Signature Crusader

This is the bottom of the line guitar from Signature. It features a bolt on neck, Scaller Floyd and one Evans pickup.

The Evans pickup is great. The best sounding passive pickup ever made. No noise even at high gain levels. Unfortunately, there is one one pickup.

Construction of the guitar is prefect. Very well made. At its price point you would expect that of course. Back in 1989 this guitar was $1000, about the same price you'd pay for a Gibson Les Paul Custom.

No guitar can be used without a backup. You need another guitar as well, just to get more variety. The single pickup makes it less versitle than a multi pickup equipted guitar.

Company is no longer in business.

Its a great guitar, but for the price new, you could buy a much more versitle guitar.

Year made: 1989-1990?
Country of Origin: Canada
Background story: I remember Alex Lifeson of Rush endorsing them for a brief period before going over to PRS's. I later learned that Lifeson was the co-founder of Signature.
This is a 22-fret Strat-shaped guitar, solid-top. Controls are very simple-one volume knob/coil split. It features one passive Evans humbucker, with the Signature logo scripted on.
I'm not quite sure what the body wood is, but can tell you it has a bolt-on, one-piece flamed maple neck. The headstock is tilted back, and the face of the headstock is painted to match the body. It is finished in a beautiful metallic gunmetal-grey/black. Considering it's age, the finish has really held up. The bridge is a Floyd Rose trem, stamped with the "Signature" logo. Tuners are 6 inline, black, non-locking Schaller. The neck, as mentioned before is 22 frets. The fingerboard is ebony. Fret indicators are small, discreet, and offset, like a Godin. The 22nd fret features the model name "Crusader" on a MOP block inlay. The flame-maple neck isn't "80's metal" thin---damned Ibanezes. I play Les Pauls, and I found the neck to be a little thinner, but nice to hold-solid. Included was a fitted case. The case alone is great! Fitted, and really holds the guitar in place. Another included feature is Dunlop strap-loks.
Funny...the "Crusader" supposedly was the entry-level Signature, but man, it has features that Jackson would charge you an arm and a leg for in 2001. If this was the entry-level model, I guess the top-of-the-line would cook you breakfast and take phone messages for you....very well done, Signature!!!!

Sound.....hmmmmm, with one humbucker, it might be a little limited. But again, the other models had different configurations.
I plugged it into my little Tech 21...a little reverb and gain, split the coil and sounded just like Lifeson from the "Grace Under Pressure" album. The humbucker is quiet when not working. Since there's no "tone" knob...I guess the idea was to let the amp and effects create all your needed sounds.
I'm still playing around with effects and stuff...but straight into the amp WAS impressive. I imagine with some tweaking, it'll only get better.

The guitar "feels" very well-made. And remember, this was the lowly entry level. The top and bottom routing is very clean. The neck fits nicely. All over, the care and attention to detail is evident.
Only the trem is showing some signs of aging (on the fine-tuners)

I don' play live....just guitar hero posing in my rec room! (ha ha) Most of the guideline questions in this section ask if I think this is solid? Will that last? Can I depend on it?
Well.....it was built about 12 years ago, and it's like new. I'm pretty sure it'll last. It seems very reliable and durable....

Alas.....Signature is no more. Too bad.
When it comes to Strat style guitars, everyone seems so cock-stunned with Fender, Ibanez, Jackson, etc.
Well...they have huge advertising budgets! No wonder everyone wants one...we're TOLD we want one.....
I wish more people would have supported little gem companies like Signature then....and companies like Godin now.
I'm assuming that if they were around today...they would be quite helpful....in recogition of a fine instrument, I'm giving a honourary "10" score......

I've been playing for a while now....(hmmm, that's a nice and broad statement, eh?)
I definitely remember when I saw Alex Lifeson playing these. I recall reading they were Canadian-made. He was a big influence to my playing when I was young and I wanted one so badly, but couldn't afford one. When I saw it in the guitar shop, I picked it up and bought it immediately. Didn't even try it out.....
A very pleasant surprise that it played so nicely once I got 'er home.
Even more surprising was the amount of detail and care involved in this little guy!
I initally bought it with some Rush nostolgia in mind...but now I realize how lucky I am to have---it's a really well-made guitar!!!
Not much is know about Signature....I found some info on the different models. I plan on entering "reviews" for all of them...mainly for educational and collecting purposes.....

