![]() An early mishap can be seen on the liner photos for the In the Beginning album. Number One had many repairs throughout Stevie's career. It is not known when the original neck was replaced. ![]() That certainly did not detract from the wonderful sounds it made. There probably was not a square inch of lacquer remaining by 1990. Eventually it developed a quarter-inch gouge just above the pickguard where Stevie's manic strumming continually bashed it. Stevie would pound, scrape, kick, stand on, and otherwise torture the guitar during his performances. The finish of Number One became progressively more beaten up as the years went by. His fingers would get torn up so badly that he would actually use super glue to re-attach torn callouses. 018! By the time 1989 rolled around, Rene convinced him to use a. In the 1970s, his high E string would sometimes go as high as a. He gradually went to smaller strings as he got older, but they were still heavy by modern standards. This added to the sustain, and gave Stevie added ability to bend the strings with the enormous strings that he used. This meant he could only push the bar, and not pull up on it.Īnother significant change from stock were the installation of jumbo bass-style frets. Stevie normally used four or five springs in this unit, and had the pivot plate pulled tight against the body. He also felt it gave him better access to the bar, but did remark that several times, during especially manic performances, it fairly well tore half his sleeve off when he got caught-up on it. This was the beginning of Stevie's "Hendrix period." Since Jimi Hendrix and Otis Rush played a right-handed guitar turned "upside down," therefore putting the vibrato bar on top, Stevie emulated this by installing a left-handed vibrato unit in Number One. The vibrato was replaced with a gold left-handed unit sometime around 1977. These script letters are what is engraved in outline form on the SRV Sig Strat. The "Tonight Show" art department came up with this new lettering style at the last minute. Stevie was to play this prototype, but it did not sport his trademark initials. This show introduced the SRV Signature Strat prototype. Eventually the iridescent "SRV" was replaced by Letraset script-style lettering, first seen during his appearance on the "Tonight Show" in 1989. Rene Martinez remarked that he would prowl truck stops to obtain letters to replace the ones that wore away. ![]() Over the years, Stevie replaced the pickguard (several times) with a black pickguard and added his "SRV" initials in iridescent lettering of several styles. I cannot find proof of the pickup rewind. The result was a slight overwind from original, which is duplicated in the SRV Signature Strat. It is rumored that sometime during the life of the guitar, either Stevie or a previous owner had the pickups rewound at the Fender factory. The guitar originally came with a stock, early-sixties style white pickguard, a right-handed vibrato unit, and 1959 pickups. In Stevie's mind, the guitar was a factory-cobbled-up 1959, so all discussion ended there. Rene claims he has found that the pickups are 1959, while both the neck and body are 1962 (See Guitar World book on SRV). In interviews, Rene sometimes took issue as to the date of manufacture of Number One. It was rumored that the "LF-1959" actually meant "Louis Fuentes" and not Leo Fender. The body was stamped "LF-1959," but the neck was stamped "1962." Stevie surmised that Leo Fender probably assembled this guitar from left-over 1959 production parts in 1962. The neck was an oddly-shaped rosewood D-neck, very large, which fit Stevie's large hands like a glove. He said he knew that this tobacco-sunburst, used Strat was, just by looking at it, the guitar for him. According to Stevie, he saw the Strat in Ray Hennig's Heart of Texas Music, in Austin. Number One was obtained in 1973 in a trade-in of his first Strat, the 1963 he purchased in 1969. Some modifications were purely cosmetic, some were functional (to derive a particular feel or tone), and others were out-and-out repairs. Over the years, Stevie and Rene Martinez, his guitar tech, replaced the pickguard, vibrato unit, saddles and neck. Even though it used all "stock" Fender Strat parts, about the only "original equipment" parts it possessed by 1990 were the body and the pickups. Constructed of a 1959 body, and (originally) a 1962 neck, it possessed a deep, dark growl of a tone that was immediately identifiable. "Number One" is the beat-up mongrel Strat that we all know and love. He has very kindly allowed me use these photographs on this site. Many of the photographs on these web pages were taken by W. Reminder: click on the graphic to see a larger version "Number One"- Also called "First Wife," a 1959 Strat body with 1962 neck, received in 1973 in trade of 1963 Strat with Ray Hennig, Heart of Texas Music Stevie Ray Vaughan's Guitar called "Number One"
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