Fender Vintera '60s Jazzmaster Modified

review
FENDER VINTERA SERIES FENDER VINTERA SERIES
96
Guitarist october 2019
Feel & Sounds
This production level does create what
many might view as a generic feel that’s
less ‘vintage’ than an American Original or
certainly a Custom Shop model. But they
feel far from cheap and not a million miles
away from the American Performers or
even Professionals. Our ’60s Strat really
would give the latter a run for its money,
even though its neck is slightly less deep
in higher positions and the fretwire, as
we said, is slightly wider and a little lower.
The Jazzmaster has a very similar feel to its
neck, both in contrast to the much bigger
and lightly V’d feel of the Telecaster (see
Dimensions box above).
Setups, too, are very good, despite the
fact that the height-adjustment screws of
the Tele protrude considerably and most
would have shimmed the neck. The Strat’s
screw-in arm is a little sloppy in feel (there’s
no tension adjustment) unless you screw
it in very firmly, and the high E saddle is so
close to the pivot post that as you bend the
vibrato down it makes contact and pushes
the saddle back a little. The Jazzmaster’s
vibrato has a less positive, almost Bigsby-
like feel and you can lock it to prevent
up-bend. Again, the arm is a little sloppy,
but the tune-o-matic bridge, with heavily
notched saddles, lightly rocks back and
forth as you move the arm.
With little more than string stretching,
the Strat’s vibrato doesn’t cause us any
problems. The Jazzmaster’s needed just
a little lubrication at both the nut and
saddles, but return-to-pitch was perfectly
acceptable – we’ve wrestled with worse.
The hardtail Tele is obviously the most
FENDER
VINTERA
DIMENSIONS
(in mm unless stated)
TELECASTER STRATOCASTER JAZZMASTER
Neck width (nut) 42 41.6 42.17
Neck width (12th fret) 51.64 51.15 51.93
Neck depth (1st fret) 22.8 21.4 21.2
Neck depth (12th fret) 25.3 22 21.8
Weight (kg/lb) 3.27/7.19 3.7/8.14 3.7/8.14
Bridge string spacing 54 51.5 51
Bridge pickup DCR (kohms) 9.04 6.14 7.62
Middle pickup DCR (kohms) N/A 5.53 N/A
Neck pickup DCR (kohms) 5.84 5.68 7
stable, even though intonation will always
be compromised by the saddles. And we do
wonder if offset compensated types should
be part of this Modified specification…
The vintage-style truss rod access of all
three isn’t the easiest if you need to make
any adjustments, but there’s little to moan
about in terms of playability. As supplied, all
are fitted with 0.009 to 0.042-gauge strings,
which give all three guitars a slightly
snappier feel and sound. We’re all different,
but 10s and a little more fight to the setup
wouldn’t go amiss for many of us.
As we begin running through the sounds,
there really aren’t any surprises – or any
sounds we haven’t heard dozens of times
before. That said, the Tele comes across in
terms of its circuit as the most ‘modded’
guitar here. With the selector in position 4
(both pickups in series), we have a wider
humbucking-like voice – considerably
bigger than the neck pickup alone – which
has a little more Strat attack to it than a
vintage-spec, but retains some bite from
the bridge. It doesn’t turn your Tele into a
Les Paul, but does fill out your sound and
drive your amp slightly harder. The bridge
certainly captures a good Tele’s bite with
some kick, too, and shifts effortlessly from
country clean through gnarlier roots-rock,
sounding vicious with the tone fully open
or surprisingly low-output-humbucker-like
with the tone pulled back. The combination
of the neck shape and what seems like
a nicely resonant body gets to the heart
of what makes a good Telecaster. We’ve
certainly played a lot worse than this.
But there’s more…
VIDEO DEMO http://bit.ly/guitaristextra
The main mod here is the
tune-o-matic-style bridge with
deeply notched saddles. The
vibrato is moved slightly closer
to the bridge than vintage spec
GIT451.rev_fender.indd 96 05/09/2019 17:34