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To make a long story short, I've been interested in playing jazz since the beginning of the year, my only guitar is a Fender Stratocaster (which i love, but doesnt get me the tone I desire).
For christmas, I was looking to buy a new guitar...
I've searched through guitar stores in my area (im south american btw), and was only really able to find Fenders and Les Pauls (I don't particularly like a Les Paul, which is why I am not considering it).
My main considerations for a new guitar are a Thinline CV60s Tele for 700$ (outrageous), and a CV60s Jazzmaster, also for 700$ (also outrageous).
I've heard good things about both guitars, pros like tommy tedesco, barney kessell, bob bain, and others use Teles; But I just LOVE how the Jazzmaster looks and sounds, though I've never seen anyone in both the indie scene and the jazz scene use it (I play sort of a fusion-y style, like nu jazz and indie rock). I've tried them and both feel amazing (Though I like how the Jazzmaster looks and feels way better).
I really don't know which one to get, as I play indie rock as well, so I'm looking to get one that is both versatile and able to get me a smooth mids-heavy tone
Any help please?
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09-18-2023 03:08 PM
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Go for the Jazz Master. The wide thin coils of the pickups do fatten up the tone compared to a telecaster. I find I have to tilt the neck angle back with a shim in the neck pocket. Then raise the bridge and add some foam under the bridge pick up to raise it as well. Put some medium flatwounds on and it will work well for Jazz styles.
I do find the upper bout controls pretty useless though. Just ignore them , they don’t get in the way , thankfully.
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One vote for getting a Tele and sticking a humbucker in the neck position.
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FWIW, I have a Strat ('89 American Standard), which I often use for jazz. I'm able to get a fairly thick sound with it by increasing mids on the amp and rolling the tone control on the guitar down to around 3.
Originally Posted by nelsonjw
Why wait? Christmas in September! Originally Posted by nelsonjw
It seems to me, you've answered your own question. You prefer the Jazzmaster, so get it. Lots of people doing all sorts of different flavors of rock and pop music have played Jazzmasters. Some of Joe Pass's earliest recordings were with a Jazzmaser, fww. It is true, though, that many more people have played Strats or Teles. Why Jazzmasters were never more popular is a bit of a mystery. But what other people play shouldn't have anything to do with what you like. Originally Posted by nelsonjw
Any electric guitar with a bridge and a neck tone is flexible. Teles probably a bit more so than Jazzmasters, because they can be twangier/brighter if you need them to be, and the combined pickup tone is cooler (IMO), but they're not really that dramatically different sounding from each other. I happen to have tried the CV Thinline recently, and I thought it was great. Originally Posted by nelsonjw
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Any guitar that inspires you to pick it up is a good guitar imo. However, whenever I've heard a jazzmaster it actually always sounded very thin to me. Another vote for Tele with a humbucker from me - that's what I have.
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The problem with a humbucker in the neck of a telecaster is , the load of a 250k pot makes the humbucker very muddy and dull. If you put a 500k pot in . Then the bridge is way too shrill.
ideally needs a stacked dual pot of 500k for the humbucker and 250k for the tele bridge PU.
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Are you sure it wasn’t a Jaguar ?
I have owned several Jazz masters and none were thin sounding.
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I use a squier bullet telecaster and I think it works great. I know many (including mine) have an issue where they send them out with loose neck joints so they sound weak, but just tightening the screws fixed it and it plays and sounds fine. I intend to put a mini humbucker in there one day for the sake of getting a more typical jazz tone and getting rid of singlecoil hum, but I don't have any complaints for the stock pickups. I picked the bullet over the CV teles because the neck felt thicker and the finish on the neck felt smoother. I like thicker necks and hate glossy finishes so to me the bullet was an all around better option.
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Strats can work just fine for jazz. Our own Dutchbopper:
In the thread:
Jazz ballad on my Strat
As pointed out above, though, you seem to have already answered your own question, and would prefer to have the Jazzmaster.
