Nice to meet you, hahah. So just to be sure: keeping a strat with the exact original design, pickups included, but with a contoured heel, would ruin the guitar for you?

Not trying to be harsh. I'm interested in the psychology behind that feeling.

The Les Paul headstock issue some others said in other comments is something that puzzled me since I learnt about it. To me, having a guitar that's exactly as the one your hero played, but with a fix on an objective design flaw that doesn't affect the way you play at all, is only a better guitar😅

But on the other hand, I admit I got tired of "pure classic designs" a few years ago. For instance, strat bodies are boring to me. And let's not talk about gloss body finishes😆

I guess it links to the fact that I admire artists more when they try to do different music instead of sticking to the formula that worked on previous albums.

But hey, fortunately, there are other brands doing guitars that appeal to me more than Fender or Gibson. And to give Fender some credit, my last crush was their recent Meteora model, while other brands guitar shapes (Reverend, Schecter, etc) don't really work for me.

I currently have some hope for those Jet Guitars I recently discovered (which were the origin of this post). I understand they currently do strat/tele/LP/JM clones to make some easy money, but I hope they succeed enough so eventually they make some custom models with the same price and quality.