Love it and hate it.
I love it as the pinnacle of Tele-vision gone wild, and my hat is totally off to the designer/parody-ist. Awesome concept.
But I hate it as the antithesis of Tele: over elaborate. Tele == Keep it simple, stupid.
OTOH, TeeVee is just too cool a label. Sweet.
Slightly better picture. It plays like a dream now that I’ve resolved a few minor issues. I’m going to stick with this one a while, I think.
Has anyone been to the Taylor guitar factory in San Diego? I’m going to be in town for a conference next week, and I thought I might check it out if the schedule allows.
I have not, but since Taylor is known for solid marketing and customer relations, I would assume it would be a worthwhile experience. The are a high-volume factory, so it will be more industry vs. craft, but that in and of itself sounds interesting.
I toured the Santa Cruz Guitar Company a couple of years ago - small batch high-end maker (maybe 800 instruments / year). Fun if you are a How It’s Made kinda geek like I am…
I need to get to Martin in Nazareth, Pa - I just have to talk **Crotalus **into driving 9 hours (vs. my 2-hour drive - that’s fair, right? ;)) to meet me there…
Love to hear the story when you get back.
So I finally got to reading a copy of Vintage Guitar I got for going to a guitar show a year ago. (June 2010), and in the ‘Ask Zac’ column, what do I see? The static on the pickguard question, with the dryer sheet answer. I guess it is a fairly common thing, after all.
Also, damn but the telemaster is comfortable.
Well my guitar-freak friends - have any of you guys seen these:
Fender Pawn Shop Series Guitars
Funny, I was thinking of building a hardtail Mustang with two hubuckers the other day. Maybe I’ll just buy one now…
The '72 looks interesting as well…
Yep, they’re interesting, all right.
http://www.guitarfetish.com/XV-JT60-Twin-Humbuckers-SOLID-ASH-natural-Finish-Body_p_1109.html
This isn’t a hardtail, but you could convert it or block it. Comparing it to the Fender version…
You can pick up the switches pretty cheaply, too. And I see the Fender has these pickups.
I’m seeing a lot more interest in offset, not standard mustang guitars over the last year or so. It’s some kind of fad. I’m still loving my Telemaster.
Edit twice: I took the master to a local show and it got about as much attention as a pre-CBS. What surprised me was how many people approved of the neck. You wouldn’t think a rosewood tele neck would be liked so much, but it works.
Edit thrice: But the guy that does nuts wasn’t there so I couldn’t get the bone replacement done.
That Mustang’s getting attention.
Have a video review.
http://www.premierguitar.com/Video/20110401/1407/Video_Review_Fender_Pawn_Shop_Series_51_72_Mustang_Special.aspx
The body does seem to be a bit different.
http://img51.imageshack.us/img51/6695/mustang2v.jpg
But I’m not seeing that as a problem, really.
Edit: Oh, I didn’t talk about the minor issue. Guitar comes, start playing, graphite nut snaps in the middle of low E. No other damage. After some consultations, a drop of crazy glue and it’s better than new. Talk to Guitarfetish, they overnight me a bone replacement. Now I just got to get a hold of the local luthier to put it in. No real hurry. My biggest issue at the moment is trying to find somewhere that sells .10s with a wrapped G, cause that’s what the Telemaster came with, and I like it.
That guitar fetish one has more of a jazzmaster shape. Plus, in order to incorporate the coil tap switches like on the Fender, I’d have to do some routing and probably fashion a new pickguard, too. After all that work, I might as well just make it from scratch…
I owned a Mustang way back, red with two diagonal racing stripes. The trem on the original was terrible, so I think a hardtail on the new one will be a definite improvement. Another improvement from the original is a standard pickup selector, where the original Mustang’s switching setup was just crap. The sliders are apparently 3-way coil taps, so can get either of each humbucker’s coils, or both if the switch is in the middle, I guess? Shrug, that last sounds pretty mickey mouse.
