Blue Strat replica (Weezer content)

[fridgelightbulb]

think this was before - probably early summer 2000. I can't find the exact video, but I think it was an unreleased song. It wasn't the one from the Video Capture Device, though might have been the same gig.

Yeah, I imagine that throw is what split the body. I don't know when the black guitar first appeared, but it had to have been shortly before. I recall that was Matt's last show and they didn't play live again until 2000.

That's what I was thinking. I just checked the Bizarre 96 video and there is a part with the neck pickup on 10. Right before El Scorcho. You can hear there's a signifciant difference in the voicing when switching pickups.

Not convinced about the bridge pickup just yet. Seems like a lot more drive is coming from that (he does turn it down slightly before switching to the neck)

I know there's a fairly recent interview where Rivers says how the blue one wasn't the first and was inspired by the one from Jason. He also mentioned how the white Telecaster was initially his, but they traded.

Maybe the El Scorcho/Oh Girl performance from 2000? That’s from the second show they did, he uses the seafoam swamp ash strat during Oh Girl but it didn’t have any tape or stickers yet.

Couldn’t find anything before the Mykel and Carli show but it already had stickers and tape all over it, maybe late spring-early summer 97? They were back in CA for a few days/weeks during that period maybe that’s when they got the parts for the black strat.


Just watched it, after going from 10 it looks like he goes down to like 3? before he starts the song which is pretty crazy; 8-9 for bridge and 3-4 for neck
Might come down to trial and error.


The premier guitar one? It sounds like he’s talking about the red strat. To be fair he’s talking about a 30 year old build after having at least 7 of them he might not know which one he’s talking about.

 

[Hondoo]

@kerouac I see and yeah that’s also something I noticed about the bridge cut out

Man, now we’re back to square 1 regarding orginal blue’s bridge pickup
I did get the Super 2 for the one i’m working on and it sounds pretty spot on, I’ve seen a couple of people say it was also F spaced; most notably in Mike’s (puisheen) original replica post, but went for the regular one since having an F spaced neck pick up makes no sense to me.

Also just a little correction the parts on the original blue ended up in one of 3 natural strats he got before the colored ones arrived and parts of the other 2 ended up on the ones that he’s currently using.
I’ll leave this just in case anyone is interested. I didn’t mention the black strat since from what I could find that one has stayed the same.

Original Blue body to Natural body #1
Same pickguard, pickups and ESP bridge
View attachment 60464

Natural body #2 to Current Seafoam Green body
Same pickguard and bridge but different bridge pickup. Natural body was used live in the early 00s, the seafoam body has been used live since 2012 unless it’s the same body as the last guitar on this list.
View attachment 60465

Natural #3 to Current Sonic Blue back up
This one is the hardest to find (natural #3) and the picture I have isn’t great but you can tell by the sticker in between the pickups that it’s the same pickguard but again different bridge pickup, doesn’t have the ESP bridge but an odd hardtail bridge with 4 corner screws. The natural body was used live in the early 00s until he got the sonic blue one, Sonic Blue strat has been used live since fall 2001 from what I could find.
View attachment 60467


Seafoam Green #1?
This is either the same body he’s currently using or a completely different one since the pickguard doesn’t match but that is something he could’ve easily swapped out and remove the tape off the body. Used live since 2000, most notably at weezer’s first show after their hiatus and Warped Tour 00.
View attachment 60468

The last green one is still the one he uses now. There's some pics around 2012 and you can see the tape residue.
He also had the blue/green ones first, then swapped over to the blonde ones, then swapped back. But the pickguards got swapped with eachother while switching to the blondes. You can see the tortoise mark next to the volume knob.
The "OG blue" blonde one still exists, here's an ewbaite studio pic and you can see it in the rack.
Here's also some old screen shots of the new blue in 2000 from this video

LMAO I'm just glad I'm not the only weirdo who's obsessing over these strats.

 

[fridgelightbulb]

The last green one is still the one he uses now. There's some pics around 2012 and you can see the tape residue.
He also had the blue/green ones first, then swapped over to the blonde ones, then swapped back. But the pickguards got swapped with eachother while switching to the blondes. You can see the tortoise mark next to the volume knob.
The "OG blue" blonde one still exists, here's an ewbaite studio pic and you can see it in the rack.
Here's also some old screen shots of the new blue in 2000 from this video

LMAO I'm just glad I'm not the only weirdo who's obsessing over these strats.

