NAMM 2013 - Fender Ritchie Blackmore Tribute Stratocaster

Fender Custom Shop introduces the 2013 limited edition Ritchie Blackmore Tribute Stratocaster, a tribute Deep Purple's iconic guitarist.

This guitar is based on the black 1968 Stratocaster that helped Ritchie create one of the most popular guitar riffs in rock history - "Smoke on the Water".

Like other Custom Shop replicas, the Ritchie Blackmore Tribute Stratocaster mimics the original guitar down to minute details. It gives fans and modern players a chance to own a close to original copy of the black Strat that Blackmore played with Deep Purple in the early ’70s. It is the instrument that helped shape Deep Purple's seminal album Machine Head and the band’s greatest hit single.

This guitar features a two-piece alder body with a lightly worn Black urethane finish along with relic details that faithfully reproduce the condition of Blackmore's original guitar.

It has a ’69 “U”-shaped maple neck topped with a 7.25”-radius maple fingerboard. Like the original, it has 21 medium jumbo frets, a micarta nut and a scale Length of 25.5". The neck is joined to the body via four-bolts, and features a special neck plate stamped with the serial number and the stylized Fender “F”.

The tribute guitar comes with a large '70s Style, and is equipped with Schaller tuners. The other end of the string is kept in tune and in place by a vintage-style synchronized tremolo, equipped with Blackmore's unique custom 1/4" trem arm.

The tone of the guitar is captured by custom ’69 Stratocaster pickups that were hand-wound by Fender's Abigail Ybarra. The pickups are controlled via a 3-way pickup selector, a volume knob and two tone knobs.

This special instrument is only to be produced within 2013, and each one comes with a rear-headstock tribute decal, certificate of authenticity and an orange-line black textured vinyl case with a “Fender Amp” logo.

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