1972 Fender Musicmaster Electric Guitar

Red! Pearloid! Sports wagon! Basically?

Musicmasters are a peculiar guitar -- just a DuoSonic without a bridge pickup -- and DuoSonics are already just a Mustang without a whammy. Musicmasters are a gateway drug into vintage Fenders, for sure. We can play the, "I remember when these only cost..." all day long because of that.

The cat's out of the bag, though -- good guitars always increase in value and when you pick up any old vintage Fender and you pop the pickguard to check them out, you can see that they're quality products from the outset -- with metal plates for shielding in all of the cavities, tidily-wired harnesses, and higher-spec parts used throughout. And this is a "student" guitar? Sheesh!

I do like the feel of the "little offset" body shape, though, and its 24" scale (in this case) neck. The neck on this one is home base for me -- a medium-slim, round-C profile topped with a steeply-radiused fretboard. It's even stamped Pedro in the pocket and features the '72 date as well.

The pickup sounds like you'd expect it -- like a burlier Strat pickup due to the shortened scale that makes it a little mellower and "rounder" overall. 

Work on this was for a customer and it got a fret level/dress, electronics spray-out, minor cleaning and adjustments, and some very light compensation adjustment to the saddles (via bending the travel screws a tiny hair). It's cuffently wearing 46w-10s and it feels stupidly fast to play.

The guitar itself is completely original save the adjuster posts/set-screws for the saddles. Those are replacements and they were a little loose and vibrating annoyingly now and then, so I added Teflon tape to the threads to keep them in sync and rattle-free.

Did you also notice the original case? Sheesh number two...!