A lot of iconic things have been honoured with a LEGO version. From cars to spaceships and even stadiums. Now another global icon joins the ranks – The Fender Stratocaster.
Does this set rock? Or is it a crock? Read on to find the answer to the question: Should you buy it?
This set faces a little bit of an uphill battle to win me over. I am about as far as you can get from a rock god. There is not a musical bone in my body, unless perhaps you used those bones to make some sort of macabre xylophone. Basically the Fender means nothing to me.
Knowing that about me I hope it is therefore more impactful when I say this set is awesome.
The build
Before you even start the build you should probably make a choice. Do you want a black guitar or do you want a red one. Parts for either are included. The colour choice just comes down to the body with the neck being built identically with either option. I went with red because I honestly think that red is cooler.
Before you get to the guitar you have to quickly whip up the display stand. Pretty simple little technic construction that should only take a few minutes to assemble.
With that out of the way you get started on the guitar. The neck and centre of the body is a really interesting build. I wouldn’t call it challenging by any stretch but I thoroughly enjoyed it.
Stringing the guitar was something different because you don’t get a lot of sets with long strings. The stringing part is assisted by clever colour coding to ensure you get things in the right spot and don’t get your strings all twisted. I love a build that includes steps to remove bricks.
The headstock is built in two parts to create the desired shape. This part doesn’t feel as well done as the body but I’m not sure how else you’d do the shape at the same scale.
The final step of the guitar is attaching the fantastic strap. More on that strap later.
The next part of this set is the amp. As a display piece I personally would have been fine with just the guitar but I completely understand why it’s part of the set.
On the outside the amp just looks like a box but there is surprisingly a lot more complexity to the build than I expected. On the inside of the body you will find the cone which is held in place by 4 1×1 rounds. There is also some internal wiring that is well done. The use of colour coded connectors helps with this part.
The top of the amp features a panel with a whole heap of small details. I have no idea what any of this is, so that might be why I didn’t really care for this part. To me it was just fiddly.
The last part is a pretty quick little foot pedal. There’s not a lot of parts in this one so not much to say.
All three builds are connected with some rubber tubing that acts as cables.
The end result
I think this makes for a fantastic display piece. It’s one of those things that just looks cool on a shelf. This is where I think the red makes a lot of sense because it stands out against the black amp.
I really love that this set incorporates so many different materials. There’s the strings of the guitars, the flexible rubber tubing and that strap. They all combine to create a visually interesting model. The strap is a particular standout to me, it feels like a lot of effort was made to produce something special that is unique to this set.
The set does include a mixture of stickers and printed elements. I would have loved less stickers but they are all pretty easily placed and those elements were bad sticker placement would have been an issue tend to be the ones that are printed. A great example is the upside down printing on the side of the slope used in the head. I’d be screwed if that was a sticker.
So, should you buy it? The set isn’t available until October 1st so it’s going to be a while before you can get it for anything other than RRP. This set is released under the Ideas banner so it’s going to be excluded from a lot of sales by default anyway. Is it worth $159.99? That’s a tough call and I don’t think I can answer it definitively one way or the other. It’s a fantastic display piece and a great build but not everybody is going to care about the subject. If you are genuinely on the fence about this one then I’m going to give you a heavy nudge towards buy it, but for everybody already in the not interested camp I’m not sure I can change your mind at $159.99.
This set was provided to me by LEGO. Opinions are my own. This article contains affiliate links.
Should I buy this set as a whole? No, I dont expect I will. Should I buy a load of those new 1×2 concave slope bricks on B&P? Absolutely yes.
The extra bricks for the black frame feel like they were included to keep the price at this point. They should of been excluded to keep the price down.
Idea set, so chance of a discount in 3-6 months time perhaps worth another look.
I will be there when the doors open at the Dreamworld LEGO store tomorrow to pick mine up.
Not only does it look really cool but some some of the greatest guitarists of all time including Pete Townshend of The Who, Eddie Van Halen and the legendary Jimmy Hendrix have played the Strat.