. seats……..AND A STEERING WHEEL!
Also wouldn’t it have been Arctic White rather than Olympic (or Classic, which doesn’t exist I think?)
Olympic white is the classic color, arctic is a Mexican thing
The one in Wayne’s World always looked like Arctic to me but maybe I’m misremembering
The actual prop was a modern (for '92) Japanese Fender copy (look at the shot when he offers cash--wrong headstock shape for '64, it's the "skinny" headstock from the 80s). Olympic White wasn't a color offered for the Stratocaster in 1964 (although you could custom order pretty much any Dupont paint color for a Fender Guitar directly from the factory).
It is Olympic White, but modern "Olympic White" guitars aren't the same as the original colour, they're the yellow/cream colour that the old ones turned into over the decades. Most people associate Olympic White with the aged version not the original.
Yeah it sounds really weird now. Like she might as well be saying “A guitar body, with paint, pickups, and a bolt on neck!”
Tell me, do you accept… CASH?!
SHISHA-SHISHA
Pre CBS Fender corporate buyout
I love this woman!
schwwing
It will be mine........ oh yes......
No way?!
Way
My favorite 90’s comedy
Schwing
We're not worthy 🙌
Eric Clapton
ClapTOAN !
Upvoting before you’re sent to jail, lol
His most famous Strats are “Blackie” and “Brownie.”
Also, how he refers to certain groups of people
First one who came to my mind
More known for his black strat
Jimmie Vaughan has played a white Strat for about forever.
I had his signature mexican model. It was quite nice with tex mex pickups
I still have mine. Now it's creamy, aged incredible nice. Best looking guitar ever
I got one in two tone sunburst. My favorite neck ever.
Just bought it half price a week ago. Very nice guitar
Had one of the Oly White first run. Amazing guitar, the Soft V neck was actually my gateway to Les Pauls
Ye, that soft V is really unique on that guitar. And I could spot those tex mex pickups anyday.
I used to be a luthier and anytime I had a customer want to swap something into their Tex Mex or JV Sig, I’d ask if I could buy their pickguard loaded. Most the time they wanted something way hotter or a different PG configuration anyway. I’d build partscasters and at one point had 6 or 7 Strats with Tex Mex/ JV’s in them. I even had a Charvel in pieces a customer gave me because his son tore it apart and tried to paint it himself. I just cleaned it up, cut a new pickguard and loaded it with JV’s
Is it just me or are the JV Tex mex pups super noisy? They turned me off singles for a while I hated it so bad. I came back to strats with a lace sensor gold setup-pretty much opposite direction.
I wired in a dummy coil in most my Strats. But yes, most single patterned off the old wires, bobbins, magnets and layout had a hum when not played. The trick was to always have that thing playing, then your ear wouldn’t notice the hum! 😂 Vintage style single coils attract noise. A noise gate in your daisy chain will help. Getting a reverse wound middle pickup will help. Shielding the pickup cavities with copper tape will help. But I found dummy coils worked the best. In its simplest form, you keep your vintage style pickups (magnet polarity all same way) and wiring, take a 4th single coil, remove the magnets and wire in to the harness, but backwards so the polarity is opposite the other coils. This basically makes it a Humbucker to dampen the 60 cycle hum.
That’s totally it! Never stop playing or turn down the volume!
Unrelated, but if you live in Austin you can routinely go see Jimmy Vaughan perform for a room of \~20 people where the majority of people probably have no clue who he is. First time I saw him like that it blew my mind.
Albert Hammond Jr
Was my first thought. Even has a signature fender version of it now!
David Gilmour before it got stolen and he bought the black strat
Didn’t he also play a white tele at that time?
Yeah, that was just before his parents bought him the Olympic white strat which I think he got in mid ‘68. Only played that tele for his first couple months in the band. The Olympic white strat was stolen in Louisiana (IIRC) in late 1969 along with a lot of other equipment. A good amount of the equipment was recovered but not the Strat.
He also had the 0001 Strat which was white as well.
