My guitar collection - G&L
While Leo ran the show, G&L did release several Stratocaster-like instruments but none with the traditional Alnico pickups the most popular guitar usually comes with. Leo’s idea of an “improved Strat” was a guitar with his Magnetic Field Design (MFD) pickups. So a release of an Alnico-pup equipped, contoured bodied, G&L Strat guitar had to wait until January 1992, when BBE Sound, Inc. had taken over operations. Of course, such a guitar needed a different name. And Legacy is a rather appropriate name. But then still, the early Legacy did not have G&L developed pickups; the CLF-100 first appears in late-1994. Instead, between 1992 and 1994, the Legacy came with Seymour Duncan (SD) Vintage Flat Strat (SSL-2) pickups, a set equivalent to the SSL-1 pickups which have staggered pole pieces. This guitar, with alder body finished in a beautiful Emerald Blue Metallic, is from 1993 and has these highly regarded pickups. This guitar has a traditional Strat tone stack, i.e. volume control, tone control for the neck pickup, and tone control for middle pickup, both treble cut, although with potentiometer values typical for the PTB circuit. The other difference between this G&L Legacy and a typical Fender Stratocaster is the Dual-Fulcrum Vibrato (DFV). The hard-rock maple neck with 12” East Indian rosewood fingerboard is from 1995, maybe due to a repair job, and has Sperzel closed tuning machines. Greg Gagliano covers several early Legacies on his ggjaguar.com website. Riley Wilson wrote about this model in “The G&L Legacy - Versatile, comfortable, affordable, U.S.-made”. For information on the modern-day Legacy, see:
Legacy (SSL-2 pickups)
The story behind this guitar
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It took me a while before I acquired this guitar. Any Legacy needed to be from an early period with SD pickups. Blue Mountain Guitars had sent me the serial number before, but G031753 is listed in the Guitars by Leo website Registry as a Three-tone Sunburst ASAT. After receiving a couple of extra pictures, which clearly showed the additional ‘A’ underneath the S/N, the confusion was resolved and the deal was made. It is well known that G&L would not waste parts, especially neck plates with an “incorrect” serial number (see e.g. the S/N on this ASAT Custom w/maple fingerboard). So instead of rejecting the duplicate, the problem here was solved by stamping the extra ‘A’. Another oddity is the presence of 11 screw holes on the single-ply white pickguard. Usually one would find any (plastic) pickguard to be attached by 8. The SSL-2 pups on this guitar have DC-R values of 6.31kΩ (N), 6.36kΩ (M), and 6.51kΩ (B). They make for an extraordinarily sounding guitar with all the things one would expect from a ‘50s style guitar. Gabe Dellevigne and I compared some notes to assess whether all SSL-2 equipped Legacies have a traditional tone stack or whether this is a customization on just this guitar. According to Gabe, these early Legacy guitars are supposed to have the PTB circuit. But he has seen too many with the traditional Strat wiring indicating enough of them must have left the factory that way. Either way, it matches very well with the Vintage Flat Strat pups.
The story behind this guitar
1993
G031753A
SEP 22 1995, marked ‘D’, ‘Leg #1’, ’20’
MAY 21 1993
