I obtained a new pickguard from a seller on eBay, the pickup is a custom handmade replacement made by Wizard Pickups in the UK, and the all-new electronics are two CTS 250k pots, a Switchcraft jack, vintage style cloth wire and a Sprague orange drop capacitor.
Stock or customized? Give us all the specs!Īll stock, with the exception of the pickguard and electronics. The bass came to me as a box of parts which had to be reassembled. It was given to me by a friend who ran a studio in Orlando, Florida. Guitar technician and custom instrument builder Graham Drew shares his 1978 Fender Musicmaster Bass in this installment of Old School, and the story that goes with it. Squier reintroduced the Musicmaster briefly in 1997, replacing it a year later with the Bronco bass. Fender later offered many of the finishes offered on their other instruments as well.įender’s line of budget instruments was discontinued in 1981, when the company introduced the Squier brand. The bass was introduced with three finishes: black, white and red, with a few early issues painted in daphne blue and sporting pearl pickguards. This was also a 30″ short-scale bass, the shortest production scale of any Fender bass. All of the electronics were mounted on a single piece of plastic. The bodies were from the Mustang production line, and 6-pole guitar pickups were used instead of the standard 4-pole pickups used in basses. Too many 14 year old thrashers complaining Uncle Charlie's '56 Bassman didn't sound like a Crate stack.The Musicmaster was Fender’s budget-priced bass at the time, made from surplus parts from other Fender models. Unusual and vintage equipment reviews on HC are often garbage. Oh - and if you stick a 12" Weber Cali in it instead of a "looser" speaker, it DOES make a great studio bass amp! I've known a few bass players that used them in the studio - the amp mic and a direct-inject signal mixed together for a really articulate but warm sound. If you just ignore all the prejudices, do the few simple parts changes and *listen*, you'll find a gem in the weeds of one of Fender's worst eras. In fact, this thread has me thinking of hunting for another one! You have to be able to get over the idea that you're looking at a cheap SF Fender Bass amp and ignore all the normal predisposition that goes with it and JUST use your ears. I was told they thought it was worth a shot as the amps weren't expensive (I think they ended up fetching $200 or so on eBay 5 or 6 years ago) but didn't expect much, and were shocked. I sold the last two I had because I have a 5D3 and needed room and money - both buyers were floored. There were quite a few (and still some) who scoff at it - and most of the naysayers are going on an empty tank as they've never HAD one or have but never stuck a decent alnico 12 in it *and* played with tubes (the lower-gain preamp tube is a big piece of the puzzle many buyers of Musicmasters miss). What you end up with is darned close to a 5D3 later wide-panel Deluxe sound.
There are websites that list a few tweaks you can do - but honestly out of the 4 or 5 I've had (both the 6V6 and 6AQ7 - note they are NOT 6BQ7's aka EL84's and lots of p[layers by them making that mistake thinking they're getting a Vox clone.6AQ7's are very Fendery-sounding, plentiful and inexpensive) all I needed to do to get an absolutely stunning guitar tone was a simple cap job (needed anyway), a speaker replacement (MANDATORY - the speaker is junk almost anything is an improvement, but a P12Q-type is the secret weapon) and a lower-gain preamp tube (pick your poison - 5751, 12AY7 or even a 12AU7). It's mostly "weird" because it was so unlike Fender to use a more *expensive* system and parts, especially in the CBS days.
#1977 fender musicmaster amp driver
The transformer-coupled inverter is actually a much better system than a driver tube, which wears out, needs to be precisely balanced and can have a huge effect on tone and gain (in a bad way, mostly). "I read Gerald Weber's first book and I'm no a tech") think there is something "wrong" with them.
The transformer-coupled phase inverter invariably makes people with a smattering of technical knowledge (i.e. They are probably one of the great "sleeper" amps of all time for small club and studio use - for guitar. We had several discussions where about these 7 or 8 years ago.
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