Who signed my Jazzmaster?

Discussion of newer designs, copies and reissue offset-waist instruments.
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bah humbuck
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Who signed my Jazzmaster?

Post by bah humbuck » Sat Nov 14, 2020 12:15 am

A friend who works at a music store recently made the unparalleled move of blessing me with this used Classic Player Jazzmaster for $250. Tuning stability is something I have constantly struggled with, for different reasons, in most of the guitars I have used; To say that is not a problem here would be a gross understatement -- I can do almost Floyd-like bends with the vibrato* (*arm not pictured due to temporary amputation during yesterday's attempt at recording) with no discernible change in tuning. I've also never had a guitar with a p90 in the neck (never even occurred to me because I mistakenly associated p90s with, I don't know, hollow bodies and... "jazz attorneys?") but it feels like I've run into an old friend I hadn't met before. The humbucker-sized p90 in the bridge leaves a little to desire tonally for much beyond antisocially harsh high-frequency feedback, so I think it's going onto the chopping block in favor of my first year Super Distortion soon. But I'm getting ahead of myself. Here's the instrument:

Image

The reason for this post, aside from gushing about my windfall of good fortune in getting to fall asleep next to this instrument, is that the fucking stoner future-former-employee that took the guitar in on consignment, failed to ask about the signatures on the back of the headstock.

Image

It would take a mummified, resurrected Leo Fender himself hurtling towards me at warp speed in the midst of sleep paralysis for me to even consider ever giving up this guitar, so "notoriety" is not a concern for me in terms of who put pen to headstock. But I'm curious. if only out of princlple, if anyone recognizes these signatures as something other than Joe SomeGuy's friends (on (on bass and cajon) from the weekly jam in the man cave.

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Re: Who signed my Jazzmaster?

Post by dinosaurkale-> » Sat Nov 14, 2020 4:20 am

i know !
it's "JORG" and " CLAD" !

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Re: Who signed my Jazzmaster?

Post by Meriphew » Sat Nov 14, 2020 11:46 am

Clapton and SRV.

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schoolie
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Re: Who signed my Jazzmaster?

Post by schoolie » Sat Nov 14, 2020 12:40 pm

Might have been signed by Gert Jonnys!

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marqueemoon
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Re: Who signed my Jazzmaster?

Post by marqueemoon » Sat Nov 14, 2020 1:31 pm

Kid Rock and Ted Nugent

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Re: Who signed my Jazzmaster?

Post by Ceylon » Sat Nov 14, 2020 1:58 pm

2pac and Benny.

Also just to be that guy, I think this is a modified Blacktop rather than a Classic Player. Still a steal for the money you paid though.
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Re: Who signed my Jazzmaster?

Post by Futuron » Sat Nov 14, 2020 9:08 pm

Looks like it says Chad. (Would narrow it down to 90% of 21st century alt rock bands)

Just hoping for your sake it isn't the one from Nickelback, haha

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Re: Who signed my Jazzmaster?

Post by countertext » Sat Nov 14, 2020 10:33 pm

Looks like Joy and Alan to me. Don’t know what band it would be, though.

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Re: Who signed my Jazzmaster?

Post by pikmin » Sun Nov 15, 2020 5:10 am

It looks like a Blacktop Jazzmaster to me and not a Classic Player .
And it looks like it’s not a P90 in the neck position But a real Jazzmaster pickup which is pretty different in sound and conception .

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Re: Who signed my Jazzmaster?

Post by Axolotl » Sun Nov 15, 2020 5:46 am

pikmin wrote:
Sun Nov 15, 2020 5:10 am
It looks like a Blacktop Jazzmaster to me and not a Classic Player .
And it looks like it’s not a P90 in the neck position But a real Jazzmaster pickup which is pretty different in sound and conception .
Yep, pretty sure it's a blacktop. The TOM bridge is a mod, since blacktops came with the traditional JM/Jag bridge IIRC.

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Re: Who signed my Jazzmaster?

Post by Stephen_42 » Sun Nov 15, 2020 9:26 am

Axolotl wrote:
Sun Nov 15, 2020 5:46 am
pikmin wrote:
Sun Nov 15, 2020 5:10 am
It looks like a Blacktop Jazzmaster to me and not a Classic Player .
And it looks like it’s not a P90 in the neck position But a real Jazzmaster pickup which is pretty different in sound and conception .
Yep, pretty sure it's a blacktop. The TOM bridge is a mod, since blacktops came with the traditional JM/Jag bridge IIRC.
Yep, it's almost definitely a Blacktop. My first good guitar was a Blacktop Jazzmaster. They came with a bridge like the traditional JM/Jag one, but with single string grooves rather than the traditional multi-grooved saddles. Still has the individual saddle height adjustments though, so not quite a Mustang bridge either.

