S-S-S-Strat XII · Compact – Blues for the Grays

A black Fender Stratocaster XII just landed on the bench. Twelve strings, Made in Japan, and older than a good chunk of the people who are going to hear it, because it's all over my next single. Before it goes in front of a microphone I wanted to know where it came from.

The Stratocaster XII headstock with twelve tuners, six over six

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That's a regular Strat headstock stretched out to fit twelve tuners, with STRATOCASTER XII on the face. It was designed in the US and built in Japan, where the factories had room to make it.

Fender's first electric twelve was the Electric XII in 1965, one of the last guitars Leo Fender designed before he sold the company to CBS. It had the "hockey stick" headstock, split pickups and a saddle for every string, and by 1969 it was gone. The Strat XII is its '80s grandkid.

It came out of Fender Japan, a joint venture started in Tokyo in 1982 with Kanda Shokai and Yamano Gakki, with Fujigen building the guitars. Japan ended up holding the whole company together. When CBS sold Fender in 1985 the American factory wasn't part of the deal, US production stopped for most of that year, and most of the Fenders sold in 1985 were made in Japan.

I was told mine was made somewhere between 1984 and 1987, and Fender's own serial chart for Japan says the same thing. The catch is that the export Stratocaster XII didn't show up until 1988 (a Japan-only version came out in 1987), and a guitar can't be older than its model. So it's most likely a 1988, from the Fujigen years that collectors chase. The real answer is pencilled on the neck heel, and I'll read it the next time the neck comes off.

The Stratocaster XII body: three single-coil pickups and the twelve-saddle bridge

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Twelve saddles, one for each string, on a hardtail bridge with the strings going through the body. That's the same idea Leo used on the Electric XII. Three single-coils, and a pickguard and pickup covers that have gone creamy with age.

Twelve-strings have a family tree. George Harrison played a Rickenbacker 360/12 in A Hard Day's Night. Roger McGuinn saw the film, got one of his own, and played the intro to "Mr. Tambourine Man" on it, which more or less started folk rock. Jimmy Page used a Fender Electric XII on the studio "Stairway to Heaven" and on Jeff Beck's "Beck's Bolero". Live, he had a Gibson double-neck so he could go from six strings to twelve and back in the same song. Pete Townshend is all over Tommy on an Electric XII, Johnny Marr built a lot of the Smiths' sound on Rickenbacker twelves, and Tom Petty left his Rickenbacker at home for half of his 2006 tour and played an Electric XII instead.

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It's on my new single, coming soon. A twelve-string makes every chord sound like two guitars and a little chorus pedal, and that's what I wanted. Sign up for the mailing list and you'll hear it first.

A guitar from 1988 seemed to deserve a 1988 welcome: Max Headroom was still on TV, MTV still played videos, and a twelve-string Strat came out of Japan for anyone who wanted that jangle without buying a Rickenbacker. I'm keeping the channel on 12.