I got my replacement strat and it's working okay so far. I really don't like the strum bar. I can only down strum (learning how to alt strum), so I use the clicking to keep my rhythm...it's like my metronome. Without it a lot of the really repetitive (and boring) sections are just random stabbing in the dark. Blitzkrieg Bop on expert is something akin to me screaming at the TV for 3 minutes.
But EA was late on their 2 day delivery promise. I sent them an angry email demanding I get free games. Let's see if that materializes.