I did see a few marks on the body when looking for 2012 pics but didn’t give it much thought since those guitars are traveling the world all the time.

Wow! You’re totally right about the pickguards, now everything is falling into place.
So they’re all from around the same period, except for the OG blue and black strat of course.
Is that the show you were talking about @kerouac? Karl probably mistook that guitar for the OG one when he said it was used until 2000

Haha there’s a handful of us!

 

[stratamania]

It's a different type from what was on the Strat Plus. Basically the same as the LSR in size, but different width.

Which dimension are you referring to as width, what is the difference to an LSR which is for a 1 11/16” nut width?

Or do you mean the Wilkinson on the Strat Plus you are referencing are larger and need a larger nut shelf towards the headstock. An LSR comes with an adapter so it can fit on such a shelf when replacing a Wilkinson of that type.

This one. The other Wilkinson roller nuts I saw were a bit larger and had a satin chrome finish. It fits the neck properly, but can't be mounted with screws like the LSR.

Thanks for posting the picture.

 

[SoniKast]

Heya, been following this thread on and off for the past few months. I just wanted to add that someone on the Weezer subreddit a few weeks back noticed that when Rivers went back to using his Strats after the Raditude era, the bridge pickup in both the Seafoam Green and Nu-Sonic Blue guitars got switched to an unknown humbucker, which you can tell by the extra hole on the humbucker being on the right side instead of the left, as it usually is on SDs. However, his white batwing SG (as of 2020) seems to have the TB-59 in there (which is... a bit silly?)


And on top of that, it seems like that same unknown humbucker has been placed in the black Strat (and probably also the blonde, though there's no way to verify that one)

...This honestly just makes the whole thing a bit more complicated, lol
Maybe it's the stock pickup that were originally in his SGs? No one seems to have noticed this until really lately and according to Weezerpedia, "Rivers has confirmed the neck and bridge pickups are DiMarzio and Seymour Duncan, respectively. But is it unknown they are his classic Super 2 neck and TB59 bridge combo." In all pics I've seen, the neck pickup seems to still be a Super 2, the hex heads match. That bridge pickup still remains unknown. My guess is that it's probably a 2002-2003 stock Gibson bridge pickup. Could be the SG, could be a Les Paul Classic, since he used that on the Green album.

 

[Strat Avenger]

Until this thread, I honestly thought Weezer, were just a made up band used in a video on Windows 95 in a Happy Days setting. They must be known more in the US, probably.

You're not missing anything.

 

[Hondoo]

Heya, been following this thread on and off for the past few months. I just wanted to add that someone on the Weezer subreddit a few weeks back noticed that when Rivers went back to using his Strats after the Raditude era, the bridge pickup in both the Seafoam Green and Nu-Sonic Blue guitars got switched to an unknown humbucker, which you can tell by the extra hole on the humbucker being on the right side instead of the left, as it usually is on SDs. However, his white batwing SG (as of 2020) seems to have the TB-59 in there (which is... a bit silly?)

View attachment 60545 View attachment 60549View attachment 60550
And on top of that, it seems like that same unknown humbucker has been placed in the black Strat (and probably also the blonde, though there's no way to verify that one)
View attachment 60547View attachment 60548
...This honestly just makes the whole thing a bit more complicated, lol
Maybe it's the stock pickup that were originally in his SGs? No one seems to have noticed this until really lately and according to Weezerpedia, "Rivers has confirmed the neck and bridge pickups are DiMarzio and Seymour Duncan, respectively. But is it unknown they are his classic Super 2 neck and TB59 bridge combo." In all pics I've seen, the neck pickup seems to still be a Super 2, the hex heads match. That bridge pickup still remains unknown. My guess is that it's probably a 2002-2003 stock Gibson bridge pickup. Could be the SG, could be a Les Paul Classic, since he used that on the Green album.

That was me! I'm thinking the green one is a Gibson as in the mid 2000's they drilled on both sides and it's small.
But the zebras I'm thinking are GFS. I remember several magazines where he said he can reliably pick out the green one so I'm assuming it's a higher quality pickup. I think I edited that part on weezerpedia and got the info from his wack website where he confirmed the super 2 and 59 combo.
From what I remember looking through reverb only Epiphone, GFS, Loller, and G&B (PRS and Stewmac?), and some newer offbrands match the zebras. Or at least only the Korean factories matched the colors at the time.

