Feline Guitars Custom Doublecut

Having your own custom made guitar - by definition - means that you can have absolutely anything that you desire. From body shapes, bindings, pick-ups and tonewoods...the choice is yours. However, if like me, you have never tried to build a guitar you will be faced with an array of detailed options that may never have even crossed your mind before. Fretwire sizes, body contours, edge finishing...there is SO much to think about and remember, you have to live with what you select and live without those things that you reject. Decisions, decisions!!
So, faced with an infinite choice of hardware and aethetic conundrums I spent a very exciting four months designing my dream axe with the guiding help and support of Jonathan Law, Feline's driving force.
The bottom line is that Jonathan helped me to design a guitar fit for purpose but all that I aethetically desired. Playing in a covers band as I do, I wanted a versatile guitar based broadly on a Stratocaster.
So, to satisfy the technically minded, I chose:
Single piece of swamp ash (like the 1960's Fenders...light and springy with a degree of 'twang') for the body. This is finished in transluscent British Racing Green and with all of the wiring done from the back, the guitar has no scratchplate.
Rosewood fingerboard and birds eye maple neck. I opted for Dunlop jumbo fretwire and 24 frets. I also chose to have the first twelve frets on the fingerboard gently curved like a regular Fender for the comfort of chordwork, but the second octave of frets are slightly flatter like on a Gibson fingerboard - for faster lead playing - which means that I can set the strings really close to the fingerboard which I particularly wanted to achieve. This is what Jonathan describes as a 'Compound Fingerboard' giving you the best of both worlds.
Two Kinman noiseless single coils and a Bareknuckle VHII humbucker giving me a S/S/H pick-up configuration. In addition to the five way selector switch and the volume pot on the front body, the tone pot pulls out to give me another two switching options: neck and humbucker on together and all three pick-ups on together.
Sperzel locking tuners, Fender LSR Roller Nut and a Wilkinson trem.
Fender bullet strings guage 9-42.
The guitar took nearly a full two years to make from inception to delivery and the whole project was undertaken at the Feline workshop in Croydon, Surrey. The guitar came with an embossed Feline Hiscox hard case, straplocks and a Feline T-shirt!

I play rock, pop and blues and, rather like Mark Knopfler, use fingerpicking for the vast majority of my playing. Certainly there is a great degree of tonal variety in the hardware that I selected and all of the controls work silently (no crackle, hiss or sudden leaps in performance) as they should.
Seriously, I can select from a soft strum to biting treble and all things in between at the flick of a selector switch and, having now owned the guitar for four months, I'm learning how to use the more subtle switching options of the push/pull tone pot to best advantage. Some of the single coil sounds are milky and silky smooth...think Gary Moore, Mark Knopfler, David Gilmour...whilst the Eddie Van Halen humbucker gives me all of the rawwk 'n' roll that I require if its ZZ Top, Georgia Satellites or AC/DC on the play list.
The volume pot and tone control increase / decrease progressively, the tremolo will not go out of tune and I am delighted with the overall balance of the sounds that I can coax out of the instrument.
For large gigs I use a Hughes & Kettner 100W Switchblade Head and Hughes & Kettner 4x12 cab fitted with vintage Celestion speakers and
a Line 6 PodXT Live. For regular pub gigging I use a Line 6 Vetta II Combo rated at 120W (although this is a solid state amp and nowhere near as loud as the all valve Hughes & Kettner rig). At home I use a neighbour friendly Roland Cube 60W.

When it comes to set-up I am a fussy customer. I said to Jonathan that I wanted a low string action or nothing... Whilst the finish on this guitar IS faultless, I did have to take the neck off the body to fit a shim in order to improve the neck/body angle which means that I can now lower the strings to my preferred height. In addition the volume pot cover was not properly seated on the main 'stalk' and I had to take it off and re-fit it with the grub screw much tighter than before.
I cannot fault the pick-up adjustment, body, fret finish...anything. Trust me; this is a seriously well made piece of craftsmanship and roundly deserves your applause.
The only niggle is that on the reverse of the guitar there is the usual tremolo cover with a long oblong hole into which you feed the strings when a change is required. Whilst five of the holes in the tremolo block are freely visible, the plastic cover partially obscures the top 'e' string hole i.e. the hole in the plastic cover is not long enough to allow full and easy access when changing strings. I will therefore have to file away some of the plastic to correct this minor detail.

This guitar is already twelve gigs old and has become my main instrument both at home and in live work. As I sit here typing this review I have over thirty pub gigs, two weddings and a private part booked for 2007 and this guitar will be my only choice for them all! Having said that, to optimise the sonic performance of the guitar I always put fresh strings on the guitar before a gig and every string change is combined with a quick clean all over, a little oil on the fingerboard and a check to ensure that all screws are tight as they should be.
I do not take any other guitar with me when I'm playing live because it is such a reliable, well built affair.
I opted for straplock buttons which work just as they should and I am taking a lot of care to ensure the longevity of a guitar that I am really proud of.

You will not find better support...
During the two year process of making the guitar Jonathan enthused with me about all kinds of rock music, the players that we rate, the gear that we use...anything and everything that we wanted to cover.
He helped me to find better ways of using my foot pedals with my amp, has a considerable knowledge of all-things-guitar and genuinely cares about both his customers and Feline's reputation.
Whilst I have not had any reason to try and have the guitar repaired or improved in any way, I know that Jonathan will always take a keen interest and I would have no hesitation in contacting him at any time.

I've been playing for twenty-five years and have owned all sorts of gear in that time. Currently I use Feline, Fender and Line 6 guitars, Line 6 Pod XT Live and for amps I use Hughes & Kettner, Line 6 Vetta and Roland Cube depending upon the size of the venue.
Taking four months to design the guitar was really time well spent because I asked all sorts of questions and by the time I had placed an order and parted with a deposit, nothing had been left to chance.
It's not untrue to say that I am delighted with virtually all aspects of the guitar but overall the British Racing Green colour, the silver hardware and black pick-ups just look SO good. I also used my uncle's logo on the headstock (I didn't like any of the stock Feline logos...so designed my own) and added a personal identity number on the rear of the headstock for insurance purposes.
If the guitar was lost or stolen then I would make an insurance claim and start the whole process again; simple as that.
Whilst I don't compare it to other guitars, as a matter of fact this guitar is the lightest solid body instrument that I have played and easily the most comfortable. The body contours fit like a glove and the neck is silky smooth.