Dear Chris,

I had a dream that one day some genius would invent a single coil pickup with a Strat sound that worked quietly in any situation, my dream has come true.

As you know I am at present recording an album which will be released in November with a large TV advertizing campaign in the UK. Two of my Strats are now fitted with your pickups and they are amazing, they sound so vibrant, sparkling and QUIET, NO HUM. So I felt I had to write and tell you how impressed and delighted I am with your ground breaking single coil guitar pickups.

You are probably aware that I have been playing Fender Stratocasters since 1959 when Cliff ( Richard ) bought me the first strat to come into the UK. The sound of the strat is legendary, unfortunately so too is the hum and buzzing of the pickups which can be a real problem both on stage and TV shows where they are greatly affected by the lighting system and detract from the sound quality of the show, this usually results in hours of work being done by the sound and lighting team in an effort to reduce the pickup induced humming and buzzing. The reward for all this effort is a marginal reduction in the noise, still every little helps.

Recording studios are another problem area for single coil pickup users, on very quiet exposed passages it is sometimes impossible to use single coils because of the intrusive hum and buzzing, I personally have had this experience on several occasions, very frustrating.

Fender Arbiter in the UK are releasing a new version of my custom shop signature model Strat next year as a 40th anniversary model and it is my intention to have these guitar fitted with your pickups as standard.

Well Chris, many have tried to produce a non-humming single coil pickup that sounds like a Strat and all have failed, until now. I believe that you have a world beater, Strat and Tele users worldwide ( not to mention road crew and recording engineers ) will thank you Chris, maybe even put up a statue in your honour, now there's a thought.

regards

Hank B. Marvin.