HISTORIC HARDWARE
If you happened to be watching The Stranglers performingon BBC’s in the early 1980s, you may have found yourself wondering about the strange-looking guitar that singer Hugh Cornwell was holding. None more black in colour, of course, but with a strange blade-like body shape with a Fender-ish headstock, it wasn’t immediately unidentifiable from any sources we have to hand. But when we ran into Hugh last year, we were able to ascertain that the guitar was a Höfner and so we contacted Steve Russell, a Höfner historian, who identified the guitar as an S7L, a highly unusual model that was only available between 1978 and 1984. It was known as the ‘Razorwood’ because of its body shape and featured an interesting set of parts, along with a fascinating backstory – and Hugh’s tale of how one of his pair of S7Ls went missing
