I am a bassist, guitar tech, and founder of Strange Guitarworks. When not working on guitars, I create experimental music under the moniker of UFO Death Cult, utilizing microtonal instruments of my own design. "Intonation is a social construct."
Benjamin Strange
New Orleans, LA
Author's posts
Jan 02 2019
Fixing a broken Gibson truss rod on a vintage Grabber
We repair quite a few broken truss rods here at Strange Guitarworks, and oftentimes it’s not a simple endeavor. Every repair is unique, which is one of the reasons we love our jobs: it’s never boring. Fixing this broken Gibson truss rod in this vintage Grabber was a doozy: the headstock was broken off, the …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.strangeguitarworks.com/fixing-a-broken-gibson-truss-rod/
Apr 25 2018
Restoring a Harmony Sovereign for The Brian Jonestown Massacre
We were recently contacted by the mercurial musician Anton Newcomb of The Brian Jonestown Massacre to restore his Harmony Sovereign acoustic guitar. To say this guitar was beat up is a vast understatement: the neck was pulling almost completely off and was horribly bowed, the frets were a disaster, the back was cracked, and almost …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.strangeguitarworks.com/restoring-a-harmony-sovereign-for-the-brian-jonestown-massacre/
Mar 18 2018
Replacing a broken truss rod
Most people think of the truss rod as the smoking gun regarding an instrument’s playability. Action too high? Tighten the truss rod. Action too low? Loosen the truss rod. This kind of advice runs rampant on forums all over the internet, and it’s dead wrong. Guitar necks have an optimal relief of between .1mm (.004″) …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.strangeguitarworks.com/replacing-a-broken-truss-rod/
Sep 01 2017
It’s our five year anniversary!
On September 1st, 2012, Strange Guitarworks was born. It doesn’t seem like that long ago – this has been so much fun that I’ve hardly noticed that five whole years have slipped by. To be honest, I don’t really know exactly how to remark upon this admittedly small, but perhaps significant milestone. When I consider …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.strangeguitarworks.com/five-year-anniversary/
Apr 17 2017
Mr. Fred’s weird banjo thing
Our friend, Mr. PH Fred, always has the oddest guitars, and the oddest requests for modifications of those guitars. Last time, he had us turn an acoustic guitar into a Stratocaster (check it out here: Elvis Meets Nixon). This time, he made what seemed like a pretty easy request, to install a Lollar Charlie Christian …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.strangeguitarworks.com/mr-freds-weird-banjo-thing/
Mar 07 2017
Elvis meets Nixon
The most requested document from the National Archives isn’t the Bill of Rights, nor even the Constitution – it’s this photo: Elvis meets Nixon. Yeah, it really happened. A bizarre moment in American history, to be sure – and one that inspired a madcap project here in our shop. Some background: one of our regular …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.strangeguitarworks.com/elvis-meets-nixon/
Jan 28 2017
Benjamin’s Fender Hello Kitty microtonal Strat of Doom™
I have an oft-repeated mantra at the shop: “Intonation is a social construct”. Over the last several hundred years, western music has largely standardized into an equal tempered system, dividing the octave into twelve notes with a ratio equal to the 12th root of 2 (12√2 = 2 1⁄12 ≈ 1.059463)(12 tone equal temperament is also known as …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.strangeguitarworks.com/benjamins-fender-hello-kitty-microtonal-strat-of-doom/
Aug 10 2016
Strange Guitarworks welcomes Dunlop Strings!
We are proud to announce that we are now an official dealer for Jim Dunlop strings! We restring a LOT of guitars, and we’ve found Dunlop strings to be among our favorites. They’re built really well, are extremely consistent, are generously long (handy for long scale & hollow body instruments), made in America, and the …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.strangeguitarworks.com/strange-guitarworks-welcomes-dunlop-strings/
Mar 28 2016
How to relic a guitar in one easy step!
Have you ever wondered how to relic a guitar? Well, wonder no more – we can teach you how to relic a guitar in one easy step, with no tools nor experience necessary! Here’s the secret no other guitar tech is willing to tell you: in order to give your guitar that amazing, broken in …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.strangeguitarworks.com/how-to-relic-a-guitar-in-one-easy-step/
Mar 09 2016
Routing for a P pickup
We generally consider ourselves rather fearless when it comes to working on guitars. Over the years, we’ve done some pretty crazy things at the request of some of our more experimental clients. Most of these things don’t really scare us, but occasionally a little pinch of fear is important: there’s no easier way to completely ruin a guitar …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.strangeguitarworks.com/routing-for-a-p-pickup/
