Fender Jazzmaster

The Jazzmaster was originally designed by Fender to be a more classy guitar and get into the market Gibson had. It was supposed to be for Jazz but it never really caught on with Jazz players. It was more popular in the California surf guitar scene. The original guitars had two Fender P-90 style pickups. This Blacktop version has a modern alnico magnet humbucker in the bridge and a Duncan Designed P-90 style Jazzmaster pickup in the neck. Unlike the Jaguar this guitar has the full Fender scale 25.5 inch neck with 21 medium jumbo frets. It has a normal 60s style headstock and the fretboard has a modern 9.5 inch radius. The body is made of alder and has a single tone and volume knob. Original Jazzmasters had a really complicated switching setup. They had many little toggle switches above the pickups to put them out of phase and what not. The electronic setup on these Blacktop series guitars is what you typically expect. Many people did not use any of those switches anyway so Fender just streamlined the design. It has a 3 way toggle pickup selector that goes left to right instead of up and down. This guitar comes with the old Jazzmaster tremolo system. Even back in the 60s Fender knew their tremolo systems were bad and they tried to fix them. Leo Fender believed that this new design was superior to previous designs since the bridge actually moved backwards and forwards along with the strings during tremolo use, thereby maintaining proper intonation even under extreme use, and preventing strings from binding. This floating bridge concept was also later used on the Fender Mustang. The floating tremolo mechanism also features a built-in tremolo lock, which helped the player preserve the guitar's tuning in the event of a string breakage and easing removal of the tremolo arm. This design was very complicated and was one reason these guitars never became popular. Surf guitar players used this tremolo system a bit but it never really caught on. This guitar can still get the jazzy sounds with the neck pickup. For a single coil design the neck pickup is surprisingly smooth. It is kind of the mix between a single coil and a humbucker. The bridge a rock machine. It has plenty of output and clarity. When you combine the pickups you get a great sound with the bite and clarity of the humbucker on top of the smooth fat bottom of the neck Jazzmaster pickup. If you are looking for a nice versatile Fender Jazzmaster this guitar is pretty decent.

The Sonic Youth Jazzmasters are a set of Jazzmaster guitars used by the guitarists in the band Sonic Youth. This review will be for both guitars as they came as a set to the shop. You get the Thurston Moore and Lee Ranaldo Jazzmasters. The guitars are basically the same apart from the color and pickups they use. These guitars are both stripped down Jazzmasters. They do not have any of the complex switching and splitting knobs. These guitars just have a 3 way toggle switch with a volume knob. The necks on these guitars are very fast as they are stripped bare of any glossy finish that may slow your hand down or become sticky. The Thurston Moore model is the more traditional of the pair. It comes with a very thin see through green nitro finish. The pickups in it are Seymour Duncan Antiquity II Jazzmaster pickups, which have a great, powerful punch and glassy highs. They have a very similar sound to P90s. The pickups have a great single coil top end clarity to them. With just a volume knob it is very sensitive to that one control. It is super sensitive to the volume control adjustments on the guitar. This guitar even more sensitive to this because of the single coil pickups. The Lee Ranaldo model has a set of Fender Wide Range humbuckers from the 70s. These are the pickups that you got if you got a 72 Telecaster Deluxe. These pickups feature Alnico magnet instead of the original CuNiFe or Ceramic magnets. The humbuckers are pretty hot and can drive most every amp. You do not have to be a fan of Sonic Youth to enjoy these guitars. I am not very familiar with their music but these are good guitars overall. I love the Jazzmaster design but I do not have much use for all the extra switching and whatnot. So these stripped down models have better tone and playability which I love in a guitar. If you like humbuckers or the traditional Jazzmaster pickups there is a guitar for you in the Sonic Youth Fender set.

