My LP Custom - it's either a '69 or a 1973-74, by the serial number. Since I got it '75, as I recall, I'd GUESS it was the earlier possible date. Originally, it was one of those obiquitous "Black Beauties," with two pups and the gold hardware - there must have been a million of them made in the late sixties and seventies.  But when I got it in '75, it was in HORRIBLE condition — the finish was in bad shape in general, completely trashed on the neck, and the gold plating was all pitted and half gone. It looked like the guitar had been dragged down a gravel road!

It was soon to become my "Radio Shack Custom." As it was a decidedly common and un-classic axe at the time, I didn't feel bad about messin' with it. Hey, I was young and foolish! And yes, this is the guitar that prompted me to sell my ES-335... Anyway, the gold hardware was the first stuff to go, then I popped the pup covers and added coil shunts (the switches in a vertical row in front of the volume knob). I added a phase reverse toggle, stuck in the old "bridge volume" hole, after I changed it over to a single "master" volume and tone (Tele-style) setup. Oh yeah, and I stripped the rest of the black finish completely off and shot it "natural"...

In '76, I added the center pup because I wanted to get mo’ better Fender Strat-ish tones out of it. I put the output of that middle pup on a little on/off/on switch I installed next to the standard pup selector. This seemed like a good location to me because I'd had a Gretsch Tennesean I'd been playing with the two toggles up there. I just paralleled the output of the toggle it to the regular selector switch: center it's off; up, it's on in-phase; down, on out-of-phase, and, of course, added a coil shunt switch for the middle pup down between the other two coil shunt switches.

I can get about a hundred and two sounds out of that ol' guy!

I played it set up that way, putting on THOUSANDS of hours playing time, for maybe five years... my "BarWars" period!

Here I am with it before the second "ebony" refinish. This has got to be Halloween, 1980, on stage with my band at the Dance Machine in Imperial Beach, California.

Why the bunny costume?
Well, the name of the band was "Thumper"...

Shot it back to "classic ebony" again in '81 myself (SOMEDAY I'd like to get a "professional" refinish... any offers?).

Switched the controls to a master volume and master tone at about that time, too.

Got a re-fret to BIG frets in ‘83.

Added the Kahler vibrato in '85.

Call it '95 or so, I put some chrome pup covers back on - about the time I saw an "Ace Frehley" three-pup model with the covers off - not that anyone would confuse Ace for me, or vice-verse. I swapped out the bridge pup for a Seymour Duncan Alnico Pro II, trying to get it just a little hotter and sweeter.

1998, I rewired the switch in the old "bridge tone" position (which had been an on/off for the whole axe, a la Pete Townsend) into a switch to "series" the neck and bridge pups - which, by the way, was nowhere near as dramatic as I had hoped. In fact, it's hardly noticeable in humbucker mode, and subtle at best in single coil mode. Just a more humbucker-y humbucker tone...(?)

2001, I rewired the (above) switch to allow me to chose between PARALLEL or SERIES wiring for the coils in the bridge pup - series being the way a regular humbucker is wired. Ah, now that was a good one! The parallel setting is a very Fender-y tone, much like a coil shunt, but is SLIGHTLY warmer and still hum cancelling - it's a keeper! I can still shunt the coil on the bridge pup, to really "thin it up" if needed, with the old coil shunt switch.

Next wiring mod will be to series-out-of-phase wire the bridge and neck!

Now I see Gibson has released a Peter Frampton three-pup model. I ought to write them about this one!

So, just how "Strat-y" could it get? A while ago, one of my old bandmates sent me a live tape of the last trio I worked with, twenty years ago. As I listened, I wracked my brain trying to remember what Strat I was using at that time - until I finally realized I didn't own or play a Strat at that time - it was all done on this ol' beast!