The Fender Stratocaster guitar turns 60 in 2014, and it wears it well. You see the instrument everywhere, and hardly a day goes by when you don’t hear its signature sound. It was so essentially and remarkably right from the very start in 1954 that it has shaped popular music for 60 years virtually unchanged. A great deal of the music you love–the very soundtrack of your life–was and is made with a Stratocaster.
It is the guitar behind the sound of “That’ll Be the Day” (the Crickets, 1957), “Purple Haze” (the Jimi Hendrix Experience, 1967), “Smoke on the Water” (Deep Purple, 1972), “Pride and Joy” (Stevie Ray Vaughan and Double Trouble, 1983), “Even Flow” (Pearl Jam, 1992), “Dani California” (Red Hot Chili Peppers, 2006), “Get Lucky” (Daft Punk, 2013) and countless other hits.
