The Fender Custom Shop David Gilmour signature’s $10k price tag leaves me uncomfortably numb. Instead, I’d spend $549 on this Limited Edition Player model from Guitar Center – and make my own Black Strat...

David Gilmour’s Black Strat is one of the most recognized electric guitars in rock history – having been used to record the likes of Comfortably Numb and Wish You Were Here. The 2016 Fender Custom Shop signature reissue will set you back around $10,000 on the used market, but as an affordable alternative, I reckon you can get close enough with this Gilmour-inspired limited edition Fender Player Stratocaster, which is currently reduced to $549 – a saving of $150 – over at Guitar Center for Cyber Monday.

At its core, it’s simply a refinished Fender Player Strat, swapping out the usual white scratchplate for a fetching black alternative – though given Guitar Center acknowledges the “rock inspired look” in the listing, we’re pretty sure this is not an unintentional coincidence.

Fender Fender Player Stratocaster Maple Fingerboard Limited-Edition: was $699.99 now $549.99 at Guitar Center

This limited edition Fender Player Stratocaster takes its visual cues from David Gilmour’s famed Black Strat. In the spirit of the Pink Floyd man’s much-tweaked original, it’s a superb base for mods. It was awarded the full five stars in our Fender Player Stratocaster review, but with the line discontinued, this the absolute sweet spot for anyone after a deal on a Strat, offering a $150 saving.

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However, that is a superb base on which to build. Our Fender Player Stratocaster review saw the popular Fender model – one of the Big F’s biggest-sellers – awarded a full five stars, noting “This is a great place to start for those who want an authentic, yet upgraded Stratocaster”.

It utilizes a classic alder body, maple neck and maple fretboard combination, with an easy-playing C modern neck shape, 22 medium jumbo frets and a trio of Player Series Stratocaster pickups, alongside that all-important Fender two-point tremolo bridge.

There are a few of reasons I like this for the Black Strat role beyond the simple paint job. Firstly, I’ve played a Mexican Strat for 20 years as my main guitar – and, despite the obvious temptations encountered in my 15 years spent writing for guitar outlets – nothing else has hit the same spot for me.

Secondly, while the build quality out of Fender Mexico’s Ensenada facility has been excellent for decades now, the 2018 Player line represented a significant step forward on component quality – with new pickup magnets and upgraded hardware – and that is baked-in here.

The Player line has now been discontinued in favor of the Player IIs, meaning this is one of those small-but-pleasant windows where you can snap up a great build at a genuine discount.

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Thirdly, while you won’t need to mod it to have an entirely gig-worthy guitar that plays brilliantly, it’s also not so pricey that I would feel bad drilling holes in it, or messing with the spec.

And that spirit of experimentation was largely the point of the original Gilmour Black Strat – famously picked up at Manny’s Music in NYC in 1970. Gilmour recently described his guitars as simply “the tools of my trade” to Guitar Player and he treats them as such.

Read the original’s Christie’s listing and you’ll see he swapped parts, cut off trem arms and even drilled in an XLR output – none of which stopped it becoming one of the most expensive guitars to sell at auction.

As such, I think if you really want to channel the spirit of Gilmour’s Strat, you don’t need a $10,000 reissue, you need to take a solid off-the-shelf build and make it a tool you can use – and this Guitar Center find fits that bill, nicely.

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