 

[eziolawliet]

Hello guys, I have made my own Cuomocaster, and I have been kind of suspecting that there is no Black Ice mod on the Sonic Blue, I got a little bit lost between all the answers, just to make sure if most of us agree that the Blue Strat has 2 volume knobs and that is all, so he goes from clean parts on neck pickup at low volume and then enters with all the raw disto from amp with the bridge pickup.

 

[fridgelightbulb]

Hello guys, I have made my own Cuomocaster, and I have been kind of suspecting that there is no Black Ice mod on the Sonic Blue, I got a little bit lost between all the answers, just to make sure if most of us agree that the Blue Strat has 2 volume knobs and that is all, so he goes from clean parts on neck pickup at low volume and then enters with all the raw disto from amp with the bridge pickup.

I don’t want to speak for others but in my personal opinion, from everything I’ve seen; yes. I would even go as far to say that that’s the case with every build:
-In the sonic blue days he would use both knobs accordingly.
-In the early 00s the knobs for the neck pickups were locked with tape at low values.
-Nowadays they’re no longer locked but I linked a video in one of my previous comments where Rivers is playing Say it Ain’t So with only the neck pickup and only uses the 2nd knob throughout the whole song.

As for the Black Ice, who knows. I don’t know even know the source of the original comment, was it really Karl? I know it’s on the weezerpedia page but it also says only one knob worked, that would mean Rivers had no way to control the Black Ice, it would’ve been at full distortion since the pot was also being used as a volume control. But the 2nd volume definitely works unless it was only a 1994 thing since he was already using the 2nd knob during the Letterman performance in 1995.

Either way I think it makes for a more versatile guitar if you don’t have it and IMO you won’t even need it if you’re already using a heavy distorted amp.


Let’s see your Cuomocaster!

 

[kerouac]

Maybe the El Scorcho/Oh Girl performance from 2000? That’s from the second show they did, he uses the seafoam swamp ash strat during Oh Girl but it didn’t have any tape or stickers yet.

Couldn’t find anything before the Mykel and Carli show but it already had stickers and tape all over it, maybe late spring-early summer 97? They were back in CA for a few days/weeks during that period maybe that’s when they got the parts for the black strat.

View attachment 60476
Just watched it, after going from 10 it looks like he goes down to like 3? before he starts the song which is pretty crazy; 8-9 for bridge and 3-4 for neck
Might come down to trial and error.


The premier guitar one? It sounds like he’s talking about the red strat. To be fair he’s talking about a 30 year old build after having at least 7 of them he might not know which one he’s talking about.

It wasn't on the VCD. I remember the video was taken from the back of the crowd near the center. It could have been the seafoam, but somehow I'm picturing the body having the residue from the stickers and tape.

Yeah, it's really tricky about the pickups. Based on the sound, I'd say the Super 2 is correct. Also, according to Karl's info, the bridge was the TB59B1. That seems pretty specific.

As for the interview, he was definitely talking about the red one. I remember he mentioned how the blue one wasn't actually the original, and was inspired by the Fender from Jason. I think he also said how his friend later destroyed it on stage.

Which dimension are you referring to as width, what is the difference to an LSR which is for a 1 11/16” nut width?

Or do you mean the Wilkinson on the Strat Plus you are referencing are larger and need a larger nut shelf towards the headstock. An LSR comes with an adapter so it can fit on such a shelf when replacing a Wilkinson of that type.



Thanks for posting the picture.

Sorry, I meant the width as in the 1-11/16" (currently available Fender LSR nut)

The Wilkinson I posted is the narrower 1.650" but not sure about the one with the larger shelf.

Hello guys, I have made my own Cuomocaster, and I have been kind of suspecting that there is no Black Ice mod on the Sonic Blue, I got a little bit lost between all the answers, just to make sure if most of us agree that the Blue Strat has 2 volume knobs and that is all, so he goes from clean parts on neck pickup at low volume and then enters with all the raw disto from amp with the bridge pickup.

Let's see it!

Yeah, back then his amps were always set distorted. I wired mine with the two separate volumes




Also, for anyone buying Seymour Duncan pickups (especially second hand) for their builds... be careful. There have been counterfeits going around and they look nearly identical to the genuine ones.... even the DC resistance seems to be reasonably close.

