Mike Eldred Interview: Behind the Scenes with the Eric Clapton Sun Strat

By: Tom Watson
Photos By: Stephen Pitkin of Pitkin Studio.

While millions of people around the world would probably like to thank Eric Clapton for the pleasure his music has added to their life, there are those with something more precious to thank him for – life itself.

“Myself and five Antiguans opened Crossroads in October 1998,” says Mary J, a resident of the Caribbean island of Antigua and former toxic-dependent. “I relapsed after six months. I was re-admitted in February 2002. I relapsed after six-and-three-quarter months. I was again re-admitted in November 2003 for 10 days and I have been clean and sober since October 21, 2003. I remember thanking Mr. Clapton in November 1998 for saving my life and he humbly answered ‘anytime.’ I saw Mr. Clapton last night, November 12, 2004, after I collected my 1-year sobriety medallion. I went up to him and thanked him again. I am living testimony that miracles happen.”

Mary J is referring to The Crossroads Centre, Antigua, founded by Eric Clapton in 1998 to “provide treatment and education to the chemically dependent person, those with other compulsive addictive behaviors, their families and significant others,” according to the Centre’s mission statement.

Today, The Crossroads at Antigua Foundation, which serves as the foundation for Crossroads Centre Antigua, operates a 36-bed full-treatment facility in Antigua; Bevon House (a 16-bed halfway-house exclusively for Antiguans); The Sanctuary in Delray Beach, Florida (a transitional sober house for men); and, is pursuing plans to open an after-care facility in the United Kingdom.

The Crossroads Centre alumna was correct in extending her thanks to Eric Clapton. Not only did he establish the Foundation, its continued success and expansion are primarily the result of Clapton’s ongoing fundraising efforts, with a little help from his friends.

In fact, it’s been more than a little help. Those friends have come out in force to support a variety of star-studded Clapton-initiated events, such as the 2004 Crossroads Guitar Festival in Dallas, the famous Christie’s-Clapton guitar auctions, and the recent 2007 Crossroads Guitar Festival in Chicago, all of which were designed to raise money for Crossroads Antigua.

But, it hasn’t been only Clapton’s long list of guitar-celebrity colleagues that have come to the aid of the cause. Corporations have also answered the call, and, as you’ll see below, sometimes initiated it.

Fender's Mike Eldred with an Eric Clapton Crossroads Stratocaster and matching amp during taping of a segment for Chicago television station WGN. Photo courtesy of Fender.

In support of the 2007 Eric Clapton Crossroads Guitar Festival, Fender’s Custom Shop, under the direction of Mike Eldred, Director of Sales and Marketing of the FMIC Custom Division, created limited-edition Stratocaster and Strat-amp packages designed to help raise funds for the Crossroads Centre.

The Custom Shop’s Master Builders produced 100 handcrafted Stratocasters and 50 amps officially named the Eric Clapton Crossroads Stratocaster and Crossroads ’57 Twin Amp, which went on sale to the public on July 20, 2007, exclusively through Fender’s website with 100% of the profit from sales (excluding applicable taxes) earmarked for the Crossroads Centre.

Fender’s promotional efforts with respect to the limited-edition Crossroads Stratocaster (also known as the Antigua Strat or Sun Strat) and amp have been both generous and tasteful. In fact, the efforts have been tasteful to the extent that Fender’s said relatively little as to exactly what guitar a buyer is getting for the $30,000 Platinum Package, which includes Strat, amp, case and a variety of interesting collateral items, or the $20,000 Gold Package that includes the guitar and a similar array of value-added materials, preferring to place the emphasis on the underlying cause for which the gear is being offered – the Crossroads Centre.

Guitar International spoke to Mike Eldred, about the Sun Strats and amps. Though the special Crossroads web area on Fender.com makes it clear that the company had worked “closely with Eric to create and release a very special limited edition set of guitars and amps,” and that “Each guitar will be crafted to Eric’s specifications and bear a unique ‘Crossroads Antigua’ graphic designed and originally hand-drawn by Clapton himself,” Clapton fans might be surprised to find out just how close to Eric’s specs the Sun Strat is.

******

Eric Clapton Sun Strat

Tom Watson: How and when did the Eric Clapton Crossroads Stratocaster project start?

Mike Eldred: It began when we were in London at the Royal Albert Hall (2006 Eric Clapton concert) and met with Eric. I told him, “We want to be more than just a guitar company for you. We want to sit down and talk about how we can partner on things that are near and dear to your heart. If there’s something you want to use us for, we’re available.”

He was very appreciative and a couple of months later we started the conversation again, back and forth with his camp. They said, “What are you thinking of doing?” We said, “Let us run a couple of ideas by you.” So, we put together a proposal for branding something so that it’s just for Crossroads and they came back and said, “You know that Eric has this Sun logo that he drew himself. Maybe we can use that as the brand.”

We got the artwork and started doing some samples and laid out the idea of doing something with a guitar and an amp. We sent some things over to Eric and he thought it was really good so we went back and forth. He’d say things like, “I want the Sun to be this size,” and we’d send over samples of it on different guitars until we got the whole thing together.

The idea was (and is) that 100% of the proceeds would go to Crossroads. It would be a limited-edition so that people can partner with Eric and be part of the legacy side of it. This effort’s been pretty successful so I think that down the road we’re going to be doing some other things too.

Tom: So, he was hands-on with respect to the guitar’s design.

Mike Eldred: Oh, yeah. We went back and forth with different sizes of the artwork and putting it on different places on the guitar. Same with the amplifier, we went back and forth with Eric and Lee Dickson.

Tom: When were the specs finalized?

Mike Eldred: I’d say about two or three months ago. It was pretty close.

Tom: From the photographs it looks like the Sun Strat is patterned after the Eric Clapton Signature Stratocaster. What are the Sun Strat’s specs?