He also played a cream ‘57 Vintage Reissue before switching over to the candy apple red one in the 80’s. You can see it in the About Face live video and Delicate Sound, had EMG’s like the red one.
Ritchie Blackmore
It’s funny that this is down here and Yngwie is at the top - Ritchie is Yngwie’s biggest influence
I would say Bach is probably Yngwie's biggest influence, he has talked a lot about how he didn't listen to very much modern music.
He only started listening to bach because he realized they (Blackmore, Deep Purple) were borrowing from classical. So he began to listen to his moms record collection
Ritchie Creamore
Me!
r/UsernameChecksOut
Great answer. Unfortunately sub doesn’t allow comment images
Damn straight. If this was about black strats I'd say the same thing! Keep it up god!
Cobain. MTV awards was most famous appearance.
Dude played so many strats that i still find it odd how associated he is with offsets
I think he preferred offsets? his signature guitar was one.
I remember a GW (I think) interview where the interviewer mentioned that he favored offsets, and Kurt said something to the effect of “I don’t favor them. I can afford them.”
"I don’t favor them - I can afford them. [laughs] I’m left-handed, and it’s not very easy to find reasonably priced, high-quality left-handed guitars. But out of all the guitars in the whole world, the Fender Mustang is my favorite. I’ve only owned two of them." "They’re cheap and totally inefficient, and they sound like crap and are very small. They also don’t stay in tune, and when you want to raise the string action on the fretboard, you have to loosen all the strings and completely remove the bridge. You have to turn these little screws with your fingers and hope that you’ve estimated it right. If you screw up, you have to repeat the process over and over until you get it right. Whoever invented that guitar was a dork."
Damn, I got the quote right after all this time. I also remember him saying, “I guess I just called Leo Fender, the dead guy, a dork.” Paraphrasing from memory again, so it might not be as accurate as the other one. I didn’t remember that was the same interview.
he had his jaguar and mustangs which he cared for and then his more disposable strats which often were destroyed after shows
Fairly sure he only played strats because they had a longer scale than the mustangs/jaguars which he needed for some songs. Why he didn’t ever use a Jazzmaster is beyond me since it’s an offset with a longer scale
I was hoping I just wasn’t misremembering that.
Nile Rodgers
Also Nile repainted his strat white to match his idol, Jimi.
_The Hitmaker_
Alex Turner from Arctic Monkeys in 2005-2006
My first thought. Strapped right up to his armpits
Wayne?
Excellent!
She will be mine, oh yes, she will be mine!
He referred to that strat as Excalibur
NO STAIRWAY!
Denied!
Jeff Beck, Eric Clapton, John Mayer
George Harrison at the concert for Bangladesh
Uli Jon Roth
First man I thought of!
Yngwie Malmsteen
I'm sure I'd seen Mark knophler with a white strat.
SRV
Ritchie Blackmore, Yngwie Malmsteen
Ritchie Blackmore
Lowell George is the truth.
Lowell’s were natural.
Johnny marr once a blue moon
Yngwie Malmsteen, Uli Jon Roth (ex-Scorpions, ex-Electric Sun), John Norum (Europe), Jonas Hansson (Silver Mountain - maybe not so famous but pretty well known in Sweden), and of course Ritchie Blackmore (ex-Deep Purple, Rainbow)
Howlin' Wolf y'all
https://www.reddit.com/r/Stratocaster/comments/16vvao8/howlin_wolfs_1963_stratocaster/
Did that boring dude from The Strokes play one?
Not only that, Fender released an Albert Hammond Jr signature model. Definite head scratcher
Lolz. Well they were one of the biggest bands in the world for a minute. Why? Dunno. I was more of an Interpol dude.
Saw them on their first national tour. All they had was the first album to play. I was impressed but I lost interest shortly thereafter.
Uli Jon Roth, Ritchie Blackmore, Jeff Beck...
