My estimate would be much less than that. AND I HAVE OCD.
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Hey Fender- This is NOT cool!
- Thread starter rogerbmiller
- Start date
So true. A couple months ago our guitarist shows up with a cherryburst Les Paul that he got off of CL. The top was so mismatched, I seriously thought he must have bought a counterfeit. Before I said anything, I looked it up and it's very common issue with LPs. Of course, these cost way more than an MIA Jazz, but they can't manage to even come close to a matched maple cap. Maybe it's too expensive to book match these, but at least get the pieces from the same library.
I'm reading all kinds of excuses on here for Fender not to do a better job, but it's all baloney. It's not rocket surgery. Matching blocks of wood out of a pile doesn't take hours and a college degree. Anyone with a decent eye and a modicum of training could do it in seconds. Fender and Gibson just don't care and take little pride in putting out the best products, because as we see in this thread, many of its customers just don't care.
Maybe form is the more important thing. But it doesn't automatically follow that it's the most or only important thing. There's still room for art and craftsmanship - and taking pride in your creations.
I know that if a manufacturer is doing a poopy job, their sales will go down, hence the profit will go down, leading to the closing of the business. If a lot of people stop buying Fender basses and guitars, they will eventually close, so no more wood imperfections and mismatches. Just have patience.
Well the wood is already cut for the purpose of making the bass. I'm not sure matching wood for aesthetics creates any more waste, but I could be wrong. Also, it's really not a big deal in the big picture...wouldn't be a choice that I would be happy with. If every one really just cared about function tone and mojo, I should think folks would be buying from aliexpress looking for "the one"
Geez man, don't use Red Bull in your coffee. I'm no Fender purist by any means. If I were, I wouldn't have replaced my '70s Jazz Bass's neck with a Warmoth. I'm certainly no "shill" for Fender. They make a few basses I like, but so do several other companies.
I typically buy basses used, so I'm used to them not being cosmetically perfect. It just doesn't matter all that much to me.
I wasn't saying the Original Poster was wrong to see things the way he does; I was simply saying that I had a different approach/mentality about it. Take a deep breath, and try to be a little more civil in the future when someone just expresses their honest opinion.
It's the kind of thing that falls under the heading "First-World Problems".
I apologize, to you and everyone else in the thread, for the discourteous tone of my post. It certainly wasn't directed at you, your post was just the most recent.
Whether the mismatched wood matters to someone or not, I don't like that Fender gets a pass on silly crap like this. But I responded before my brain kicked in. Sorry.
It would not take minutes and it would disrupt production. For a problem that is not a problem to most people in America. So let's drive the cost up of the instruments because some people on TB think it's an earth shattering problem.
Haha. OK. $1200 is not an expensive USA instrument. It is the bottom of the line. You can buy these for less than $1000. It's easy....if this bothers you find one of the thousands of Fenders that are matched well. Or get a solid finish. Or pay more and get a Music Man or Lakland or something. See how that works?
So far the score in this discussion is about 50/50, so every 1 out of 2 cares...
..at least here on TB.
Do a poll on TB and my guess is that anywhere from 40-60% will care. Maybe more. But TB members are like 0.001% of the actual bass playing population. I can tell you that about 99% of the people that talk to me at shows have no idea what my Lakland is.
Good luck trying to sell a used bass with this kinda woodwork for the price you think you deserve.
I bet most of those:
1) Did not know that there was an "issue" from looking at the pic, but had to read entire post.
2) Already hate Fender and jump at any opportunity to scrutinize
or
3) Don't understand the question
I also get that there a few that legitimately think that mismatched grains in wood is a QC issue
I think matching wood has very little to do with price. I always thought it is the standard practice for all wooden products except maybe for the fruit lugs.
I bet matching grain is the basic stuff people learn in lutherie schools
I bet matching grain is the basic stuff people learn in lutherie schools
I think in Fender's case there's much more important things to complain than wood matching in laminated bodies. The main thing for me is their highly inconsistent quality, compared to similarly priced gear (i.e. EB Musicman). I'd never risk buying a Fender sight unseen, OTOH I did (twice) with EBMM. The other thing that bugs me is how in this world they haven't yet figured out how to make a P or J with a usable low B, or a neck with no (or at least not that embarrassing) dead spots. There's people out there making almost boutique stuff for the price of a MIA Fender (including much improved P or J clones), thus find their lacks plain unacceptable.
