Fender Eric Johnson Stratocaster, Maple Fretboard - 2-Color Sunburst

pros: very light guitar yet great sustain. the smooth fretboard w/ medium jumbo frets helps moving your hand up and down the neck with minimal friction, therefore much faster than many guitars. louder on the pull-offs and hammer-ons with less effort. can play for hours once your hand gets used to the flat v-shape neck which is a bit chunkier than the c shape. stays in tune longer which helps with using the whammy. cons: since its has medium frets, its not very good with bending. the finish on the neck collects oil from your hands much faster. either needs frequent cleaning or oiling up the back of the fretboard to reduce friction. A MUST HAVE

Mine arrived with a loose screw on one tip of the pickguard and that kind of set the stage for disappointment. The strat I built using a MIM neck, deluxe body, and custom shop electronics is way better and I only have about $900 in it. The EJ is a nice Fender but I just didn't see a > $2K guitar here.

VERY NICE INSTRUMENT, COSMETICS, ELECTRONICS, SOUND ALL TOP NOTCH, THE NECK IS COMFORTABLE, A BIT OF A CHANGE FROM THE MODERN C, MAY BE MORE PLAYABLE TO LOTS OF OTHERS, I LIKE THE NECK, SEEMS FAST, SMOOTH, FRET WORK IS VERY WELL DONE, WEIGHT AROUND 9 LBS ALTHOUGH AS WE ALL KNOW THAT VARIES SOMEWHAT, THE OTHER REVIEWERS WHO DISCUSSED THERE LIKES AND SPECIFICS FOR THIS GUITAR ARE SPOT ON! THANKS AMAZON FOR ANOTHER QUALITY PURCHASE

Overall a wonderful guitar. Would prefer 22 frets but the overall playability of this guitar is top notch. Worth the time And money.

I am a guitarist from the DFW area that has been playing professionally for over 40 years. Trust me, I've been through a lot of guitars in my years. I've owned and played a very large number of Fender Teles and Strats, including having owned a Pre-CBS Tele and having played many others. I am comfortable saying that this is as musically balanced a Fender guitar as I've played. The attention to tonal balance in the pickups is extraordinary. To my ears, finding the magic balance between twang and balls in a Fender pickup is pretty rare. They can often sound like icepicks or muddy. The EJ Strat pickups seem to have found that magic meeting. Twang and funk, or can rock out righteously. I can roll down the volume knob on the neck pickup and get a nice round jazz sound out of it, too. The feeling is with this guitar that the whole package comes together magically in a remarkable "musical instrument" that is about perfect for what it is: a traditional, vintage sounding Fender Stratocaster. Sometimes, with the Custom Shop pieces you feel like they slap this or that neck, with this or that body, with these or those pickups, without necessarily paying attention to what the net creation will be. Fender's Custom Shop is hit or miss in my opinion. The EJ's playability is like a custom built guitar, and as good as any CS guitar I've played. Remarkable, comfortable, pro playability. For my money, this is the Strat to buy, though I know some folks can't handle the fairly large "V" neck (which feels great in my hands). This guitar feels like an extension of the player as much as any Fender I've played.

By far and away the best Fender I've ever owned (I'm on my third EJ). Yes the neck can get tacky with use - Gibson Pump Polish and a microfiber cloth fixes that in seconds. The voicing is subtly different from most other Fenders I've tried, slightly brighter and a more pronounced Strat quack. I agree with other reviewers here that the tuners are a might cheap/nasty looking but they keep the guitar in tune well .... I've always try to use with Fender 3250R Super Bullets strings, the one occasion I didn't the guitar sounded odd and the strings didn't see the end of the night.

I've owned many a Strat. Now, I don't even know where to begin. This Stratocaster signature's pickups had 19 prototypes before EJ approved them. The tone is unbelievable. Literally. The thin nitro coat is sure to show that unbelievably classic '57 vibe over time, and will age phenomenally well. The fretboard radius upped to 12 which I was skeptical of. But, like everything else on this guitar, it simply works. Big hands bend strings with NO buzz, thanks to that nice wide radius. No gizmos, s1 switches, no messing around. The Best Strat made. period.

I own one, candy apple red, and it's everything you'd expect from a guitar that was built to Eric's specs. No joke. Jus got it signed by EJ recently. ;)