Steinberger 5150
Fonda Stacer
The Steinberger story began many years before the two men had any association with one another. Ned Steinberger designed furniture as an industrial designer. Apparently Steinberger worked with Stuart Spector, a bass luthier at one point in New York. Spector requested assistance from Steinberger on design for a bass guitar. Ned Steinberger agreed, and the initial result was the Spector NS. This was a new bass guitar design, of which was later adopted and expanded upon by Warwick.
Inspired by this initial move into the music world, Steinberger persisted with a new take on the traditional bass guitar design. He thought extensively about some of the problems that existed with the traditional Fender Precision Bass style design that had very much dominated the market to the day.
Looking at the main part of the design of the bass guitar, Ned Steinberger found that overall, the design was not very ergonomically ideal in approach. He found that the body of the bass guitar was too heavy, large and above all, subject to issues with tuning and portability. He decided to break with his own past and the past of the music industry and do something that many others were afraid at the time (except perhaps for Eddie Van Halen): innovate.
He did just that. Next, he further redesigned the body of the bass guitar, using fibreglass and graphite (aerospace industry materials), he managed to create a smaller, more compact and lighter body available for the bass guitar player. He further used polyurethane or nitrocellulose to finish the body, along with several other key methods of development and redesign that result in a very unique and radical approach from the traditional bass guitar design.
Getting proper support and attention from major guitar manufacturers for his radical and new design was much more difficult. He took it to numerous major musical manufacturers (including Fender and Gibson) only to be turned down by all, including those who liked the idea, but not the design of the instrument. Eventually Steinberger himself decided to take matters into his own hands and began manufacturing the first line of Steinberger bass guitars, whilst making a few sacrifices financially along the way.
He relocated to the state of New York after building on borrowed money, a brand new factory. Eventually after designing the then hugely popular Steinberger bass guitar, Ned Steinberger rethought his design for the electric guitar. He already had a prototype for this in the early 1980s upon relocating to Brooklyn, yet it was not introduced into the market until 1984, the same year that the TransTrem system for his line of electric guitars was introduced.
The TransTrem will go down in the technical rock books as a piece of underrated genius, which it is. By using a locking system, one could play chord sequences in different keys, thus generally eliminating the need for alternate guitars with different tunings, or even capos. It even allowed playing the guitar after string breakage by shifting the TransTrem to the centre position, thus enabling the ability to complete the song. This surely would have been impossible, even on a Floyd Rose tremolo system.
Eddie began playing some more varied and interesting music on the 5150 album. After endorsers, such as Sting and David Bowie, played Steinberger instruments, Eddie obviously became inspired by the use of this new and ground-breaking line of instruments. He then requested a GL-2T to be painted in graphics not dissimilar to the Kramer 5150.
The result was the Steinberger GL-2T 5150. This guitar, and its counterpart, the Steinberger GL-2T OU812, were used during this era. Apart from the paint job and the pickups, which were EMG pickups, it is very much guessed that the guitar is stock.
Steinberger is now owned by Gibson. After Ned Steinberger sold the operation of his company in 1987, Steinberger instruments went through a bad period prior to ownership being acquired by Gibson, due to shifting trends more so than any other reason. Steinberger has not maintained the popularity that it has in previous times, yet is still running today.
Unlike the Frankenstrat or other Eddie Van Halen guitars, there is not much difficulty in recreating this particular guitar. From the Steinberger website www.steinberger.com below are some stats for one of the models of the Steinberger guitars, the GT-PRO Deluxe:
It is however, unfortunate that Eddie lost interest in using this guitar after some time. Although very much nowadays seen as a 1980s fad, the Steinberger line of guitars, including the GL-2T that Eddie Van Halen used, are original and interesting guitars indeed. Post 5150 album, the guitar was not really used extensively and eventually was retired by Ed in favour of his Kramer 5150. Still, it is an amazing guitar, and one that can be easily replicated today.
I always get confused with this. The 5150 album was released in 1986. Pardon my ignorance but what amp did EVH use for that album? Was the Peavey 5150 head/combo launched shortly thereafter or was he playing that amp for the album in 86"? Also was he using the famous Kramer red/white striped Kramer "5150" at that time? His tone was great on that album IMO, a little more gain than the 1984 tone. Thanks, I'm a little foggy on these few years (84-86) transitional pre Music Man/Peavey years.
I'd say he may have used a prototype on the censored album, but I've also heard that that album is mostly a Soldano SLO. I'm pretty sure most of Balance is the 5150, but I think I read where he used his old Marshall on a few tunes on Balance too. Aftershock and Big Fat Money, I'm thinking.
The album 5150 was most likely recorded with the 5150 Kramer guitar and the Steinberger Trans Trem guitar. The amp was most likely a Marshall, more to the point his baby 100 Super Lead. The Harmonizer can be heard as far back as Fair Warning, and was becoming more of his overall tone around 1984-5150. OU812 was a lot of harmonizer and the marshall cranked to fair warning proportions, still the Kramer 5150. censored was a prototype Musicman guitar, the 5150, and a bevy of guitars that spent time in the background. I believe he used a tele on runaround. The album's amp was a prototype 5150, Soldano Slo and from all accounts Dream another Dream and something else was CAE amp.
OU812 had a bunch of different guitars used including a Fender Electric VII, an Esquire, a Silvertone and an Airline (like the Eastwood Tuxedo). The Airline was used to record A Apolitcal Blues which is a B-side to Black and Blue. Oh yeah, a Strat with a Tele neck was also used on Finish What You Started.
I'd wager that EVH uses whatever combination of amps he needs to get whatever sound he's looking for. I mean, the guy's probably got more gear at his disposal than we can imagine. I do know that he used the Kramer "5150" for most of his 5150 tracks, along with the aforementioned Steinberger TransTrem. Album-wise, you can probably throw in a Strat, a Tele or two, and a few Les Pauls to the mix.
After listening to the solo to Hear About It Later, you may be right...it does sound like there might be a harmonizer in there. It's pretty subtle compared to 5150, but it does sound like there's a harmonizing effect in there.
I believe Ed had that tone in his back pocket so to speak. If you listen to unchained at the end, you will hear a 2nd guitar come in. To my ears that is the 5150 sound. Also if you listento 5150, that tone is used for the verses/rhythm his lead tone sounds like 1984 type tone. At least to my ears.
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