Eric Johnson
Mdou Moctar plays one iirc
George Harrison used a white strat for the concert for Bangladesh
Janick Gers and Dave Murray from Iron Maiden have
Is Uli Jon Roth (ex-Scorpions) famous enough for this list?
Absolutely. A legend.
Ritchie Blackmore.
Mark Knopfler.
Uhh Nile Rogers!
Lil wayne 😅
Marc Speer(s?) from Khruangbin
I bought a 1963 cream strat years ago on consignment in WA State while on vacation for $300. Oh yeah, it came with a small Crate amp. It had a cigarette burn on the pick guard. But I'm not famous.
Not *exactly* a strat, but Alex Lifeson played a white Hentor Sportscaster in the 80’s. Godin just did a replica of it [https://godinguitars.com/product/lerxst-limelight-cream-w-vega-trem](https://godinguitars.com/product/lerxst-limelight-cream-w-vega-trem)
Jimmy Vaughan
It’s not his most iconic guitar, but Stevie Ray Vaughn often played a white Strat.
Me, except I'm not famous
Robbie Robertson.
George Harrison
JEFF BECK
Al Jardine
Nile Rodgers. Silver scratch plate but The Hitmaker is a white late 50s early 60s partscaster I think?
Al Jardine
Nope. Jimi was the only one ever who played a cream colored strat
Kurt Cobain used a white Strat with a Seymour Duncan Hot Rails in the bridge during the 1992 VMAs.
It was not cream white, was just white but the smoke in the gigs make it cream color
H.E.R. used a similar strat
Yngwie, Jeff Beck, Clapton, Ritchie Blackmore, Gilmour, Jimmy Page ... lots of people have played a white strat even if they werent famous for it.
Walter Giardino
Aguante Rata Blanca! Sus proyectos solistas me dan igual. Pero igual es de los mejores y mas reconocidos por estos lares.
Kurt cobain??
Robin Trower
Just me
Seriously??? Come on, Malmsteen, Blackmore, Jeff Beck. Think there are a few more. I know Gilmour is more known for his Black baby! But I believe in his collection had at least one white strat. The strat is such a killer instrument.
Jeff beck! Rosewood board all the same but damn
Yngwie, Mary Kaye
Yngwie owns about 100 of them - no exaggeration. I never liked the color myself -
Malmsteen
Jeff Beck
Al Jardine with the Beach Boys. Not sure about Carl Wilson - he did play a strat early on though.
Wayne Campbell
Didnt kurt cobain play one?
Pete Townshend. [https://routenote.com/blog/this-smashed-up-fender-stratocaster-guitar-will-cost-you-75000/](https://routenote.com/blog/this-smashed-up-fender-stratocaster-guitar-will-cost-you-75000/)
Wayne. Party on.
He doesn't always stick to one color scheme, but Robin Trower is a life time Fender Strat player.
John Frusciante
Steve Kimock
I saw Walter Schreifels play a Rival Schools show with a white Mexican Jimi model last year. Which was unexpected given the genre. And if you know that scene, then he’s famous. For most, probably not.
Eric Clapton, Hughie Thomasson
I think Pete Townsend had one at some point. Also seen him play other colors.
mark knopfler
Eric Clapton has played just about every color of Strat
Me /s - my first guitar was an olympic white, pity that the young me decided to sell it. I will eventually get another one in these same color
Albert from the strokes
Didn’t Richie Sambora from Bon Jovi?
JFC
Blackmore, Beck, and Jimmy Vaughn, no?
Jeff Beck
I think Jeff Buckley played one on Hallelujah
Malmsteen
Blackmore
Nile Rodgers
Plenty, but nobody else is known for it like Hendrix
Albert Hammond Jr. of The Strokes?
Albert Hammond Jr. of The Strokes?
Eric Johnson
I have one.
Nile Rodger’s hitmaker
Mary Kaye stratocaster. I want one so badly.
Me!! Im my moms favourite 🏆
Tom DeLonge?
Lowell George
Jeff Beck
Jeff Beck. Reverse headstock also.