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New range from fender.


Painy

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9 hours ago, drTStingray said:

The attached article, though 5 yrs old, gives an interesting insight into Fender and its financial issues - citing competition with its own history as its biggest competitor - people wanting only to buy old ones rather than their new ones!!

https://mobile.nytimes.com/2012/09/30/business/fender-aims-to-stay-plugged-in-amid-changing-music-trends.html?referer=https://www.google.co.uk/

 

Interesting.

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15 hours ago, AndyTravis said:

Yeah that’s what I’m thinking - but then I saw this on instagram so the tort would be gone...

644E5386-486B-494F-9BAB-53E1F7F4D018.jpeg

I think that's the Standard MIM, because it doesn't appear to have the clay dot markers . My preferred guard colour for a blue bass though :) 

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Fender stuff has been available in Lake Placid Blue for a while?? Is the fact a US made one is now blue, an exciting thing? Personally for me, making different colours available/non-available isn't a deciding factor in choosing a guitar ( I guess), I'd just look at the range of colours and decide on the one I liked the look of. I guess if it were only available in one, minging, colour (which I guess could happen if there were limited availability and shopping secondhand, or left-handed etc) then I might just decide not to buy. 

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Much like the 'American Professional' is just a re-brand of the American Standard series and the 'American Elite' is just a re-brand of the 'American deluxe' line, this new 'American Original' is just a re-brand of the 'American Vintage' series. I think the launch of the different lines at different times, while they are still marketing the old lines for sale, has caused a bit of confusion. Not quite the level of confusion of Gibson Les Pauls with their Studio/Classic/Traditional/Standard with matching 'Traditional' or 'High Performance' sub-specs if you want robotic tuners. I think that Fender could have handled the re-launch a bit better. I prefer the old brand names better as well.

In terms of the guitars and basses themselves, I think that they all look nice. The prices have gone up, but the prices for everything have gone up. 

In terms of the lack of 'innovation' criticism, this 'American Original' line is clearly not designed to be innovative. The American Professional series is clearly geared to be their new 'standard' passive electronic bass with a few modern updates in terms of pickups, hardware and frets. The 'American Elite' series is far more innovative in terms of Fender design, in terms of the compound radius and updated hardware and electronics, so it appears to be designed to compete with the more 'boutique' active jazz basses from Sandberg, Sadowsky Metro in the same price bracket. 

Fender have also recently launched an offset series and the Dimension bass so they do try 'new' stuff from time to time, it is just that most of time their new ideas don't catch on. I speak of this as an owner of Fender Toronado, a attempt by Fender to make a guitar with humbuckers and a Gibson scale length. It is a fine guitar but not as nice a 'proper' Strat or Tele. I was tempted of selling it, but I will keep it just in case Ed Sheeran or someone like that starts using one and their value skyrockets. 

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Just on the lack of innovation thing.  EVH guitars and amps are made by fender, yes they are not out there in terms of design etc but they are very different from the standard fender fare.

http://www.evhgear.com/gear/

Are there any other makes out there that are really fenders?

Edit: looks like Jackson and charvel are produced in house at fender too.

Edited by No. 8 Wire
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These 50s, 60s and 70s basses are nothing new. The only difference is that they were previously manufactured in mexico. Now you can buy them, manufactured in the USA, and sold for twice the price.

 I think Fender had Trump voters in mind when they thought of this range.

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I don't really get what the hand ringing about fender is - its a 'heritage' type brand.  You can get a slightly more modern style of fender if you buy a USA Jackson or an EVH (okay guitars only that last one).

But I still don't get the ragging on fender - if they produced coffee table versions of their basses then suddenly there would be no room for the 'boutique' style basses, 90% of which are just that.

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This is all very silly. Fender aren't trying to rip anyone off, they are trying to survive.

They are repositioning their ranges and (hopefully) addressing the issues of the past. If these are better made basses (and they'd better be or Fender is gong out of business) then they will be worth the price. If anyone doesn't want to pay US prices then they have less expensive ranges (which I hope will be better built as well) to choose from.

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On 20/01/2018 at 16:19, No. 8 Wire said:

if they produced coffee table versions of their basses then suddenly there would be no room for the 'boutique' style basses, 90% of which are just that.

They did...I'm unsure whether these were solely custom shop or limited run models, but does anyone remember these monstrosities:

imagAux1_Tye-Zamora.jpg

21945461.jpg

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31 minutes ago, NancyJohnson said:

They did...I'm unsure whether these were solely custom shop or limited run models, but does anyone remember these monstrosities:

imagAux1_Tye-Zamora.jpg

21945461.jpg

Ouch that is rank.  However it has striking similarities to another phallically well endowed range of basses which has a large and loyal following.  I guess this is good evidence that Fender should stick to what it is good at.

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