“It’s just meant to be a rock machine”: YouTube star Ryan ‘Fluff’ Bruce hooks up with Ernie Ball Music Man for a StingRay signature model that’s more versatile than you might expect

Ryan ‘Fluff’ Bruce, guitarist of Dragged Under and the face of the Riffs, Beards and Gear YouTube channel, has become the latest YouTube star to join the Ernie Ball Music Man artist lineup, with the US high-end electric guitar brand unveiling a signature StingRay RS.

Available in a choice of the disco-friendly Aqua Sparkle or retro-cool Tealy Dan finishes, with the latter sporting an ebony fingerboard, the former roasted figured maple, the Ryan ‘Fluff’ Bruce StingRay RS is a typical EBMM – a head-turning build with a sound that should pair nicely for lots of styles. 

Fluff's signature guitars are nigh-on identical apart from the finish and fingerboards. The bodies are solid Honduran mahogany, slightly offset at the waist. 

The roasted figured maple that’s been used for the neck is a deep caramel color and as per the fashion in the house of EBMM, it has some TLC from gunstock oil and hand-rubbed wax to make it feel like the neck of all necks.

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The dimensions are familiar enough – with a 25.5” scale and a 10” radius fingerboard, it’s not that far away from contemporary Fender. But where this StingRay RS flips the script – and what is arguably the star of the show here – is the signature Fishman Fluence humbucker pickup at the bridge position.

With switchable voicings via a push/pull volume pot, it lets players choose between “heavy, chunky rhythms” at position one, and a lower-gain passive voicing at position two – nice and friendly for cleaning your tone up.

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Speaking to Guitar World in 2020, Fluff said the Fishman Fluence design was a game-changer, even in an era when the market for electric guitar pickups has no shortage of excellence.

“I love their pickups, especially the Fluence stuff,” he said. “They use a pancake effect – one copper, one not, built almost like a 3D printed pickup. It means they can tune the magnet exactly how they want to and it even a million times down there will be no variance. 

“There’s no phase relationship so you get an incredible detailed attack and clarity across all strings. It’s like an HDMI cable. Or 4k guitar… which is useful when you are using a lot of gain. I couldn’t unhear the muddiness of regular pickups after trying the Fluence.”

That custom-voiced Fluence 'bucker is paired with a Fishman SSS-BA1 single coil at the neck. There’s a three-way pickup selector and the aforementioned push/pull volume pot mounted on a metal control plate and that’s your lot. Less tweaking, more getting down to business.

Fluff’s proclivity for big riffs means it is no surprise that this comes out of the factory with a set of 11s (Ernie Ball Beefy Slinky electric guitar strings, in case you were wondering), and he has gone for a top-loaded hardtail bridge. 

No whammy bar might confound some people. Fluff does play a StingRay with a vibrato, but he did away with it because he never used it.

“It’s just mean to be a rock machine,” says Fluff. “And with the hardtail, instead of the trem, because I don’t really use the trem. Honestly, we compared. My actual one-off guitar, that looks identical to this, has a trem. This resonated more and I just liked how it felt.”

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Other premium features including locking Schaller tuners, electronic shielding in the control cavities and 22 high-profile stainless steel frets. 

EBMM is making these in strictly limited quantities, with 25 of each color available worldwide. Both models have a signature neckplate and are numbered.

The Aqua Sparkle can be bought directly from Ernie Ball Music Man, while the Tealy Dan is a Sweetwater exclusive. Both are priced $3,199, and they're selling out fast. At the time of going to press, EBMM has only 11 of the Aqua Sparkle model remaining. 

Ernie Ball Music Man's collaboration with Fluff comes just months after it was announced that the popular YouTube star Rabea Massaad had signed up as an EBMM signature artist and was working on a signature model based on the Cutlass.

Previously, the company's affordable wing, Sterling by Music Man, collaborated with YouTuber Jared Dines on his own signature model, which was refreshed with a sleek new look in February.