The Guitar Learner

while famous frankentele is Steve Morse‘s, the Frankenstrat is Eddie Van Halen’s creation. The name itself comes from the combination of Frankenstein name and Stratocaster, a famous Fender guitar model. for your information it is a american national treasure, “Frankenstrat” copy can be found at Washington D.C.’s American History Museum.

The Frankenstrat is Van Halen’s effort in combining the Fender appearance with classic Gibson guitar tonality. It was Gibson PAF humbucking bridge pickup, Floyd Rose tremolo and chrome hardware installed on ash Stratocaster body, maple neck and fretboard. Eddie painted it several times, and the now famous color combination is red body with white and black stripes.

the Frankenstrat

what he did is a heavy-modification. The Frankenstrat neck was continually being changed over times. and The first bridge was ’58 Fender tremolo then he changed it to Floyd Rose bridges. The placement of the 1971 quarter was a spontaneous addition when it was recruited to keep the Floyd Rose bridge flush on the body. even he took truck reflectors and put them at the rear of the body just for his fun moments, so is an eye hook to secure the straps.

now, is this scary enough for your Halloween?

here i share guitarworldvideos about van halen’s frankenstrat, a deep intimacy of van halen’s interview about it (go here for fender stratocaster highway one review)

you know what time it is and there’s nothing more interesting than a Frankentele. as you knew that telecaster gained incredible fans all over the world because its sound and its simplicity. there are lots of people want to have their own telecaster based on their personal ideas. simply taking telecasters into new genre without disrespecting its history. it’s an amazing story, seeing what telecasters had been through. and i really want to start with the famous one, Steve Morse’s  Frankenstein telecaster. we know who Frankenstein is as well as we know what a telecaster is.

from what i got from musicradar’s article about frankentele (you can read the details by following the link), it is really a constant revision and improvement guitar. Stratocaster neck attached into a Fender Telecaster body, installed Gibson Tune-o-matic bridge, a set of Gibson frets and a 12-string tailpiece, also a group of pickups were Steve Morse’s ideas on how to build a frankentele. you can also get info from Steve Morse’s site about his frankenstein telecaster.

The FrankenTele today. © Rod Morgenstein

Body detail. © Rod Morgenstein

Back view of Morse’s Telecaster, showing years of belt wear. © Rod Morgenstein

well, are frankenteles scary enough for your Halloween? you should have one actually. telecaster inspires lots of musicians and i think I’ll build one of my own frankentele, although my spalted maple tele is a branded franken tele, too with great sound and craftsmanship. there are best guitar parts around and i REALLY want to put them on telecaster model and see what happen.. is an annoying curiosity though..