Fender has celebrated the 50th anniversary of Iron Maiden by dropping a fully stacked catalog of electric guitars and bass guitars – one for each of the heavy metal pioneer’s legendary players.
That means there are six-strings for Dave Murray, Janick Gers and Adrian Smith, as well as a Precision Bass for Steve Harris. Leveraging the full stable of its brand family, Fender has given in-house Stratocaster to Murray and Gers, while Smith has been honored with a Jackson.
Naturally, all the models channel the guitar identities of each player. Murray, for instance, has long been a proponent of floating tremolo bridge-equipped Strats with either an HSH, or a three-mini-humbucker, pickup configuration.
As such, his two 50th Anniversary guitars – a standard model and a Custom Shop one – both play into that. The Masterbuilt variant, built by Andy Hicks, is a mirror of Murray’s “ultimate touring guitar”, with a walnut Oval C neck, compound radius rosewood fingerboard, and Seymour Duncan Hot Rails and JB Jr pickups.
It’s finished with an NOS Olympic White finish, stainless steel frets and FU-Tone hardware. This Masterbuilt example, which was comprehensively road-tested, has since become Murray’s new #1 guitar.
It is, as Fender calls it, a ‘high-performance’ guitar, designed directly with Murray himself, to handle the rigors of global touring. It was a dream project for Hicks to work on.
“Dave Murray has always been my favorite guitar hero,” says Hicks. “Not only is his style absolutely brilliant but he also proved to me long ago that Fender absolutely belongs in the world of heavy metal.
“It was an absolute honor to build this guitar for him and I will never get over the excitement of seeing my favorite player from my favorite band playing one of my guitars.”
The second Murray Strat, meanwhile, looks to combine “the best features of Dave’s favorite Fender guitars”, offering a Floyd Rose R2 double-locking tremolo, and three Seymour Duncan pickups: a JB TB-4 and ‘59 SH-1N in the bridge and neck, respectively, and an Antiquity Texas Hot in the middle.
A black finish and compound-radius rosewood fingerboard are also among its specs.
Janick Gers, who joined Iron Maiden in 1990, also has a new Strat, which has a slightly more vintage vibe to it.
Sure, it has Seymour Duncan JB Jrs in the neck and bridge positions, but it otherwise keeps with up with ‘SSS’-style appearance of orthodox Strats, with a 7.25” fingerboard radius, vintage-style synchronized tremolo with bent steel saddles, and vintage tall frets.
The final Fender proper is the Steve Harris Precision Bass, fitted with Precision split P Bass and Fender Vintage Precision Bridge pickups, a maple fingerboard, and Satin Black finish.
In the Jackson camp, Adrian Smith – who has helped prop up Iron Maiden’s signature multi-guitar harmonies since he first joined in 1980, and later re-joined at the turn of the century – has been honored with an SC1 Superstrat.
Again, it’s a culmination of Smith’s favorite guitar specs, complete with DP 100 DiMarzio and Fender Noiseless Sumerian Cobalt pickups, a 12”-16” compound radius fingerboard and a top-mounted Floyd Rose tremolo.
It’s not often that you see a brand go all-out with a complete stable of signature guitars to celebrate one band in particular, but this seems like as good an occasion as any to break the mold.
As Hicks himself puts, the worlds of Fender and Iron Maiden are closely linked, with Murray – and the rest of the group – helping cement the brand’s position as a serious metal alternative.
Head over to Fender and the Fender Custom Shop for more info on each of the new models.