Specifications:
Made in Mexico
Body Material: Alder
Body Shape: Jazzmaster®
Neck
Number of Frets: 21
Fret Size: Medium Jumbo
Position Inlays: White Dot Position Inlays
Fingerboard Radius: 9.5" (24.1 cm)
Fretboard: Rosewood
Neck Material: Maple
Neck Finish: Gloss Urethane
Nut Width: 1.650” (42 mm)
Scale Length: 25.5" (64.8 cm)
Neck Plate: Vintage Style 4 Bolt
Truss Rod Nut: 3/16" Hex Adjustment
Electronics

Pickup Configuration: H/S
Bridge Pickup: Hot Vintage Alnico Humbucking Pickup (Bridge)
Neck Pickup: 1 Duncan Designed™ Single-Coil Jazzmaster® Pickup (Neck)
Pickup Switching: 3-Position Toggle: Position 1. Bridge Pickup, Position 2. Bridge and Neck Pickups, Position 3. Neck Pickup
Controls: Master Volume, Master Tone
Hardware

Hardware Finish: Nickel/Chrome
Bridge: Vintage Style Adjustable 6-Saddle Bridge with “Floating” Tremolo Tailpiece
String Nut: Synthetic Bone
Switch Tips: Black Switch Tip
Tremolo Arm Handle: Vintage Jazzmaster® Tremolo Arm
Tools

Truss Rod Wrench: 0.1875"
Miscellaneous

Strings: Fender® USA Super 250L's, NPS (.009-.042 Gauges)
Unique Features: HS Pickup Configuration, Simplified Controls/Switching, Black Skirted Amp Knobs
Accessories

Included Accessories: Truss Rod Adjustment Wrench
Control Knobs: Skirted Amp Knobs


The Blacktop series Jazzmaster is a great guitar for the price. The pickup combination is unique, and super versatile! With a bridge humbucker that bites and a neck soapbar-style that sings, this guitar can do many genres very well: classic rock, metal, indie, southern rock, blues, jazz, country... The only genre that I can think of that the guitar would be out of place in would be just brutally hard, technical metal, and the guitar could even get away with performing that in the studio for recordings.

The playability is great right out of the box, with the neck profile and depth being very comfortable to my hands. Factory workmanship is great, with the frets being well dressed, and the finish being spot on. I'm not a fan of the original Jazzmaster tremolo systems, yet this guitar didn't seem to go out of tune after using the bar. I was very surprised by that fact. One minor inconvenience is that the tremolo bar has no retaining screw/nut/snap feature, so it will not stay inside the guitar if the instrument is turned with the strings facing the ground. The bar will fall out. For many people, this won't be a problem, but for anyone that likes to get really into the moment in an impassioned onstage performance, this could be a huge problem, even creating a potential safety/tripping hazard.

Fender has done a great job incorporating vintage elements with some new modern ideas - the tuning keys are a great update, as well as the interesting pickup combo. I'm very happy with this guitar, and I think it's a great deal for the money - around $450-500 new from a dealer. Check it out!

I bought this guitar in a swedish musicgear shop. This guitar became my first one and i don´t regret a single penny of it. It cost me approx. 800$.

Excuse my english. I´m from sweden.

This guitar has just the things i was looking for when i was looking for a guitar. Superb sound, easily played and it feels awsome. It has three pickups which there is a three way switch for and one wolume- and one tone knob. It also has a another switch which you select lead or rythm soundlike sound. If you put this switch down you control the guitar with the three way switch. In this case you have(if want to) three diffrent solo sounds. If you put i upwards you get a more lofi and soft sound with a little less voulume,which is ment to be a rythm sound. But I like just as much i leadplaying. The "Lead & rythm" button also has one volume- and one tone knob. This guitar is great for almost any music but i wouldn´t recommend it to metal. I play blues,jazz,pop and rock and it works perfect. It doesn´t matter how hard I play it still stays in tune.

Not much. It´s hard to get my tremoloarm to stay in place. But I don´t use that much. Had some problems with the neck before a bought it so I had it repalced.
THE ORIGINAL BRIDGE SUCKS. Replace it with a Mustang bridge or buy an buzzstop.

It´s a Fender. Do I need to say more.
Great quality except the tremoloarm. I dón´t bother do something about it...

I Love this guitar. Looks, feels and sounds great if you ask me. Dispite the dislikes i have to give it a top rating!

This review was originally published on http://www.musicgearreview.com