Alden Jazzcaster/ J Mascis Jazzmaster

tvrf21

I am thinking about buying an Alden Jazzcaster from Cranes Music, which is basically a Jazzmaster coppy without the roller pots and it made of basswood.

http://www.cranesmusicstore.com/aldenjazzcasterpowderblueelectricguitar-p-257.html

My only concern is that it is made of basswood, does anyone know how different the sound would be to a jazzmaster made of alder? I have a telecaster made of basswood which does have a more treble heavy sound, but that has humbuckers in it. But I'm not sure what it would sound like.

I know the J Mascis Jazzmaster is made of basswood, how different is that to a normal Jazzmaster?

I would try it out, but its only available over the internet, so does anyone have any insight into how different a basswood body would make jazzmaster pickups sound? Or has anyone tried the J Mascis Jazzmaster and found any major differences.

robertoriginal

the only jap jazzies' that are alder are the sunburst ones( i believe) all others are basswood.

to be completely honest, you will not notice a difference.

if you have two guitars identical in every way, cept one is bass and one is alder, you will only notice a slight weight difference(maybe 1.5 pounds at most)

as far as sound you will not notice much goin on.

alot of people don;t want to hear it, but truth be told, the type of wood you use for an electric solid body has little to nothing to do with the sound.

*edit* upon reading the descript, you know it has different pups in there, so it won't really sound like a jazzy normally does.

and i remember that the jag-stang is basswood, so is the 69 re-issue mustang, and a handfull of ibanez stuff is basswood. same thing with washburn.

tvrf21

I was planning on putting some seymour duncans in there any way as they look the same size as regualr jazzmaster pickups.

So your saying it wont make much difference being made of basswood?

I'm a big Incubus fan and I love their tones on the new stuff, and I love early Elvis Costello stuff and Dinosaur Jr. are awesome! but I just cant afford even the Jap reissue, so I reckon this would be my best bet. What does everyone else think?

robertoriginal

seems like it would be a good compromise, but if you dig the incubus stuff you will want a digital sort of setup, and with dino you'd want to go pretty much all vintage and tube.

alot of a players "tone" comes straight from the hands, the wood on a solid body really doesn't make a difference, the wood on an archtop or aucoustic is another story.

get it, thro some duncans in there, rock the hell out!!!

tvrf21

I tell you what I really like about the jazzmaster tone is that slight hollow sounding ring you get when you play past the 12th fret. You get it with all guitar on the neck pickups I know, but there is just more clarity to the Jazzmaster sound. Its just really awesome sounding, probably best heard on A crow left of the murder and beware criminal by Incubus, just great sounding.

As far as Incubus being digital, I would disagree, He uses Jazzmasters with an AC30 and a Marshall Plexi, in my book thats pretty vintage sounding.

robertoriginal

i thought his near rack system was packed full of digi effect, same with his pedal board.

you get the cool ringing sound just from the space between the bridge and the trem, altho the last time i saw him with a jazzy he was using a buzzstop+a mustang bridge, that was overkill.

plus there is so much wood that gets taken out of a jazzy, probly to help with weight but its immense, this is one that i built for someone over at the shortscale, not too long ago.

you should be able to tell which one is which.

Spitfire

The Alden Jazzcaster has p90 pickups (Alden p90s are pretty good too) and a Jazzmaster has much lower output pups. So the body wood won't make a huge difference but the pickups will so don't expect it to sound at all like a JM. It should sound pretty meaty I reckon.

robertoriginal

definitly, if hey are good p-90s that would sound really awsome then.

Fran

Yeah, i would'nt worry too much about 'tonewoods'. The sonic difference would be marginal.

If you can buy a second hand jap Jazzy i would go for it. I fitted a humbucker in my surf green Jazzys bridge position. A DiM 'the breed', it sounds great with all the RAWK qualities you would expect and it was very easy to fit. You may notice the pole pieces dont match the holes in the pup cover but who cares, only a Jazzmaster purist would notice at a glance anyway.

Here..

robertoriginal

awsome fran, i didn;t know you had that jazzy?

is that a stock jap, or a re-fin?

Fran

Yeah its stock. I got it off teh Hurb on SS. I did'nt really want another Jazzy, i was more interested in a vintage MM or maybe one of the 'new breed' like a Toronado but the surf greenz made it irresistable. 😉