TUNE-UPS
Sonic Blue Persuasion
LONGTIME STRAT ADDICT KENNY WAYNE SHEPHERD UNVEILS HIS NEW SIGNATURE OFFERING FROM FENDER — AND A NEW LIVE DVD/ALBUM
By Richard Bienstock
Kenny Wayne Shepherd with his new signature Fender Strat in Faded Sonic Blue, “a custom color that was created around this guitar”
FENDER
KENNY WAYNE SHEPHERD has served as one of the foremost modern practitioners of the blues, and also of the Fender Stratocaster, for going on 25 years. For most of that time, his primary Strat — the one heard on his 1997 breakthrough Trouble Is… and every album he’s recorded since — has been a 1961 sunburst model. But now he has a new number one, having collaborated with Fender on his second signature model, which, like his approach to the blues, combines classic elements with forward-thinking and unique appointments. “It’s a number of different ideas and different components and different perspectives that are all based on some of my favorite guitars,” he says of the Kenny Wayne Shepherd Stratocaster. “The goal was to make not only a premium-looking instrument, but also something that would provide a premium experience for the end user.”