Larry Carlton - S5 SSS LH Black

North American alder has an acoustic characteristic that denser woods don't have: it sounds open from the first touch, with a present mid-range and clear highs that don't sting. It's on this wood that the Sire Larry Carlton S5 SSS LH in Black builds its identity - an electric guitar with a double-cutaway body whose restrained weight makes it ideal for long standing sessions, and whose three-single-coil SSS configuration delivers that crystalline transparency of tone, that articulate bite that neither a humbucker nor a P90 can reproduce identically.

The C-profile hard maple neck is screwed in place with a 4-screw steel plate, giving it the dimensional stability you'd expect from a guitar in a stage environment subject to humidity variations. The Edgeless™ hard maple fingerboard with 9.5" radius has more camber than the flatter radii found on high-end lutherie guitars - this pronounced curvature hugs the palm in the downstroke position and promotes precise chordal playing on all six strings simultaneously. The 22 Medium Jumbo 2.7 mm frets with sanded edges eliminate fingerboard friction, and the 42 mm saddle with 10.8 mm spacing anchors each string with a density of contact that synthetics can't match. The S7V 2-point bridge, with bent steel block and saddles, transmits vibrations without loss of body mass.

The 5-position selector cuts out the sensor combinations with a neatness typical of this SSS architecture: neck only for round jazz voices, middle and bridge in parallel for the quack characteristic of the 70s, bridge only for the taut brilliance of rock and country. The mint green pickguard on black lacquer, ivory buttons and chrome fittings create a visual counterpoint - classic in form, sharp in chromatic contrast.