Sold: The Spindrifting One

The Spindrifting One is a stunning looking and sounding Jookified Strat that is truly cool in every way.

Based on Fender’s finest, a swamp ash body has been stained and waxed, back and sides, and generally battered to within an inch of it’s life. We don’t mean a belt sander relic job, this is looking for something different with the concept being to make it look as though the body has been made from old driftwood, rather than an old guitar mistreated. We think we’ve carried it off and the finish looks stunning in-the-wood.

In addition to the finish, we have the first ever set of Gimp pickups. These are exclusive to Jookyland and have been made for us by uber Wizard, Marc Ransley at Mojo Pickups. They have a different, much better, tone at the bridge that is more Tele/P90-like that the traditionally weak Strat bridge pup, and some of the sounds the pickups along with one of Marc’s handwired wiring looms offer are plain beautiful.

The neck is maple/rosewood and fast with a nice soft C shape, 9” radius and medium frets, it has a low buzz-free action and a beautiful smooth ride.

The strings are strung thru the body with a hardtail bridge and sustain is excellent, whilst Wilkinson ‘aged’ tuners mean tuning is never an issue.

All in all, this is a stunning looking guitar, with bags of tone and a beautiful feel. What else could you possibly want?

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To be clear, The Spindrifting One is an utterly unique guitar, and there will never, ever, be another made. It is signed and numbered, entirely hand built and finished cooler than a slo-mo run across the pebbled beach at Portishead. There will genuinely never be another guitar like this and past experience suggests that it won’t be around for long.

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Technical Stuff:

Type: Norma’s Natural Guitar

Electrics: Mojo Pickups Wound Jooky Gimp Pickups – Set GI#1 (CTS pots, Oak Grigsby Switch, PIO Caps)

Guitar Type: Fender Stratocastor Style

Construction: Swamp Ash body, Maple/Rosewood neck

Strings:     D’Addario EXP 10s

Output: ¼” Guitar Lead

Controls: Volume, 2 x Tone, 5-way-switch

Special Stuff: Certificate of Authenticity, Builder Signed and Numbered, All Wrapped with our Trademark Jooky Wrapping.

Serial Number: JGE#67

Introducing: The Spindrifting One

Well, the bratskis holibob mithering may be cramping me style somewhat, but I snuck thru some final tweaking and fettling yesterday and I'm pleased and proud to be able to formally introduce you to the rather splendid The Spindrifting One, and what a battered and aged bit of stuff it is.

From the top it is a back loading swamp ash bodied Strat, which has been given a lovely 'Time Stained' finish, battered around the ring and generally looks as though it has lived a life less ordinary.

The neck is quite divine, maple and rosewood, 9.5" radius, nice soft C of shape.

It is strung thru the body and hard of tail, so sustains like a little blue tablet, and has a lovely zingy tone. Tuners are aged Wilkinsons, strap pins some aged Gotohs which are my new faves courtesy of Planet Mojo.

And speaking of Mr Ransley, The Spindrifting One of course is boasting the first ever set of our Jooky exclusive Gimps pickups, in all their shabbiest of chicness. In case you missed these, they are uncovered and given a fabric binding here in Jookyland, and are something truly special, with a bridge pickup that is simply stunning and 'tweeny positions that just want to make you smile. These are everything I always wanted a set of Strat pickups to be but have never found and I am in love. End of.

These of course are linked together with one of Mojo Pickups vintage looms, complete with all the good stuff that entails.

Finishing touches are some shiny chromed pickup rings and shinier still Gretsch knobs and a rear control panel carved from an old Blues record.

So there we are, probably the best Strat you'll never get to play, as I may well just have to keep this one. OK, probably not, because of the golden rules of Jookiness, but I want to. I really want to, and Strats and me don't do that baby.

La la laaaa

We Are The Gimps

Well, not quite time for a formal introduction, but The Spindrifting One is almost there (minus a string tree or two and some proper Gretsch knobs), but I couldn't resist stringing it up and giving the first ever set of Gimps a run for their moolah.

And cool though they may look, sounds-wise they really are superb.

The bridge pickup has a definite Tele sound to it that is just lovely - nothing like the anemic Strat bridge pickups you usually have to suffer, while the middle and neck pickups are more hot Strat territory, though as clear as a bell even when I dug out a Big Muff (old Soviet one) and a Fuzz Face (modern re-issue). I really love the fact that there is something more in there that is hard to describe, maybe a bit more in the middle than your average Strat.

The best part for me is the in-between tones which are glorious here, especially the bridge/middle one where you get a kinda other-worldly-Tele sound that is a total joy. The tone controls really come into their own too and you can do a real Tele to Strat change with barely a twiddle.

Other than that, I'm loving The Spindrifting One. I wanted to make the body look proper lived in old, and it has plenty of dinks and dents, but it is the worn patches at the top I'm really most pleased about. Playing wise, I like a hardtail Strat and this is solid, so that is cool, and the neck is bang on. I went for a flatter board (9.5" with a C shape) and it feels great bending strings.

