Electric Babes Ella 07 Lace

Depicting the female body in the form of musical instruments is a long-standing artistic tradition. Matisse did it, Picasso did it, and now two Austrians called Norbert and Helmut have taken those abstract concepts and made then flesh - or rather wood - in the Ella 07.

Actually, the Ella 07's feminine allusions are more explicit than abstract. The upper scratchplate is shaped to resemble a bra, while the other one is shaped like a substantial pair of knickers.

Two T-type metal plates have been laser-etched to create the illusion of lacy suspender belts, with the lower one providing a home for the knobs and a three-way switch.

There's also a bloomers-shaped pearloid scratchplate on the rear to protect the swamp ash body from picking up a nasty dose of buckle rash.

The bolt-on maple neck has 21 jumbo frets immaculately installed in an ebony fretboard.

There's no neck plate: the screws are countersunk into metal ‘C' cups, and the angled neck block and the  deep cutaways provide excellent upper fret access.

The headstock is fitted with low-slung three-per-side tuners that manage just fine without string trees.

The pickups, as you can tell by the name, are made by Lace. A TN100 Lipstick Chrome at the neck promises a noiseless T-type sound, and a Hemi Chrome claims ‘serious vintage humbucker and single coil tones combined' using barium ferrite magnets.

Sounds

Swamp ash with a maple neck is a tried and trusted formula. The lightweight Ella 07 even has through-body stringing, and unplugged it has great twangy sound.

The neck pickup is fantastic: big, ultra-smooth and woody, almost a big-box jazz tone, but with enough brightness for stinging blues and glassy chime.

The Ella 07's manners are so impeccable, you shouldn't ever need a compressor to control unwanted transients - and as for sustain, this guitar just keeps going.

The Hemi - best set a fair distance from the strings - is no roaring rocker: it's bright, open and throaty, somewhere between a P90 and a Tele bridge rather than a PAF.

The thing even quacks, for heaven's sake - but oddly, Electric Babe has omitted the humbucker/single coil switching that this pickup is designed for, and the Ella 07 is dying for it. A coil tap would have made it even more versatile, but as things stand, the middle position sounds a bit bland compared to the individual settings. I suspect that two parallel single coils would be far better.