I see the concrete block guitar on youtube, and think "yeah it's all just pickups man," and then I pick up my dad's old 70s Bob Weir Ibanez and think "holy crapballs, nitro and wood and tone and all sorts of awesome." The 335 I built has super thin stain and truoil, and a bone nut, on a cheap and nasty kit, and it just sustains for days and sounds lovely. I'm with you DB, as far as a nice clean guitar goes, its all about wood and vibrations. But on something built for noise, I can't hear a difference.

TL;DR: the TL-1 needs to have a thin coat. But when I build that Floyd wearing shredder, it'll be solid paint.