Fender Duosonic – Fender Mustang – Fender Musicmaster – Fender Stratocaster Junior – Fender Jaguar – Fender Bronco – Gibson Melody Maker – Gibson Byrdland
The Fender Jaguar was introduced in 1962 just as surf music was becoming popular. While surf essentially made the guitar popular it’s likely that the Fender design team was wanting to improve upon the Jazzmaster. To this end, the Jaguar had the same offset waist and dual circuit wiring that the Jazzmaster had. They did [...]
The Gibson Melody Maker, which was introduced in 1959, was Gibson’s answer to the problem of competing against Fender and other guitar companies for the lower end, budget and student, guitar market. Gibson had been primarily known for making higher end guitars, such as the Les Paul and ES semi-hollows. They needed a cheap guitar to round out their product line, a Gibson guitar that just about anyone could afford.
The period between the time Leo Fender started the Fender Electric Instrument Company around 1948 and the company’s sale to CBS in 1964 is known as the ‘pre-CBS’ period. The original Fender Duosonic was introduced during this time period, in the summer of 1956. Fender guitars made during this period are valued for their quality [...]
The Fender Mustang was introduced in 1964 as part of a redesign of Fender’s student guitar line. The basic idea was to add in things like a tremolo bridge and advanced pickup switching to the revamped Musicmaster and Duo-Sonic. The Mustang was perhaps the most successful of this line, staying in production from 1964 until [...]