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A Fat Tele (humbucker in the neck position, with appropriate control potentiometers) works pretty well. Look up Ed Bickert, and Paul Desmond's album "Pure Desmond" for examples - Bickert used a Tele, and later in his career a Fat Tele. Fender has a current model called the American Performer Telecaster Hum that might work, and there are several other Teles with a humbucker at the neck (and sometimes at the bridge as well) that might work. Look at the Fender.com website and sort through the Telecasters.
I like Teles, properly equipped, for a jazz tone, but I don't really like Jazzmasters for jazz, and they're not often used by jazz players as far as I can see - they tend to be too bright, IMO; and generally you won't use a vibrato tailpiece for jazz playing. That said, a Strat on the neck and middle pickup with some eq adjustments can be OK for jazz, but it's not my favorite.
Another option, somewhat less expensive, is the Ibanez AS93. It's modeled after a Gibson ES335, and is available in the USA for around US$800. Ibanez has international distribution, so maybe they're available in your locale. See ibanez.com under "Hollow Bodies", models "AS". Epiphone has some "Inspired By Gibson" ES335 reproductions that are pretty nice for around US$600.
If you want to spend more than US$800, then D'Angelico, Eastman, and others all make semihollow and fully hollow guitars for more-or-less affordable prices (around US$2000). Even more expensive but with limited distribution are Gibson, Comins, and Collings guitars.
Semihollows are IMO more versatile than fully hollow guitars, and particularly for someone just getting their feet wet a fully hollow might be too much of a departure from what you're used to.
Look around at jazz players whose tones you like and see what they play. You might get some clues as to what you would like from that.
Set a budget and try to stick to it - but don't cheap out (that's a delicate balance to strike).
Good luck.
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Agree that's a really nice sound but in so many videos like this I've seen it seems almost any guitar can be made to sound big and fat. Most that I've heard in an actual live setting sound nothing like this. I can't recall any of JD's guitars ever sounding less than spectacular no matter what he used in videos. Granted he's a good player but I'm dubious of home videos. Originally Posted by Cunamara
btw what happened to DB, got tired of this joint?
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Welcome! In the opinion of this crotchety old curmudgeon, it ain't what you play - it's how you play it. Joe Pass made some mighty fine music on Fenders, including a Tele and a Jaguar -
There are many solid bodies in the hands of wonderful jazz guitarists, and a lot of them are active participants here. I'm no Bickert or Pass, but I've had a solid body in my working arsenal for over 50 years. My archtops have shared the rack with Strats, Teles, and LPs for decades. Here I am on my current and favorite out of the 10 or so solid bodies I've owned since 1969 -
Before you put money you don't want to spend into a new guitar, work on getting your Strat right for you. Simple changes start with volume and tone settings (both guitar and amp). Backing off your guitar's volume control and increasing the amp's will often warm up the tone. This depends on how your guitar is wired, but it's quick, easy and free to try. Rather than cranking the bass, try cutting all EQ pots on your amp all the way back and bringing them up gradually to find the sttings that sound best to you. I play through a Vibrolux or a Princeton at a local club, and both sound best to me with the bass and treble between 9 and 10 o'clock. If you're playing with your treble control(s) set high, trying to fatten up your tone by cranking the bass will only make the tone tubby - it won't get rid of the unwanted highs that are keeping it from sounding warm and mellow. I keep my guitar's tone pot at or below halfway.