The tell-tale signs that it's almost definitely a Blacktop:

- The vibrato tailpiece doesn't have a locking button on this guitar, and it doesn't have a locking button on Blacktops either. Classic Players do have the locking version as stock. Of course, they could have modded the tailpiece rather than the bridge, but it would be a pretty bizarre change to make (whereas swapped JM bridges for TOMs is pretty common).

- The humbucker sized P-90, or more specifically the pickup ring. It's obviously not the stock pickup ring (stock is black), but Blacktops are routed for a humbucker in the bridge, mounted via ring. Classic players, on the other hand, are routed for Jazzmaster pickups which have a bigger horizontal footprint. That wouldn't leave any room for the pickup ring to screw into.

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Re: Who signed my Jazzmaster?

Post by Fiddy » Wed Dec 23, 2020 10:32 pm

Trump and Biden?

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Re: Who signed my Jazzmaster?

Post by Unicorn Warrior » Thu Dec 24, 2020 7:47 am

My dad

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Larry Mal
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Re: Who signed my Jazzmaster?

Post by Larry Mal » Thu Dec 24, 2020 8:38 am

Ah, I can answer this.

So, those signatures are Nick Drake's and Nick's weed dealer, Jim.

Jim was always up in Nick's shit, he'd bring an ounce or two by because Nick loved to get a puff in while he was working on his jams, but Jim would always be hanging around all day after that shit and it drove Nick crazy.

That's why in those Nick Drake songs he's always playing that quiet-ass acoustic guitar and singing in a whisper, because he didn't want fucking Jim to know he was recording otherwise Jim would come by asking did Nick need any weed or anything and then Jim would maybe have his harmonica that he couldn't play for shit and the whole day would be ruined.

Of course, Nick didn't really want to be known for those tired-ass moping songs about girls, that was just kind of him fucking around on guitar while stoned out of his shit, too stoned to even tune his guitar half the time. But Nick was really planning to do a funk-rock concept album about aliens coming to show the world how to dance at the pyramids and then overthrowing the war babies who had outlawed the funk or something. It was pretty hard to follow at times because he only could work on it sporadically when Jim wasn't hanging around, regardless, Nick was real excited about working with the Tower of Power horn section and he thought he could get Bernie Worrell and Larry Graham to appear on at least some cuts.

I think he called the aliens Afronauts now that I think about it.

Anyway, it wasn't to be, because he ended up taking his own life to get away from Jim and that harmonica.

The lesson is, drugs are bad, people.
Back in those days, everyone knew that if you were talking about Destiny's Child, you were talking about Beyonce, LaTavia, LeToya, and Larry.

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Re: Who signed my Jazzmaster?

Post by BlueMelody » Thu Dec 24, 2020 10:36 pm

Larry Mal wrote:
Thu Dec 24, 2020 8:38 am
Ah, I can answer this.

So, those signatures are Nick Drake's and Nick's weed dealer, Jim.

Jim was always up in Nick's shit, he'd bring an ounce or two by because Nick loved to get a puff in while he was working on his jams, but Jim would always be hanging around all day after that shit and it drove Nick crazy.

That's why in those Nick Drake songs he's always playing that quiet-ass acoustic guitar and singing in a whisper, because he didn't want fucking Jim to know he was recording otherwise Jim would come by asking did Nick need any weed or anything and then Jim would maybe have his harmonica that he couldn't play for shit and the whole day would be ruined.

Of course, Nick didn't really want to be known for those tired-ass moping songs about girls, that was just kind of him fucking around on guitar while stoned out of his shit, too stoned to even tune his guitar half the time. But Nick was really planning to do a funk-rock concept album about aliens coming to show the world how to dance at the pyramids and then overthrowing the war babies who had outlawed the funk or something. It was pretty hard to follow at times because he only could work on it sporadically when Jim wasn't hanging around, regardless, Nick was real excited about working with the Tower of Power horn section and he thought he could get Bernie Worrell and Larry Graham to appear on at least some cuts.

I think he called the aliens Afronauts now that I think about it.

Anyway, it wasn't to be, because he ended up taking his own life to get away from Jim and that harmonica.

The lesson is, drugs are bad, people.
Yeah, we all knew what Nick really meant with Thoughts of Mary Jane :fro:

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