Introducing The Fat Pussy One

Well, I'm pleasured to introduce you to the latest wee Jooky guitar, the rather fetching and very delightfilled beauty that is The Fat Pussy one. And I have to say, I'm really rather pleased with myself over this one.

As I mentioned a couple of weeks ago, I've long fancied trying a Hand Scattered (isn't that a lovely phrase?) humbucker sized P90 pickup from Allan Price at Catswhisker. Allan is one of a few top notch 'winders' of pickups in the UK and an utter gent to deal with. Makes a nice change to be able to talk about somebody doing exactly what they say, earlier than promised and then that the end product happens to be better than you hoped, but this is it. A golden moment.

No, the irony isn't lost on me.

But the proof is in the stuffing it down your throat, after all, and this pickup really delivers in spades. It is quite simply perfect.
To put that into context, The Fat Pussy One is a single pickup guitar, so you always worry that it will be limited, but the fact that the pickup was set-up with the option of switching out-of-phase, means that you get two great tones for the price of one little chrome topped hunk of magnet and wire. And what you get are two amazingly raw and somehow 'real' sounds, that just make you want to play more and more. And even with my dodgy hands at the moment, I can't help but keep going back to this guitar - it just sounds 'proper', without any of the muddiness of humbuckers. I just love it.

When James Sant bought the P90 equipped Jazzmaster-esque The Psychedelic Surf One a while back, I remember him describing it as 'it sounds like sex in your face' and you can say the same of the Fat Pussy One, there is something primal about it.

I am a bit of a P90 nut, as you probably realise reading this blog, but I'm happy to say that this is the best P90 I've ever had the joy to play. And I like to think I've at least played most of the ones around these days, and quite a few of the 'originals' too.

But the guitar - well, in simple terms it has a single P90 with a single volume knob. This is a push-pull pot though, which changes the 'phase' - and the out-of-phase 'mode' is a joy, on a Strat you are getting that BB King/Peter Green hollowness, which is amazing for blues and Jazz, while the straight P90, well, take your pick.

As a bit of fun, I also put a red-topped Kill Switch on, which is great fun and a must if you like your effects laden noise-ville sonic architecturey...

What else? Well, golden USA Fender tuners are a joy to use as ever, and I can't quite believe I've got this far in describing an entrant to the Jooky academe without mentioning the cool black and red Paisley finishing combo...which just works perfectly.  And I need not say more, for once.

But there we are. As you can tell, I'm a tad chuffed with this one, especially since I rewired the Kill Switch so it works the right way around..

The Fat Pussy One, and ode to Jook, methinks.