J Mascis Squier Jazzmaster

Travisthedog

Is this guitar as good as the hype and importantly is it the best way to get a jazzmaster on a budget

Anyone here got one that they can advise on?

guitarcookie1

I have one but I've not played any other type of JM to compare it against.

The neck is really comfortable to play with quite big frets. It balances on the strap and my knee well (no annoying neck dive).

The pickups are the bit I'm not sure about. They're supposed to be P90-ish rather than JM-ish but they don't sound as good to my ears as the Irongear P90's in my Epi Dot (but that's a completely different guitar); they're a bit 'shrill' with light/medium gain tones. They're fine once you get passed ACDC levels of gain and the clean tone with reverb is really nice, I can spend hours with this alone

The trem is ok for shimmery wobbles and I've only noticed slight tuning issues every so often (the trem arm is a push-in job and doesn't seem to stay in very well for some reason).

dogload

I've got one and also an AVRI Thinskin Jazzmaster.

If you want an authentic Jazzmaster for not much, then look at the Squier VM. The J MAscis is a slightly different beast. As guitarcookie says, the neck is chunky and has a more modern radius than the AVRI but is very comfy and fast.

the trem is closer to the bridge (which is tune-o-matic as opposed to the traditional jag/JM 'rocking' bridge) which gives a greater break angle thus more sustain. 

The pickups are not shrill on mine, but are P90 and therefore not as open and pure as the real thing. They sing really nicely with appropriate levels of dirt and volume, without descending into high-pitched whistle (which tbh my AVRI doesn't but a Jag will). If you play loud and with lots of gain, they are great, but they aren't traditional Jazzmaster tones.

If you replace the bridge with a roller type TOM (or Wilkinson as I have) then tuning stability when using the trem is greatly improved. 

the only down-side tio the Squier JMJM is the fact it only comes in vanilla and gold!

MarkGAK

If you're looking for a Jazzmaster style guitar on a budget, I honestly don't think you can beat it. A few people are put off because it is a signature model, but if you can get past that, it's an awesome guitar.

A_T_W

dogload said:

the only down-side tio the Squier JMJM is the fact it only comes in vanilla and gold!

Surely you mean that's the best thing about it :P

chrisj1602

I'm really interested in these and I like the colour scheme, it's like the reverse of my Goldtop so would look very nice next to it...