Fender’s just introduced a new variation on the Mustang – the Fender American Special Mustang! The Fender Mustang was introduced in 1964 as a step up from the late-1950’s MusicMaster and Duo-Sonic ‘student’ guitars. However, certain aspects of this design attracted a number of professional players who at the time weren’t comfortable with other guitars available at the time. They seemed to like the 24-inch scale and the compact, lightweight body.
For example, Johnny Winter was often seen with a slightly modified Mustang (there was a trapeze tailpiece to bypass the trem!) around the time of his early albums (including Progressive Blues Experiment).
As well, and perhaps surprisingly, John McLaughlin reportedly used a Mustang when playing with Miles Davis around the time of the Bitches Brew album. His version was strung with heavier flatwounds.
Intended to be an affordable version of a US-made instruments, the Fender American Special line not only costs a bit less but makes a lot of sense. These are really good, well thought out and practical instruments!
Here we are looking at the Fender American Special Mustang. It has nearly all the features of the classic version – but with an adjusto-matic bridge and stop tailpiece instead of the vintage bridge and trem unit. For many players, this is a serious upgrade! The new bridge provides solid, reliable intonation and better control of the string geometry.
As well, the new Atom pickups are now humbucking and splittable, with standard toggle switches rather than individual sliders.
The classic Mustang ‘slab’ body, compact and light, is still there, with a glowing gloss urethane sunburst or black finish.
This is an instrument that shouldn’t be overlooked. It’s got a lot of strengths.
Specifications:
| Neck | Maple neck with ‘slab’ Rosewood fingerboard and white dot position markers. 24 inch scale length with 9.5 inch radius and 1.650 inch nut width. Modern C shape neck profile. |
| Frets | Jumbo frets, 22 in total. |
| Body | Alder body in the classic compact, lightweight Mustang slab design. |
| Finish | Gloss Urethane finish in three-colour sunburst or black. |
| Hardware/electronics | Splittable ‘Atom’ humbucking pickups, pickup selector, master volume, master tone. The volume control is a push/pull that splits the pickups, providing the inside of the neck pickup and the outside of the bridge pickup. |
| Playability/Action | These guitars play very well right out of the box and like any Fender can be readily set up to the player’s requirements. |
| Case | Fender Gig Bag Included |
| Pricing | $1249.99 CAD with gig bag. |
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