I don’t have a high-dollar pickup range to protect. So I can produce a singe-coil pickup that will sound as good as any company can wind anywhere in the world, and I can do it at a much lower price point because I’m not worried about people thinking that the pickups in expensive guitars aren’t as good.
This Fret-King Country Squire Semitone Deluxe features a translucent red finish and optional “vintique gold” pickguard. The model is loaded with two Fret-King Alnico 5 vintage-voiced single-coils and a Fret-King humbucker, and sports a Wilkinson VSV vintage-style trem.
You’ve always been concerned with
making the guitarist’s job easier. Can
you tell us about some design problems
you’ve aimed to fix?
For instance, the major problem
with all vibrato-equipped
guitars is keeping them in tune,
hence the original invention of
the Floyd Rose system. My systems
have always been the alternative
to a Floyd Rose. I’ve never
asked a guitar player to clamp
anything, and I’ve never asked
a player to use a wrench
to change strings. But I’ve
always endeavored to keep
him as perfectly in tune during
his performance onstage
as he possibly can without
all the other paraphernalia
around it, and I think that is key
to the success of the guitar. This applies
to a semi-pro or a professional player and even
the beginner. We shouldn’t leave
the novice out of the equation
because why should beginners
have to play something sub-standard?
We try to give all players
equal footing to be able to play
onstage in front of any audience,
no matter what level.
From your experience, what
does it take for a guitar innovation
to catch on in this industry?
I think our industry is steeped
in nostalgia—it has never really
moved forward. There have
been some fantastic innovations
in the guitar industry, but very,
very few of them have actually
been successful because they
always seem to just go one step
too far. I think guitar players are
very conservative, even though
they might be outlandish in
the way they look and dress.
Their choice of instruments
can be incredibly conservative.
There’s so much nostalgia out
there that if the companies
that tend to be associated with
major players try to innovate
or make things different or
better, people say, “Well, that’s
not a real such-and-such guitar
now because you’ve changed
the bridge, you’ve changed the
tuners, and you’ve changed the
pickups.”
The Fret-King Studio Ventura 60 sports a trio of custom-wound Fret King P-90-style single-coils (the middle pickup is reverse-wound/reverse-polarity to cancel hum in positions 2 and 4) with tortoise-shell colored caps to match its pickguard. Radio knobs and a gold-metal flake finish complete the retro vibe.
Will you ever consider offering
custom options?
As far as custom options go, I’m
a little bit wary, because I don’t
believe we can always give our
customer the sound he’s got in
his head. He comes to a custom
builder and says, “Well, I’d like a
double-cut bolt-on with a swampash
body, and a maple neck with
an ebony fingerboard, and I want
it to have this style of pickup in
the bridge, and I want it to have
this style of pickup in the middle,
and I want this vibrato bridge or
this fixed bridge.” When that guitar
goes together, I don’t believe
it can possibly deliver the sound
that’s in the player’s head. Instead,
I prefer that the player looks at
our guitars, plays our guitars,
and then chooses something that
suits what he wants to do.
The futuristic Fret-King Ventura Super 60 HB3 has a two-piece alder body, a 25 1/2” bolt-on neck with Gotoh Magnum locking tuners, a trio of PAFstyle humbuckers wired to a “Vari-coil” rotary control, and a Wilkinson WVP “wave” trem.
I think custom building a guitar is guesswork. You can make a very pretty guitar, but you’ll notice on our website there aren’t too many guitars in there with fancy tops, or what I refer to as furniture guitars. I think guitars should be chosen for playability and sound. I don’t think they should be chosen because they have an outrageous flame-maple top. That is not a reason to buy a guitar for me. That’s a reason to buy something that you have on the wall to look at. I don’t believe guitars should be hung on the wall and looked at. I believe they should go out and earn their living.
The V-style Vintage VV60TA features an Eastern poplar body, set maple neck, a 24 3/4”-scale bound rosewood fretboard, and Wilkinson humbuckers.
You’ve created so many useful
innovations in the industry.
For someone who’s not at avid
guitarist, how are you able to
see the picture so clearly?
Well, it started with the Roller
Nut. That started me on the
path. I was looking for a purpose.
I’ve played in bands, I
know what it’s like to play
onstage, and I know what its
like to go onstage with a guitar
you don’t trust. It’s a panic. So
when I developed the Roller
Nut, I could then actually take
a guitar with a vibrato system
and know that when I used
that system—if I went to a lead
break, or if I decided to do an
arpeggio—all six strings would
be in tune. That’s a huge relief
when you’re onstage performing,
no matter how big or small
the club is.
Wilkinson shows his latest handiwork—the hardware component of his ADT Self-Tuning Bridge.
I’ve always worked with players. I’ve never looked at the commerciality of our industry, probably to my detriment. I’ll say to a player, “This is a design. Does it work for you?” And I’m talking about serious players—I’m not talking about a local guy down at the pub. I like to use their ears, and I like them to confirm my theories. When I invented the VS100 Vibrato System, I knew it worked, or I felt it worked, but it wasn’t until a lot of guitar players of some stature would actually turn around and say, “You know what, Trev, this is a great vibrato bridge. It works, it stays in tune, and I’ll use it.” Like Scott Henderson, he was really, really helpful to me at the time, and he’s a superb guitar player and an absolute tone monster. So that gives you confidence. You feel you’re doing something right when you get people— top players—actually say, “This works and I can use it onstage.”
And how did you come up with
the ADT self-tuning bridge? i
understand it was a joint effort?
Yes, I was part of a team. I like
to say that I drove the bus. A
lot of the mechanics were left
to me, but I’m not a digital
engineer. The technology that’s
required to take the sound from
the string and turn it into a signal
to generate electric motors
to turn gearboxes is not my
doing. That was just me being
able to say, “A guitar player will
put up with that, but he won’t
put up with this. So we have
to make it happen faster or we
have to be more accurate.” And
so forth. So yes, I stress all the
time that I was part of a team.
But it was my job with that
product to actually design it
and tailor it so it didn’t get in
the way of playing normally.
So what’s next?
A holiday?
I don’t know. We
can still take the self-tuning
system further. I guess we’ll just
keep trying to make a better
mousetrap.