NGD Sort of

Hi Folks,

I've been a gibson player all my life and recently bought a fender deluxe player. I've also had a few XA 1330's well before the fender. The XA's were far from perfect condition and I didn't like the bendmaster so I sold one and later gave the other to my nephew.

Fast forward to today and I talked my nephew in to trading me the xa for a near perfect fender clone I had kicking around with updated pickups. He doesn't play much and I think he'd rather have a good looking guitar than one that's beat up. You see, I bought the fender deluxe because I really liked the sound, but no matter how much I play it, I just can't fall in love with it. So here I am with the XA again. I figured it's not worth a ton of money so I'll mod it until I'm happy. I do really like the feel and neck, other than the bendmaster trem which just seems to get in my way.

That's a great story! What is it about a guitar that just "clicks" with a person? It's a lot of things, but you definitely know when it's not right, as with your strat.

Mod away, make it your sound. About the trem, what specifically don't you like about it?

The trem gets in my way. I guess it's how i rest my hand. I'm guessing there is no real value to it being an anniversary edition so I can repaint if with out kicking myself later.

I'm reading the pickups are all Magnaflux . Are they decent or are they UBC that people love/hate?

It's already a bit beat up so why not mod it how you want.

If you're doing a repaint anyhow, swap the trem for something you like. Make it a fun project. What have you got to lose? But do it before the repaint in case you need to drill/fill holes.

The magnaflux are great pups from what I've heard.