Hi this is Nick from Total Guitar, we're here with Simon and James from Biffy Clyro
and they're gong to be talking to us about their signature range of guitars and basses
that they're releasing through Fender Squire, we're also joined by Neil Whitcher from Fender
so guys how did it all come about, who approached who?
>>That's a very good question. >>It just came out of the ether didn't it?
>>It did. >>You kind of brought it up obviously, we've been asking for years basically to
try and get a signature guitar but Neil came up with the idea, the concept and we were making the
record or just before we made the record and we were delighted, such an honor for Fender to ask us. My
very first guitar was a Squire so it's come full circle it's really nice.
>>Yeah definitely I mean we've been working together for a good number of years now and
I think it's pretty obvious the guys are now Fender family definitely and it just came
down to timing and finding the right platform for it and getting the instruments right.
We were working on some Squire instruments, I brought some prototypes down so I chased these
guys round varous dressing rooms on tour and got them some sample instruments and then
we took it from there really. We made a few tweaks, matched some colours, got some logos
and here we are, just about to press go. >>Can you take us through the specs guys?
Did you have much to do with the design process itself?
>>I think we trust Neil immensely with, Neil knows exactly what we like to play and what we like
to use so for us it was basically getting the nicest, best possible guitar for a reasonably cheap
price I guess, it was basically trying to make them as lovely to use and we've used
these guitars live and they sound absoltely amazing, I'm probably best to leaving it to
Neil to talk about it! >>Yeah well we had the platform, Simon's guitar
is a 60's custom shop strat, that's his favoured guitars and I've been picking a few out for
him over the last few years so I think I've got a pretty good handle over what he likes.
So what we did with this guitar is it's based off the 60's guitar, it has a 9 1/2 inch radius
which is a bit more of a modern radius and medium jumbo frets so it's a really playable
guitar and then the pickups, we tweaked the pickups a bit, on regular Squire guitars we
have anaco 5 magnets in there, this is a blend of 3 and 5 which I'm sure you're fully aware of!
And the reason for that really was that we wanted to put a custom set of pickups in it to kind of differentiate
it but also get close to kind of like the sound that Simon gets live. So that bridge
pickup is definitely quite a full sounding bridge pickup, I know you use that set a lot in the
bridge, so we wanted a full sounding bridge pickup and that's what we did. Unfortunely
we don't have the bass here. >>We don't yes which is a shame, real shame
we can't show it off but it's at least as pretty as this one and plays very well as
well. >>And again that had a modern radius neck bigger
frets and James' number one is kind of like classic blue matching head caps so we did
that and we have a nice Biffy Clyro logo on the front and the guys signatures on the back.
>>Cool, cool, so when can we expect to see them in stores, is there a release date yet?
>>Yeah there is they're going to be available for sale on the 20th October which is very
close so and we're literally just about to press the kind of go button, they're rolling
off the production line and they're going through quality control at the moment so we're
making sure that they're perfect and they'll be out very soon.
>>Cool, great well that's very much guys for joining us.