ST-70 Black Paisley : Best Sounding Strat Style Pickups

I have had 5 different Strat’s including a 1993 MIM that I bought new back then and still have. I put in a pair of Fender noiseless into that one, and still didn't like the sound. My Squier Vintage modified even though it came with Seymour Duncan designed pickups still didn't sound as good as this one. The tone in these Roswell’s are just right. I love having the humbucker in the bridge position with the split coil option. Strat’s are known to have a feeble bridge pickup, this one doesn’t yet maintains that clear tone when it split coil mode, and gives you that extra bark and bite in full humbucker when you really need it. The extra high gain in the humbucker really makes your pedals come to life.

This guitar stays in tune really well as long as you don't use the tremolo bar, unlike my CST-24T which appears to have the same bridge but gives you a perfect tuning even when using the trem.

Clapton is famous for putting a wooden block in the tremolo cavity because he wanted to maintain that unique sound a Strat style guitar has, while maintaining rock hard tuning stability. The springs in the tremolo really enhances the unique Strat tone.

When doing bends playing leads the guitar stays in tune, and does so especially well if you tighten the trem bar in the back all the way tight, and tighten the 6 screws holding the trem bar down on the guitar.

I was surprised to get a guitar with a fit and finish done so well for this kind of money. I put it on a stand, and it looks so good, I can't help but pick it up when I walk by and play it.

It took some setting up however. Unlike the CST-24T that came superbly setup right out of the box, this one took some tweaking to get it right which is usually standard fare with any new guitar.

The frets are smooth but using a fret rocker showed me that several of them were a tiny bit high next to the others. Consequently, I could only get the action with zero fret buzz very close to the 2/32" gap I prefer between the bottom of the string, and the top of the 12th fret. I mean it was only a hair over that. Of course, a fret leveling would perfect that because the fretboard itself was perfectly flat; that would make this guitar a rocket ship, and for the price you could afford to even have it done and still be way ahead of the game. Very few guitars come without at least one or two frets a tiny bit raised.

I love the design of the headstock. I like it even better than the ones on my OEM Strat’s. So overall, the fit and finish are superb, it plays wonderfully, and stays in tune really well, and that is saying something because I am checking it with a Peterson Stroboscopic tuner. I love being able to make full note bends for example on the E, B, and G strings and it comes back perfectly in tune.

Considering the price, this is a mind-blowing guitar. I have been playing it more than my CST-24T and I don’t know why. It's currently my pet go-to guitar out of my entire collection.