Hello hello, and welcome to Famous Guitars with me, Cassie; the show where I hand pick only the coolest guitars to tell you all about, and then proceed to go absolutely nuts about them. Now, before we get to the good stuff, I’ll give you a quick run-down of how this is gonna go.
First, I’m gonna introduce the guitarist whose guitar I’ll be talking about. I’ll give you a little bit of history on it, where it came from, who made it, all that jazz. After that I’m going to give my opinion on said guitar, sound good? Great. So how about I quit rambling and tell you about the beast that is; the Eddie Van Halen Frankenstrat!
So who is Eddie Van Halen anyway?
If you don’t know, I’m going to assume you’ve been living under a rock. But as long as your rock is comfy, I guess it’s fine. Eddie’s thought of as one of the greatest guitarists in rock and roll history. He got really famous after his band -named Van Halen- released their first studio album Van Halen. Their biggest song titled “Jump” spent five weeks at the top of the charts. He was known for his two-handed guitar solos, often being credited with creating the technique. He died of a stroke on October 6th, 2020. RIP man. So there ya go. Now you know who Eddie Van Halen is. You’re welcome.
The Frankenstrat
The Eddie Van Halen Frankenstrat. Also known as “Frankenstein” and “Ed’s Baby.” (Which I think is kind of adorable.) The guitar started out as a humble ash wood stratocaster. Eddie bought his guitar way back in 1977.
Let’s talk about that paint
All the different paint jobs it had were all done by the man himself, including the iconic red and white stripes. It started with a simple glossy black finish with a light green pickguard.
A little down the road, he was inspired by a local punk act to put the black stripes on the guitar. He put some strips of masking tape over the areas he wanted black and hit the rest with a generous amount of white paint. It looked great! So great that copies started showing up… Everywhere.
Eddie was TICKED. Can’t have other guitarists stealing his thunder, y’know? He donned the masking tape again and painted the red finish we all know and love. He also changed the bridge… and the neck, which ended up snapping in two onstage.
The Electronics
Now would be a good time for me to mention the handy-dandy Guitar Glossary I put at the end of this article. Anyways though, the electronics on the Frankenstrat were changed A LOT. Almost daily. So, what ended up staying? Long story short, not much. The bridge and neck were changed almost daily at one point. But what I can tell you is what’s on it now. Starting at the very top, there’s a maple neck and fretboard with the iconic Fender headstock, and 22 jumbo frets.
The pickups are a bit of a mystery, but I tried my best to find something for you so, it here goes. The neck pickup I think is a single-coil Gibson pickup, and for a little while Eddie had a DiMarzio Super Distortion humbucker pickup. Take what I just said with a grain of salt, or a few, but that’s what I believe to be on the Frankenstrat.
Eddie installed a German Floyd Rose tremolo system, with a quarter attached to the guitar body up against it to keep the bridge flush. If you need to put a quarter on your guitar to keep your bridge where it needs to be, MAYBE you should use a different bridge, just saying. But who am I to judge? The bridge never got swapped again, so I suppose Ed really liked it. Or he just didn’t care that much anymore. He also had the guitar strung up with 009 gauge strings, which is the same kind I use. They’re comfortable strings, I see why he liked ‘em.
My Opinions
How do I personally feel about the most famous guitar in rock history? Well for starters, I LOVE the design. I think the red, white, and black stripes look really cool on it. I however am not a fan of how many times the poor thing was gutted and redone. I mean I understand, Eddie just wanted the PERFECT guitar. However a lot of other really nice guitars were also gutted to accomplish this. Including a Charvel Star, one of the coolest guitars ever to exist. Give the poor thing a break man!
As for the electronics, I really like the DiMarzio Super Distortion pickup I mentioned earlier. I’m not sure how to describe them other than perfect for the early 80’s rock/metal sound I love. Thanks to this project I might actually put a set on the next guitar I build!
The neck pickup I’m really indifferent about. Yeah yeah it’s a Gibson pickup, nothing special. I will give kudos to the fact that it’s a single coil though. I do love me a nice single coil, and Gibson makes pretty decent ones.
Overall, I think the EVH Frankenstrat is a really cool guitar! It has definitely seen some things in its lifetime, but if someone uses a guitar for that long, some unfortunate things are bound to happen to it. Like the blue paint smears all over it. Not exactly sure how that happened, but it did. I still think it’s an ax worthy to be wielded by the one and only Eddie Van Halen.
So there you have it. The EVH Frankenstrat… or Frankenstein… OR- you get the point. I hope you enjoyed reading this as much as I did writing it, I had a lot of fun doing all the research on this beast. Thanks for hanging out with me, and until next time; Rock on!
Guitar Glossary (terms used in this article)
Two-Handed Solo: A guitar technique in which one taps the desired fret with their right hand instead of the left.
Pickups: The little rectangles under the strings of a guitar that pick up the sound and push it through the amplifier.
Bridge: The part of the guitar that supports the strings at the bottom.
Fret: The metal wires that run perpendicular to the strings. The fret is what the string touches when pressed down.
Fretboard: The part of the guitar your fingers touch. Also called the fingerboard.
Tremolo: A device that allows you to temporarily change the pitch of the strings.
Stratocaster: A guitar made by Fender.
Pickguard: A sheet of plastic that shields the guitar from pick marks/scratches.
Headstock: The piece of wood at the end of the neck that’s usually carved into fun shapes.
Single-Coil: A type of pickup with only one coil of wire wrapped around six magnetic rods. These types of pickups tend to be noisier than a humbucker.
Humbucker: This type of pickup has two coils of wire that cancel each other out. This eliminates lots of the feedback from the amplifier.
A rock: The thing you’re living under if you’ve never heard of Eddie Van Halen.
Joe • Sep 26, 2023 at 8:05 am
What a wonderfully researched article Cassie, and most impressive writing! Anyone who’s anyone in the guitar world both knows the guitar and its designer, player, and accomplished composer with a vast skill set. I really loved reading this article, great job!