Jacob Collier shows off his custom-made Strandberg electric guitar – which only has five strings

Anyone familiar with Jacob Collier’s first four albums will no doubt be bracing themselves for the unmistakable musical spectacle that will be Djesse Vol. 4 – the multi-instrumentalist’s hotly anticipated fifth studio album, due later this year.

Guitar fans especially will be keeping a keen eye open for the album, which is set to feature both Willow and Steve Vai – the latter of whom was snapped shredding on command for Collier during a studio session earlier this year.

Now, six-string fans – or, indeed, fans of any string configuration – have been given another reason to have Djesse Vol. 4 on their radar, with Collier showcasing his new custom Strandberg electric guitar in another album sneak preview.

It certainly is a looker, but that bold finish isn’t even the most notable appointment – a closer inspection of Collier’s headless axe reveals it actually only has five strings.

Fitted with Lace Sensor pickups, the guitar might be the only five-string Strandberg currently in action, and goes against the norm of Strandberg fans constantly seeking more strings to accommodate the progressive music associated with such instruments.

For Jacob Collier – or should that be, Djacob Collier? – it seems the high E string was deemed surplus to requirements, with the versatile virtuoso instead dipping his toes into riff-heavy waters with a reliance on the lower register.

It’s an interesting turn for Collier, who has previously used high-gain guitars in his tracks as lead instruments. For example, his previous effort with Vai – Do You Feel Love – saw the Ibanez icon solo over an electro-funk beat, while his effort with John Mayer, Never Gonna Be Alone, was all about uber-compressed lead lines.

Here’s hoping Collier has doubled down on his newfound penchant for guitar riffs, and that this track is actually the same that’s set to feature those Whammy-laden runs from Vai.

Unsurprisingly, the post has attracted the attention of numerous high-profile players, with Megadeth’s Kiko Loureiro voicing his approval by saying, "We need more guitars! Shred it! More is more!"

That he’s opted for a five-string guitar is unusual but certainly not uncommon, with Collier joining an ever-growing list of guitarists who have all deemed six strings to be too many for certain applications.

Wes Borland is a standout champion of such a practice. Last year, he showed off a four-string guitar-bass hybrid model built by PRS, which the Limp Bizkit guitarist dubbed “the most amazing instrument I’ve ever played”.

Starcrawler's Henri Cash is another notable contemporary of the less-than-six-strings movement, favoring a custom Randy Parsons build that features only three strings. 

In a conversation with Guitar World, Cash traced his three-string antics back to Keith Richards’ five-string guitar – one of the most notable examples of a player ditching a string to meet their specific sonic needs.

Famously, The Rolling Stone legend removed the low E string of an open G-tuned guitar (which would have made it a low D) to curate a configuration that he used on the likes of Brown Sugar, Start Me Up, Happy and many others.

Head over to Jacob Collier’s Instagram for further sneak peeks ahead of Djesse Vol. 4’s arrival.