Plini was an early adopter of Strandberg’s revolutionary headless electric guitar designs, using the Boden as a go-to instrument for his technically radical instrumental compositions. Not that the headless design is even the most revolutionary feature of the Strandberg Boden.
That could be the weight. Give or take 10 per cent, these tip the scales at 5lbs. But most would argue that it is most definitely would be the neck. Strandberg’s EndurNeck profile exists outside of guitar’s alphabetical descriptors for neck shape. Little wonder Ola Strandberg patented it. There’s nothing quite like it – nothing that gives the thumb so many flat surfaces to rest upon.
Plini had played Ibanez guitars for around 10 years before making the switch to Strandberg. Why? Because everyone else was playing them.
“I saw Chris Letchford [Scale The Summit] was playing a Strandberg, Tosin Abasi from Animals As Leaders was playing one for a bit and Misha [Mansoor] from Periphery was playing one,” said Plini, speaking to MusicRadar in 2019. “They looked fucking amazing so I thought, ‘That’s the guitar I need.’”
He hooked up with Strandberg in 2015. They made a signature guitar. That signature model shipped with Suhr electric guitar pickups, seating a SSH Plus humbucker at the bridge and an SSV at the neck.
“I guess the reason I landed on these pickups is because the guitar is such a futuristic version of what an electric guitar can be, these are the best version of vintage pickups,” said Plini. “I liked the fact that it’s blending the two different worlds in a way that you can make this sound like a classic guitar, even though it looks like it landed from space.”
Fast-forward to 2025 and the signature Boden that Plini is playing still looks like it landed from space – only maybe even more so.
When the Australian virtuoso was playing ArcTanGent Festival 2024, we caught up with him to shoot a quick video segment and find out what’s changed on his guitar. For a start, the finish. This one is in “some sort of black” paint job (which we would say is Stranberg’s Black Granite Satin Acrylic).
And there’s now a tremolo system. But maybe the biggest difference is the pickups. Here, Plini offers us a tour of its features and explains why he has modded it from its usual three-way switching and swapped out the pickups for a set of Fishman Open Core Classics.
If you are in the market for a fresh twist on the Plini Boden, Strandberg might have just the thing. It has just launched the Mirage Edition.
It’s priced $1,999, has graphic finish on black, an EGS Rev7B tremolo bridge and string locks, a pair of Strandberg Custom OEM pickups and three-way switching as per Plini’s original. Check it out at Strandberg.
ArcTanGent has announced Tesseract and Wardruna for its 2025 lineup. The festival takes place on 13 to 16 August in Bristol. You can view the bill and find ticket details at ArcTanGent.
You must confirm your public display name before commenting
Please logout and then login again, you will then be prompted to enter your display name.
“What if we made a record with guitars?”: Charli XCX teases new “Lou Reed” rock direction for her next album
“He would lead you down the garden path with quite a bog-standard chord structure and then suddenly go AWOL”: From David Bowie to Radiohead and Steely Dan, here’s some of popular music’s most outlandish theory choices