 

[stratamania]

The Wilkinson I posted is the narrower 1.650" but not sure about the one with the larger shelf.

Here is a picture of a Fender Strat Plus variant with a Fender Wilkinson nut. Back in the day, these sat on a larger nut shelf rather than a slot. Jeff Beck's (RIP) main white Strat had one of these.




Later, Fender used the LSR roller nut, these sit in a slot rather than a shelf.

However, if you buy an LSR nut as a part, it comes with an adapter (black part in picture). The adapter only needs to be used if you are fitting an LSR to the older shelf type shown above as a replacement.

 

[fridgelightbulb]

@kerouac I almost forgot! I have some info for you regarding the neck width for your red strat.

This is a page from a 1995 Warmoth catalog (2 or 3 years late but still useful I think) It appears they only offered 1 5/8 (41mm) and 1 11/16 (43mm) nut widths for their strat/tele replacement necks.

So I guess this confirms the 41mm nut width for the red strat.
If I had to guess the og blue probably had a 43mm nut width with 6150 frets (6100s are way too big) but that’s just me.


I got this from a listing I found on ebay, it might still be up there, I remember typing "Warmoth catalog".

 

[stratamania]

This is a page from a 1995 Warmoth catalog (2 or 3 years late but still useful I think) It appears they only offered 1 5/8 (41mm) and 1 11/16 (43mm) nut widths for their strat/tele replacement necks.

This is correct, it is only in quite recent years that the in between size1.65 was offered in early 2019.

Meanwhile, at Warmoth: 1.650" Nut Width, y'all!!!

1.650" Nut Width is now an option on all build-to-order #Warmoth necks! We also have a bunch in stock. Click here to see all the Warmoth 1.650" Nut Width necks in stock.

unofficialwarmoth.com

 

[eziolawliet]

Hello guys, sorry for my late reply, it´s my first time on a forum to be honest ha.

Lemme share you my two cuomocasters. I built them 2 years ago.

This one is a seafoam green made from Guitar Fetish parts, (body and neck). And that squier hardtail bridge (that I believe is the one Rivers uses on his nowdays seafoam green strat) this is my backup guitar (I´m a huge Weezer fan, like, creepy fan hahaha)





Then we got the main, the blue strat, my dream guitar coming to live. This one is from a Guitar Fetish body, and an All Parts neck.
Both guitars have the same electronics, 1 master volume, and i installed a Black ice mod on both (To be honest i don´t like it, i find it useless since i play through distorted amps) but I think i´m gonna change them to a 2 volume setting.

The bridge was a hard one, I had luck after years of looking for it, so I think I got the exact bridge.

1. It’s a gotoh brand bridge discontinued and made in Japan late 80s to 90s.
   
   

This guitar is so fun to play, I played a Blue Album tribute with some friends alongisde some dudes playing a Nirvana show. I recently had the opportunity to get a Marshall 6100LM (it is now at repair because the clean channel isn´t working, although i never use it, i still want it available and repaired) I might share videos soon.




I also got last year an marshall slx, very cool amp. I borrowed it to a friend who has a rehearsal studio where we play, so I can´t show you any recent video of the sound alone. I just have this one with the full band.

View this content on Instagram

View this content on Instagram

I might be crazy, but I love talking about these stuff. Ha

Do you think I should go for the 2 volume setting guys?

Also, do you know any other pedal Rivers might have used on the Pinkerton tour besides the wah?

PS: I loved every answer on this forum.

 

[Hondoo]

Hello guys, sorry for my late reply, it´s my first time on a forum to be honest ha.

Lemme share you my two cuomocasters. I built them 2 years ago.

This one is a seafoam green made from Guitar Fetish parts, (body and neck). And that squier hardtail bridge (that I believe is the one Rivers uses on his nowdays seafoam green strat) this is my backup guitar (I´m a huge Weezer fan, like, creepy fan hahaha)



View attachment 60640

Then we got the main, the blue strat, my dream guitar coming to live. This one is from a Guitar Fetish body, and an All Parts neck.
Both guitars have the same electronics, 1 master volume, and i installed a Black ice mod on both (To be honest i don´t like it, i find it useless since i play through distorted amps) but I think i´m gonna change them to a 2 volume setting.

The bridge was a hard one, I had luck after years of looking for it, so I think I got the exact bridge.

