For sure ,i have a tubescreamer that i use and it makes thatguitar sing.I also have a Texas special Strat from 03 that i play quite a bit.Really rich pickups though.

Hey there, Don't worry, the high E string on a strat, never usually lays directly over the pole on the bridge pup, if it did, then the lower strings would not be lined up which would cause it to sound thin, which would be very un-desireable. You want the bridge pup covering your lower strings, since it has the most high end, by far the better compromise, cause the width from E(low)to E(high)is slightly wider than the pups poles. As you move up the neck the strings get closer, since the spacing at the nut is smaller in width, than the wider spacing at the bridge.That is why it lines up better on the middle and neck pups. Play on Brotha!

Speaking of the custom shop pickups like the texas specials. I have a left handed strat that I flipped over and strung righty (ala Hendrix) but I didn't like the reverse pots so I equipped it with Custom Shop fat 50's whick I liked a little better than the texas pickups and the results were incredible! I think the long low E string gives it a sound that really resembles the Hendrix mojo.

As long as I'm sitting here procrastinating over working on my wife's car, I wanted to chime in on this one too.

I've been playing guitar for well over 20 years. I currently own 19 guitars (although two are basses) and I've played -MANY- guitars in my time. In all of those years with all of those guitar, I've only found <b>1</b> where there was a genuine alignment problem...and that was on a Hondo II LP copy. On that guitar, the bridge had clearly been mis-drilled as you could see the strings didn't run parallel with the sides of the neck.

More importantly, as other's have said, the strings on a Strat simply don't go over the pole pieces...MIM, SRV Sig or otherwise. I'm not sure what you've read or who told you what, but remember that a Strat is NOT a Les Paul (or anything else with dual hb's). In regards to the MIM that you returned, chances are that it was NOT an alignment issue as you suggest as much as simply the el' cheapo pickups that MIM's typically come with. When I purchased my MIM new back in '96, I had been looking at it along with a '57 RI. The RI certainly sounded much better, but the '96 MIM felt and played much better. To me at least, how the instrument feels is much more important than how it sounds because you can always change the sound by replacing the pups later, but if it don't feel right...that's much harder to deal with (and pups...even decent ones, are usually cheaper than a new neck!). Later I finally put a set of Fender Vintage Noiseless pups in my MIM and you wouldn't believe the difference! This last year I upgraded those to a set of Duncans and she really is a screamin' demon (and the VN's are going into my new Squire). It's possible that the pick gaurd on the MIM you purchased was mis-drilled but I find it VERY unlikely.

My advice to you is don't worry about "how the strings look over the top of the pickups". If you like the way the instrument feels, plays and sounds, THAT is what matters. If the aesthetics of the string alignment over pups is really bugging you that much, you are worrying about the wrong thing my friend!

Peace,
Jim