If you come across ANY Signature guitar, consider yourself lucky!

This guitar was made in the late '80s in a small custom factory in Aurora, Ontario. The company was started up by Alex Leifson of Rush and an old friend, Russ Heinl, but was unfortunately unable to sustain itself for more than 2 or 3 years. During that time, they produced a limited number of high-end super strats to customer spec. Alex himself was most closely associated with the Aurora model, though all Signatures had the same basic specs and body shape. The Crusader was their "budget" model, and would have cost you about $1000US of your hard earned cash when new. It features a one-piece Alder body (this one finished in charcole-grey metalic), a 22-fret bolt-on maple neck with an ebony fretboard and the pointiest headstock to come out of the pointy eighties, Schaller strap locks and tuners, and a Signature/Schaller Floyd Rose whammy bridge. The neck is meatier than the typical Ibanez Wizard neck; the maple is unfinished, with a wide, flat fretboard and fat, high frets. "The CRUSADER" is inlaid on pearl at the 21rst fret. There's one Evans EH-2 pickup in the bridge position, with a push-pull volume control for coil tapping and a "Nobease" knob. I mention the knob only to stress that all the hardware on this guitar is top of the line, and nothing was added to the guitar without consideration and forethought - it is a very well designed and executed instrument. The feel, balance, control position - the overall ergonomics are exceptional - a very comfortable guitar. It comes with a custom, form-fitting Signature hardcase. It's a simple "EVH" style shredder, but everything about it says "Quality". Still there aren't many "features", so I'll offer up an 8 here.

The Evans passive humbucker is very articulate. Evans ad copy from the late '80s rock magazines reads "Clean, Clear Distortion", and that's as good a discription as any. These pickups remind me of nothing so much as the Joe Barden Humbuckers in my Heartfield Elan - they are extremely well balanced, with a detailed and distinct voice which works very well clean, but really shines in medium to high gain applications. My girlfriend noticed how good this guitar sounds when I first plugged it in (okay, so she's a musician too, but still... :-). The coil tap offers up very realistic but utterly noiseless single coil voicings. By varying the right hand position and the volume control I can pull a wide number of excellent tones from this guitar. I'm not familiar with the technology employed by Evans in their pickups, but these are the quietest pups I've ever played short of actives - even quieter than the Bardens! You can record in front of a computer monitor with these pups without a problem. Of course, there are always going to be limitations to some degree when using a guitar with a single pickup, but given these restrictions, the sound rates a 10...

I bought the guitar used, but the quality of it's manufacture is clearly evident. It had been hanging on a pawnshop wall for three years and was dirty and grimy when I bought it - the strings were rusty and the neck out of adjustment. I pulled the strings off and spent two hours cleaning it up. A quick tweak to the neck, new strings, a few adjustments to the bridge, and voila, an astonishing instrument emerged. Everything worked perfectly and looked fine, and the care taken in building it is evident throughout, from the extremely tidy electronics work to the careful routing and finishing, you can't fault the quality of this instrument. Besides the Crusader, I also own a Signature Oracle, their top of the line, set neck, three pup model with a flame maple top and gold hardware, etc... And to it's credit, the Crusader plays as well as the Oracle.

It's a simple, proven design with top quality hardware and excellent build quality. You can't gig a Floyd-equipped guitar without a backup, of course, but this is a solid working man's guitar, and would withstand the rigours of gigging well enough.

The company is long gone, so I wouldn't look to them for assistance at this point...

I've been playing a good while now and have a rather embarrasing wealth of gear I've collected over the years (see http://www.magma.ca/~jimid/index.htm for all the gory details). I pride myself on my ability to find exceptional quality "off-brand" guitars and Signature instruments certainly qualify. Killer instruments, easily on a par with the best from the Jackson/Charvel camp over the years. Well worth seeking out...