Simply because I'm bored, I'm going to throw out something:
Swirl finishes, really popular among the Ibanez crowd.
The idea, as I saw on Project Guitar, (http://www.projectguitar.com/tut/swirled.htm) is that you have a large bucket of water and add different colors of paint, which float on the top. You dip the body in the water and swirl it around. No comments on the effects of dipping a wood body in water.
What if you did it with different colors of stain?
I don't see myself trying it anytime soon but thought I would throw it out there.
Or you could just add some of these (http://www.houseofkolor.com/hok/products/specialty.jsp) different kind of flakes to your clear coat.
James