On the Fender '51… no tone control? Seriously? The description says there’s a 3-position rotary switch, and I only see two knobs and no switches, so one those knobs is a pickup selector, and the other is volume (with push/pull for coil tapping the humbucker) and then we’re out of knobs. So no tone control. :eek:
Similar issues with the Fender '72 – volume + “pickup blend” knob (which actually sounds kinda cool, except: ) no tone control. The hell?
It is a bit more of a jazzmaster shape. And yep, that’s what I noticed about the video review, no tone control.
I’m pretty sure you can wire a pickup blend knob, I’ve seen 'em before.
By the way, I don’t want to keep going ‘guitarfetishguitarfetish’ all the time, I just have not seen anything that beats them on a price/quality level. Stewmac, allparts, byoc, anything.
Yeah, no tone then, feh. I don’t know what they’re thinking. Or maybe this is supposed to appeal to the metal/highly distorted crowd that don’t (think they) need a tone control. It definitely feels like a miss to me.
Re: blend control - this is partially what a four knob Gibson layout is useful for: put the pickup selector in the middle, then use the two volumes to blend the pickups.
http://digital.premierguitar.com/premierguitar/2010gh?fm=2#pg92
Look what I found! A trip through the Taylor Guitar Factory! DoctorJ?
Can we get them to stop describing their XV-440’s P-90’s as “Dogear”, when they clearly aren’t, and the XV-400’s clearly are?
… I just looked, it says Soapbar. Weird. Half the places it says Soapbar and half the places it says Dogear. I’ll send 'em an e-mail in the morning if you don’t.
FYI, I just ordered a Xavier XV440 sunburst on clearance for $135, what the hell. I’ve wanted a guitar w/ P90’s, so this can be my “let’s solder new stuff into this axe, who cares if I screw it up” guitar. Hell, at $135 I could almost use it for firewood if it doesn’t work out.
That and the description for the XV440 says, “We use a 60’s style intonated wraparound bridge”, where they obviously don’t. As pictured, the XV400 has a wraparound bridge/tailpiece, where the XV440 has the usual tune-o-matic bridge and separate tailpiece.
So, what - you went to an open mic night with the guitar to show it to other players? Did you play or anything?
The Pawn Shop series - interesting marketing angle. Never hurt to try one…
**squeegee **- cool; keep us posted. And as for them getting “dogear” vs. “soapbar” wrong for the different varieties of P-90’s - well, I can deal with blown ad copy of the guitars are playable and cheap.
Well, sure. It just bugs the gear geek in me.
Hey, WordMan, in case the GuitarFetish P90’s aren’t what I’d hoped for, what might I swap them out with? One of these Duncans (which one)? I’d think about using a Gibson P90, but the price is in the “are freaking you kidding me?” category, double what the Duncans fetch. What maker’s (sanely priced) P90’s would you consider canon? I think my tone preference would be for bright over warm, but I’ve never owned a guitar with P90s so we’ll see if I continue to feel that way.
My basic rule with pickups is: lower-output and/or positioned as a “vintage style” is likely better. Simply because I like an articulate pickup that I can overdrive with the amp if I need it, vs. a hotter pickup that can crunch nicely, but doesn’t clean up all that great. So of those Duncans, the first one. And yeah, Duncans, in my experience, are of high quality and much cheaper vs. Gibson’s official drop-in’s…
Observation: take your time getting to know P-90’s - they have the thickness of a humbucker, but the articulateness of a single coil. Good things, but they require a bit of different treatment. I wouldn’t be surprised if you gained up your amp and stomped on your OCD/pedal du jour ;), and backed off your volume to 4 or 5 to get a thick, crunchy rock rhythm tone when you are muting with your palm. In other words, Volume backed off more vs. for a 'bucker. This gives you more “dial up space” when you dime it for a lead or something big - but when you do, look out! Lots of potential for feedback and over-the-top tone…it takes a while to find out the ranges that work, but it really worth it when you do. I almost NEVER have my Tone on 10 with P-90’s - 6 or 7 or so is more like it…