Hard Rock/Heavy Metal scene: where have the strats gone?

[nigelpkay]

Most alder body guitars with Floyd’s just won’t cut it for a lot of modern music.

He's not a shredder, but Stephen from Deftones uses a Alder strat shape (ESP) with a Floyd for modern music. Granted they are 8 stings.

Yeah I’m not saying you can’t play heavy music with it, but when you are laying down rhythm tracks you are going to be reaching for a solid fixed bridge guitar when recording. It’s just physics. Trust me I’ve tried heavy trem blocks etc... it’s just not the same. Even more so when you get into lower tunings.
Live is a different story, use whatever makes you comfortable. That’s why Maiden uses the superstrats live, in the studio they are using Les Pauls or similar.
I have 2 Charvels, a Fender HSS, and a custom mahogany 25.5 scale with Evertune, and for recording I always use the latter. The others for leads.
Playing live I would use the Charvel every time

 

[Beyond Black]

Unfortunately you get guys like this using them now.

Who or what is that?

That's Adam Levine, lead vocalist of Maroon 5. He plays guitar onstage with the band on occasion and plays pretty good too! That looks like a Fender Custom Shop Strat with a Floyd Rose bridge that costs around $4K. My friend has the same guitar at his studio.

Guitar George

I didn’t recognize him with a shirt on.

 

[PBGas]

Unfortunately you get guys like this using them now.

Who or what is that?

That's Adam Levine, lead vocalist of Maroon 5. He plays guitar onstage with the band on occasion and plays pretty good too! That looks like a Fender Custom Shop Strat with a Floyd Rose bridge that costs around $4K. My friend has the same guitar at his studio.

Guitar George

It's a Music Zoo ZF strat that has had some additional relic'ing done. Great guitar. I have a version myself but non-relic'd.