In most of the cases, guitarists don’t appreciate Fenders from 70’s, known also as: big headstock Strats, CBS era Strats or: bullet truss-rod Strats.
Me personally love’em, but I can dig why people mostly don’t share my affection to those Stratocasters from 70s.
At that time Fender as a company was under few serious reconstructions. First owner and Stratocaster inventor, Mr. Leo Fender was already out of the company (he sold it to be precise), times were harder, prices went down, salaries up… they needed to make some cost cutting, that wasn’t fortunate in every field…
Why people say CBS Stratocasters are worst?
According to common opinion, those guitars were simply… worst than their ancestors from previous two decades. There’s also the fact that more heavyweight Strats comes strictly from that CBS era, and as we know “Good Stratocaster” means “lightweight Stratocaster”. This principle rarely fails. Therefor guitarist barely look for Fenders from that era.
What about CBS copies made in Japan?
But what about Bullet truss rod Stratocasters made in Japan? Well… Firstly there weren’t made by Fender under reconstruction , secondly Greco and Tokai used to copy only the best Fenders, thirdly they attended that process 10 years after the Fender’s problems during CBS era, Japanese luthiers really had time to find what’s good and what’s bad about Big headstock Stratocaster.
My personal experience is that every bullet truss rod Stratocaster from Greco and Tokai I had were very good.
How Silverstar Stratocaster is different than GoldStar Sound Stratocaster?
– GoldStar Sounds (TST, next generation after the SpringySound), which were preCBS Stratocasters copies (’54-’57, ’59 and ’60-’62 and ’64 models)
– SilverStars, which were the CBS Stratocaster copies.Quite popular opinion is that SilverStar is lower end series than GoldStar, but it isn’t a true. Both could be quite entry level quality (TST50 and SS36) or very high-end (TST80 and SS80).
Specs:
- Tokai SilverStar SS40MR;
- 1983;
- 3,4 kg / 7.49 Ibs
- Original frets, 90% remaining. Polished and stage-ready;
- 25,5″ scale;
- 21 frets;
- 2 string trees;
- Alder body;
- Maple fingerboard; (looking for rosewood fingerboard? check: Fernandes Stratocaster FST60, Tokai Telecaster TTE-60)
- Maple neck with skunk stripe;
- Neck profile: V;
- Radius: 9,5″;
- Vintage basic Tokai tuners,
- S.T.C made in Japan tremolo bridge;
- Original electric circuit and pots,
- GigBag included;
- Comes in a professional transportation box, ready to be shipped.
We all like to test our guitars with an amp we own, so I offer you 14 days to test this guitar. If you don’t like it, you simply send it back to me with no hassle.