A good day's work then, methinks. And the bits I'm waiting for should be here next week so I'll do the formal intro then.

But Gimps, a grand idea, and now a reality. I may have to break a habit of a lifetime and record these babies.

La la laaaa

A Glimpse of the Gimps

Well, I'm feeling rather chipper today. The Black Russian One is awesome, in a box and awaiting a courier, and I've fettled and plonked my first set of Gimps in The Spindrifiting One.

For those of you that were tripping and missed it, the Gimps are my very own, uniquely specced pickups that Marc Ransley at Mojo Pickups has wound for me and then I have Jookified for goodly measurement.

These will only be available from the Jooky web site and will no doubt feature prominently in my guitars in the coming months.

Right, I am such an ad break.

The idea behind them is that I don't really love normal Strat pickups, and so we've come up with something that is subtly different having more of a Tele or P90 voice, which should be interesting, especially with a five way switch.

As for the look, well you can't see too well in the shonky fotos, but they don't have covers, instead are bound and definitely have an air of Jookiness about them.

The pickups are numbered and signed as with everything else, and they will be few and far between, I'm sure. These are the Strat ones, though I think there will be a Tele one soon...

Anyway, these are the first ever set and I wanted them in The Spindrifting One as that is pretty groovy too.

Now if I can just find some solder, I'll see how they sound

La la laaaa

WIP: The Spindrifting One

Well, things are still a bit on the slomo side as far as putting guitars together again goes, but I managed to get the bodywork done on The Spindrifting One if nothing else, so the world hasn't died a death.

What I wanted to do with this was basically give it a bit of an old wood vibe - not a relic, but I wanted it to look as though it has been played and generally been a bit of a workhorse for a fair few years. More of a finish worn away than a aiming a belt sander at dawn,
whoever she is.

I started with a shiny new three piece ash body, and from there stained it rosewood, sanded it back and the stained it again having mixed in a little mahogany with the rosewood to give it a darker shade. From there I used hard wax oil, which made it shiny. A few coats of that. And then took the shine away with wire wool and generally roughed it up a bit.
From there, I like to use a coloured beeswax and bring it up to a sheen. The nice thing is that it smooths out the distressed parts and gets away from that whole just-happened look, fresh minty relicing so often has.
After that, it was a few more coats and a lot of buffing so that it has a nice sheen but still looks careworn.

The hard part with all of that is of course stopping as it is such good fun, whilst the groovy bit is that it genuinely feels as though it has been played for years, feels nice and smooth and like an old friend's sock.

And I'm pretty pleased with how it has turned out. I did go for a few dents and dinks here and there, basically because it wouldn't have looked right without them, but I don't think they are excessive and other than a chip on the front, they aren't really that noticeable unless you are having a good old shufty for them.

From here, I've got a nice Gotoh hardtail bridge which I've put on, some of Mojo's aged Gotos Strap Pins and dug out the Mojo Pickups wiring loom with the beautiful old looking book PIO cap and all, and I'll sort some pickups out when I've got some pennies. Saying that I've got some Strat pickups somebody gave me, so I might pop them in until I get something better.

Other than that, I had some nice pretty things arrive yesterday, but more about them later methinks


La la laaaaa

And Now For Something Different

Well, I know that I've said before that Strats aren't really for me. I've owned loads over the years and I like the shape, but the three pickups get in the way and they never seem to stick around for long.

But still, I quite fancy having a Strat around the place, I love SRV and that chap with the hair, Hendrix or something, and well, there is nothing like that in-between-sound, is there?

So, being a recidivist in excelsis, I thought it was about time I tried to break my usual habits and see if that made a difference. So the obvious starting point is to do a Jooky Strat with (shock) three single coils and as I managed to get myself a nice swamp ash body to play with, all was timely indeedy..

So avoiding my usual go-direct-to-vintage-spec, It is going to be more of a modern Strat, so it won't have a scratchplate and as the ash looks nice I think it might end-up stained some colour or other, though perhaps rusty might be nice. I'll have a think.

In fact, I've just put a rosewood stain on it, which is a lot darker than it looks in the foto, but there we are. It looks nice either way. And I think it will end-up pretty beaten up, so it probably doesn't mater anyway.

As for the neck, I can't not have a big ol' CBS headstock, and I want Rosewood or Ebony or the board, so we'll see.

I usually go for vintage trems, but wanted this to be a hardtail with thru-body-stringing-for-sustain-like-a-lickle-blue-tab, so that is the plan there.

Other than that, I usually go for split Klusons so I'll probably go for locking tuners, just to be obtuse.

And that is about it.

Oh, wiring - I've already got a Mojo loom from another Strat project I aborted, but I will no doubt try a set of Marc's Mojo Pickups as I've never tried his Strat ones and probably won't do this again.

Knowledge is important of course, even for those of us that be powerless.

And there we find ourselves, that will be The Spindrifting One, popping up around here one day soonish, perhaps, probably maybe.

La la laaa