1980s Lotus Strat-Style Electric Guitar

Here's a quick post just to let you enjoy this (Korean?) Lotus-brand, Strat-style guitar's oddball paintjob. It's like a metallic grey-black-burst and has a "black pearl" pickguard stock. It looks more like a current-era partscaster than it does a throwback. Funny, huh?

The owner had me set it up for an odd re-entrant tuning -- eEBEG#B low to high, where the first "e" is the same pitch and string as the "high E" in normal tuning and the high "B" is guitar's normal B. You can just move the high string to the low string slot and then string the EADGB strings after it. This makes an open E tuning that can be "fingered" like a 5-string banjo -- complete with a high-pitched drone.

And does it sound good? Sure! It has an odd, replacement middle pickup that puts one in-between position out of phase, but otherwise I'm happy with how well-built this (and other) Lotus guitars from the time are built. The (basswood?) body was a little soft for accurate whammy use and the bridge block was a super-thin joke, so I "blocked" the trem/whammy so it handles like a hardtail for the owner.