Strats with Mark I/Mark IV??

[MarkofXlnts]

I am going to be purchasing a new guitar in two weeks, and have been thinking about ordering a Fender Yngwie Malmsteen Strat. I owned two of them several years ago, but have never had the chance to use one with a Boogie. Does anyone here in the forum know how this instrument reacts to the Mark IV, Mark I, or Caliber series amps?? My styles range from 80's metal to blues, and I do occasionally listen to Yngwie. I am not looking to copy the Malmsteen tone exactly, but I want to be able to cover styles from hard rock to blues. Any Malmsteen/Boogie users out there? Any comments would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

 

[King Tone]

I have a mark I and mark III but no strat! I would imagine it would sound fine with either but with the mark I you may want something to boost to get the gain you may want. The mark I does not have the searing gain on the high strings like the mark II,III,and IV, which are good for those thick lead tones.

I use a MI audio tubezone to get the gain I want out of the I, setting the amp cleaner.

 

[bpm91]

I have a Mark III Blue Stripe and a MIJ Fender Strat.... the Mark LOVES my Strat. Cleans are amazing: clear, rounded, creamy warmth. OD/Distortion awesome too.

 

[Platypus]

Marks do well with Fenders.. cannot comment specifically on the Stratocaster but my Telecaster loves both my IIC+ and my IV.

 

[Boogie Woogie Man]

I have two Strats, one with Fralin vintage hots, the other with Custom Shop 69's and they sound incredible through my Mk lll blue stripe. FYI, so do my Telecasters.

 

[HamerFan]

I've been messing around with my Hamer Daytona that is a strat equivalent which has a hot rails bridge and vintage rails neck and middle pups. I've been using R2 with the gain at about 4, pushed, presence 1 pulled. Treble 7, mids 7, bass 4, triode, tweed, Class A. Sounds really nice on the neck pickup.

 

[eltrain858]

i use strats with my MkIV, both of them have lace sensors + hot rails.. with a stock strat i find it a little lacking in the gain/sustain on the lead channel for blistering leads, but adding the BB preamp out front (or another boost for that matter) helps a lot with that.

 

[Kinx]

IMO strat/mark matches each other perfectly even using single coils, you can get incredible heavy tones as well as nice cleans from this combo. i like mk series amps with fenders more than with any other guitars

 

[MarkofXlnts]

Great feedback! Thank you everyone!! I used to be a Fender guy, then switched to Gibson and had Les Pauls when I made my first Boogie purchases a year ago, so I never actually got to play my Strats through any Boogie amps. I love the thick Gibson tone, especially for leads, but miss the range of other sounds available with Fender guitars. If anyone else has additional comments, I would love to hear them as well. 8)

 

[l'ctricgeetarhack]

I play a newer maple V-necked Deluxe Strat with the SCN PUP thru a Mark IVA. Definitely a different, but very nice, sound than humbuckers-think the tracks off "Tattoo You"- I think Keef and Ronnie were using mostly single coil guitars like Strats and Teles, maybe a Les Paul Jr, through their Boogies.

 

[Mulemasta]

I have a USA deluxe Ash, maple neck and I can't handle the thin lifeless tone. The solution is a LP or PRS, definitely a killer match for me. Fender sounds great through other amps just not enough for me through any of my Boogies

 

[dodger916]

I prefer my Strat over my SG with the Mark IV, whereas the raw, crisp growl of the SG really loves the Mark IIs! I think the articulation and power of the IV is a great match for a Strat, whereas the SG's voice gets a little lost. The Strat also sounds great with the Mark II. By the way, the SG has stock 1971 humbuckers whereas I installed Tonerider single coil aftermarket pickups in the Strat. Nice p'ups by the way at a great price.

I think the guitar volume and tone controls seem to influence the sound more with the II than the IV. I also think with the Mark IIs, the instruments voice is a bit more apparent than with the IV.

 

[Shep]

i can get really nice eric johnson style lead tone's out of my mk IV with my strat...the cleans are likt a really nice fender amp.. everything sounds good with a boogie..

 

[Bourque]

I was beat to the Eric Johnson reference. I think it was Seven Worlds he used a Mark I with his Strat for part of the record. His tone needs no introduction.

 

[telecasterkid]

I can possibly offer up the next best thing to the Yngwie Strat/Mark combo. I have a Mark III and two strats one MIM and one MIJ all wired with the Dimarzio HS-3/YJM/YJM pup configuration. Simply put the Mark series LOVES strats. The clean tone is unbelievable. I don't think you will go wrong. To this day a strat through a boogie is probably my all time fav tone.

 

[supergenius365]

Love my '57 AVRI Strat and IIC+ combination!


Just added a Barber Tonepress as an "always on pedal" and am in sonic Heaven.

 

[HappyStrat]

Don't let my handle fool ya, I'm more an LP guy. My current Strat is a 2001 American Deluxe with Samarian Cobalt Noiseless (SCN) pups. The guitar plays great but the pups sound like crap through any amp for that matter. I've adjusted them to every position possible and they still sound lifeless and crappy. I rewired it with RS Guitarworks pots & caps, it only gave me a slight improvement. Before I give up on this Strat, I'm gonna re-outfit her with some Lollar pups.

Is everybody else that has SCN pups on their Strat happy with their tone or do I have a set of dud SCN's?

 

[plumptone]

I have two strats - one is a 1989 strat plus with the Lace Sensors and the other is a 2001 American Deluxe with the nioseless pickups.

I use a DC-3 and an F-50. The Lace picups sound great through both amps and sound very 50's to my ears. The nioseless pickups are a bit different. I think they do a very authentic 60's style strat sound, and can cop a very good Knopfler and Gilmour clean type of sound. But they are not high output pickups by any stretch of the imagination, and don't seem to be as well defined when the amp is in overdrive. I have had to adjust them to get them so that they sound good through both amps.

They seem to do better with the DC-3 than with the F-50. I found that I had to lower the height of the neck pickup quite a lot in order for it not to sound too muddy, but I keep the middle p-up at standard height. The bridge pickup I've had to raise as high as I possibly can without string interference. I think they are good pickups in general though. I guess you have some sort of a trade off when you eliminate the hum/noise, and they do that very well. Some folks like them, but I know a few players who really don't care for them. The one thing I do notice is that they sound WAY better when you have new strings on. As soon as the strings lose that "just put on" lustre, the pickups reflect that immediately.

I'm also considering swapping them out, but I'm not sold on any replacements yet. I don't want a humbucker-style pickup, but I don't want to deal with 60-cycle hum. It seems like an acceptable trade-off - at least to me.