You can change the tone capacitor for a higher value and the volume pot for a lower (250 instead of 500) [EDIT: Fenders with SCs come with 250s - so unless yours has a nonstandard pot or a HB, you can lower the resistance of the volume pot even further by wither replacing it or putting a fixed resistor across the two end terminals. A 250k fixed across a 250k pot will cut the total resistance to 125k, a 400 will cut it to about 150k, and a 500k will cut it to about 165k.]. Lower your neck pickup further from the strings to fatten up the tone a bit. You can change the p'up for a stacked or blade humbucker, but even that's probably not necessary. You're playing other styles as well, so I suspect you don't want to go to a heavy set of flat wound strings, but you might try a set of the lightest XL Chromes. I've used 11/13/17 plains on solids for years with flats to play everything from blues to pop to funk and fusion, and they're OK for straight ahead jazz too with the tone pot(s) rolled off. You can even warm up your tone a bit with a longer old fashioned high capacitance cable from guitar to amp.
Check out these and similar videos:
Last edited by nevershouldhavesoldit; 09-20-2023 at 03:19 PM.
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"Joe Pass made some mighty fine music on Fenders, including a Tele and a Jaguar"
agreed nshsi, but the sound of those guitars in Joe's recordings is less than stellar, very plinky imo.
I guess it depends if we're talking musicality or sound in combination.
that said I'm sure the sound could be much improved on w/ a solid body in a live situation today.
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Unfortunately the Ventures mucked up the image of the Jazzmaster (and Strat) for playing anything other than surf music. And then there was Dick Dale, all those new wave groups in the 70's/80's, etc.
You show up with a "Jazzmaster" on the bandstand at the local cocktail club and you're likely to have a used Luxardo cherry aimed at your forehead.
Ahem. Just joking.
The Telecaster is still the best choice, IMO. Seymour Duncan makes an Alnico 2 which is a great pickup for playing jazz--very mellow and not bright at all. You can find a used Tele/Squier/clone for a decent price almost anywhere. I got mine for $150, which included the SD pickups and a Warmouth neck.
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So I often see that "Joe Pass playing a Jaguar" picture, but what most people seem to miss about that picture is that it's a Bass VI.
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What amp do you use? Originally Posted by nelsonjw
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That picture sure is! Good eyes. He did play a Jaguar too-- think it was the house guitar at Synanon? At any rate, it's a Jaguar here. Originally Posted by customxke
Interesting about the 6 string bass...Wes tried that too:
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Having all three: strat, tele, JM.. I would say that the tele is the most useful but any can really work. I would not worry. JM are great guitars.
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I just got a cheap tele and put
a cheap alnico 2 HB in the neck
position …,
left the pots as 300k
12 guage TI flatwounds
it works great ….
good neutral sound
not too twangy for jazz
i had a pacifica strat before
that but it was way too bright
for me
I thought the fender scale would be a problem but I adjusted fine and don’t notice it at all now
bon chance
ps get the guitar that is the most comfortable to play for you,
you will play it more , and consequently will get better at
playing
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I've heard enough players get great traditional jazz tone through a Strat to understand that it's possible.
That said, wanting and needing a new guitar are exactly the same thing. The aching desire you feel when you repress the new guitar instinct can't possibly be healthy.
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In this video at about the minute and a half mark you can see the Jaguar label, plus the guitar has only two pickups (Bass VS has three) and metal switch-plate covers (Bass VI doesn't). Originally Posted by customxke
I've never seen a video, only pictures, but he also played a Jazzmaster.
But at that point in time, he didn't own a guitar. The Jaguar supposedly belonged to Synanon, and a I guess he borrowed others until he was given the 175 he became associated with.
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Did Joe every play a Tele? On record? I heard that photo was the result of him being handed a Tele and handing it back after the photo was taken
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All true, but I was referring to the photo of him playing a Bass VI, with 3 pickups, no chrome on the upper bass bout, and no Jaguar logo, posted earlier in this thread. Originally Posted by John A.
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Originally Posted by nelsonjw
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I think one could get a decent jazz sound out of any guitar with a neck pickup, tone control and a good amp... some better than others obviously. I often use a Tele for jazz gigs and it sounds great - different to an archtop; lots more sustain (which can be good or bad depending on what sound you want). I'm toying with the idea of sticking a humbucker in the neck position, but the single coil sounds great too.
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