Mike Eldred: The specs are exactly what Eric Clapton uses right now. The guitars are built in the Fender Custom Shop by the same builders who build his personal instruments. The thing with Eric is that his specs change. Sometimes he likes a thinner neck. Sometimes he likes a bigger neck. So, over the years, the specs on his personal guitars change while the specs on the Eric Clapton Signature Stratocaster model have pretty much stayed the same.

The Signature production model is like a snapshot taken at the time he was using that guitar. What we do in the Custom Shop when we make a guitar for him is we tailor it to what he wants at that time. He might order six guitars with a specific neck shape and then a year later order six more and fatten up the neck. The specs of the Sun Strat are what Eric’s using right now.

Tom: So, if I buy a Sun Strat I’m getting a guitar that’s as close as possible to what Eric Clapton’s using right now.

Mike Eldred: You’re getting exactly what he’s playing right now built by the same people that built his.

Tom: Would it be fair to say that the Eric Clapton Crossroads Stratocaster has essentially the Clapton Signature model specs, only tweaked one way or another to what Eric’s using at the moment?

Mike Eldred: Yes, to exactly what he’s using right now.

Tom: Any idea, even a rough estimate, as to how many man hours Fender has devoted to this project?

Mike Eldred: Oh man, I couldn’t even give you a rough idea. We went back and forth on this project for almost a year. No idea.

Tom: Did you have to pull Master Builders off of other projects to get this done?

Mike Eldred: No, we just put this into the mix. It was planned out once we knew what we were going to do. We knew that we were going to do 100 guitars early on so we started factoring that in to the production schedule.

Tom: If you only had the final specs a couple of months ago, wasn’t that crunch time?

Mike Eldred: The final specs were things like what’s the artwork going to look like on the case, what value-added items would be included, can we get a copy of the set list that he uses at the Crossroads concert, laminated passes from the show, is he going to sign the plate on the amp, is he going to sign the certificate that comes with the guitar, things like this. We had the neck and body specs way before that. The nuts and bolts of it, the guitar, that was easy. [Laughs]

Eric Clapton Sun Strat Neck Plate

Tom: Who presented the Sun Strat to Eric when it was done?

Mike Eldred: We sent the first one over to Eric. It was kind of funny, he got it and asked us, “Can I start playing this now?” And we’re, “Yeah, you can start playing it immediately if you want.” He thought he might have to wait for a special occasion or announcement. He told John Mayer about it and John bought the first one. They both played the Sun Strat on the Good Morning America show about a week before the concert.

Tom: John Mayer’s has the rosewood fretboard. The Custom Shop tweaked it for him?

Mike Eldred: Yes. And John doesn’t use the pre-amp that Eric does so we put one together for John that doesn’t have that other stuff.

Tom: Has Eric made any comments to you about the guitar?

Mike Eldred: At the Crossroads concert he told me he thought it was great and the fact that he used it on Good Morning America was pretty impressive.

Tom: Did he have it with him at the Crossroads Guitar Festival Concert?

Mike Eldred: It probably was there, but because he was going back and forth and was sitting in with a bunch of people I think that he didn’t want to commercialize the event. I know he was using it in rehearsals.

Tom: Seems that I saw a couple of the Sun amps on stage.

Mike Eldred: Oh yeah, those were on the stage. He used the Sun amps for his whole set and then when he sat in with people he used them too.

Tom: What did Lee Dickson think of the guitar?

Mike Eldred: Lee thought it was great, really cool. Like I said, Lee was very much a part of the whole thing – the guitar and the amp, even the packaging – what if we included picks (limited-edition Eric Clapton guitar picks), and things like that.

Tom: I imagine support for this project ran through the entire company.

Mike Eldred: All the way up the ladder. We’re all huge fans of Eric and a lot of us play guitar, so it’s a natural thing. It’s like, hey, how cool is this? The bottom line is, what do you get Eric Clapton for Christmas?

There’s not much you can get the guy, so if you can sit down and partner with him and do something that’s really cool and as a result save peoples’ lives and nobody makes any money, that’s a good thing. Everybody at Fender was hugely involved. In fact, we bought one of the $30,000 packages.

Tom: Was the original intent to get involved in the charitable aspect of Clapton’s activities?

Mike Eldred: Obviously, that was the result, but originally the main focus was, and this is exactly what we said to Eric, we want to be more than just a guitar company that supplies you with instruments. How can we help? You are involved in a lot of different things, use us for more than just supplying equipment.

Eric Clapton Sun Strat Amp

Tom: This is a bit off the topic, but I have to ask, what was it like when you got to inspect Blackie?

Mike Eldred: When we inspect any of those guitars, like Blackie, the Jimi Hendrix Woodstock Strat, Jeff Beck’s Esquire, Stevie Ray Vaughan’s #1, it’s a real honor. It’s humbling to go through them and check everything out. Part of what we do at the Custom Shop when we do those projects is we have to become sort of like detectives, like, how come the dirt’s underneath the finish – that means it was refinished, and things like that. It’s an honor to be that close to an important part of Fender’s legacy and see how these famous guitars were put together.

Tom: Get any special feeling when you worked with Blackie?

Mike Eldred: You could tell Eric had really invested a lot of playing time on this guitar and that makes you remember how much great music had come out of it. It’s like holding and looking at a famous artist’s paint brush.

Tom: I’m sure Fender carefully documents the inspection of these famous guitars.

Mike Eldred: Every time we do this we video tape everything, take high resolution photographs, document everything, and we keep all of this information on file because it’s history and most likely no one’s ever going to do this again, especially with guitars like the Hendrix Woodstock Strat or Blackie. You have to have a detailed record of all that to create and maintain the project’s integrity.