View attachment 60641

1. It’s a gotoh brand bridge discontinued and made in Japan late 80s to 90s.
   
   View attachment 60642

This guitar is so fun to play, I played a Blue Album tribute with some friends alongisde some dudes playing a Nirvana show. I recently had the opportunity to get a Marshall 6100LM (it is now at repair because the clean channel isn´t working, although i never use it, i still want it available and repaired) I might share videos soon.

View attachment 60643


I also got last year an marshall slx, very cool amp. I borrowed it to a friend who has a rehearsal studio where we play, so I can´t show you any recent video of the sound alone. I just have this one with the full band.

View this content on Instagram

View this content on Instagram

I might be crazy, but I love talking about these stuff. Ha

Do you think I should go for the 2 volume setting guys?

Also, do you know any other pedal Rivers might have used on the Pinkerton tour besides the wah?

PS: I loved every answer on this forum.

I think he was using a Roger Mayer fuzz, but I can't remember where I saw that.

There's some more wrong? info about the volume knobs in here as well.

Weezine Issue 6 - Spring 1996 - Weezerpedia

www.weezerpedia.com

I also built two using Guitar fetish bodies! I'll share them later

 

[eziolawliet]

I think he was using a Roger Mayer fuzz, but I can't remember where I saw that.

There's some more wrong? info about the volume knobs in here as well.

Weezine Issue 6 - Spring 1996 - Weezerpedia

www.weezerpedia.com

I also built two using Guitar fetish bodies! I'll share them later

Woah this is so cool, I've never seen those magazines before.

English isn't my first language so I get lost most of the times. Was the Blue Strat a Master volume configuration or a 2 volume configuration?

Any idea of what does the middle position of the 3way switch does? I change my mind anytime I see a different live video hahaha.


Show us your strat man! Guitar fetish bodies are really good imo.

 

[Hondoo]

Woah this is so cool, I've never seen those magazines before.

English isn't my first language so I get lost most of the times. Was the Blue Strat a Master volume configuration or a 2 volume configuration?

Any idea of what does the middle position of the 3way switch does? I change my mind anytime I see a different live video hahaha.


Show us your strat man! Guitar fetish bodies are really good imo.

Oh no worries I think it really is just Karl messing up in the 90's and the info's been wrong ever since. It's too confusing.

The whole "crunchy while the volume turns down" might have just been a simple treble bleed too.
Maybe the middle position is silent?

 

[Hondoo]

My wack builds, also GFS XGP bodies, also a green and blue, also an Allparts neck. I built the green last year and just built the blue a few months ago to have one in standard tuning.
The green body had some defects so I think they sent me one of the B stock ones but I got some money back.
The blue body was 100% perfect.


Warmoth 59 roundback w/ SS6100 frets

Super 2 and 59 custom hybrid

Push pull pots that activate the little toggle to switch between coil split/parallel. (so always series wiring with the push pulls down). Also just master volume and tone.

$10 Musiclily bridge, and $50 string saver saddles lmao



Allparts SRO-W neck
Lowkey the Allparts neck is higher quality than the Warmoth and it was under $150 new. But they’re over 200 now so I went Warmoth for the stainless frets (which don’t really feel any smoother).

Surf Green! Same guitar but with a yellow super 2 and no fancy saddles. Also vintage staggered Gotoh tuners.

I also routed out the area under the pickguard and it saved like half a pound. The green went from almost 8 pounds to just over 7. The blue is just a hair under 7 now.



Also did the fender style contour that I gave up painting

 

[fridgelightbulb]

There's some more wrong? info about the volume knobs in here as well.

Weezine Issue 6 - Spring 1996 - Weezerpedia

www.weezerpedia.com

Nice find!
No mention of the Black Ice whatsoever. I don't think the information was wrong but outdated since I'm pretty confident the configuration was changed before the Pinkerton tour.

Also the middle position on the 3 way switch works exactly like any other 3 way, definitely not silent.
Rivers uses it here before the 2nd chorus.

 

[Hondoo]

Nice find!
No mention of the Black Ice whatsoever. I don't think the information was wrong but outdated since I'm pretty confident the configuration was changed before the Pinkerton tour.

Also the middle position on the 3 way switch works exactly like any other 3 way, definitely not silent.
Rivers uses it here before the 2nd chorus.

Woah is that the only time he's ever used the middle position? That's gotta be the only footage of anyone actually using the middle position lol