Just the other day I was lucky enough to get my hands on a Fender Squire standard series Stratocaster.
Now I have to admit, when it comes to Fenders, I am a bit of a snob, U.S.A or the highway. It’s like my mate Bill always says, “it’s all about the SNOB value” but I must admit I was pleasantly surprised when I had a close look at Fenders standard series squire.
For a made in China guitar, these are a damn good instrument IMO.
I made a short video, but unfortunately the sound came out pretty ordinary, and that’s not mentioning my current lack of guitar skills.
To give you a closer look at this fine axe here are a few happy snaps that I took.
First up, a standard look at the guitar as you would see it standing upright on the stand or hanging up in a rack at the shop. It comes with a slim, I think it’s a “C” shape neck, (in any case it is very similar to the neck on my 99 Telecaster) and a 22-fret rosewood fretboard.
The back is a solid black, with a totoise shell spring cover, notice the lack of skunk stripe. It also has a bolt on neck.
It comes with a two point tremlo bridge with heavy duty bridge saddles. The bridge is currently set up as floating. I have the wang bar, but forgot to put it in when I took the photos.
Three single-coil alnico pickups and a five way toggle switch with a tortoise shell three ply pick guard.
The fretwire is probably a medium size, I couldn’t find any specs on the fret wire size, it is definitely smaller than medium jumbo.
The antique Burst Rosewood finish on this guitar is amazing, when you get close up you can see the shape of the grain just starting to come through the laquer, so I would asume it would be a nice wearing finish, giving the guitar a nice tone and good aging characteristics, and seeing it’s an Alder body, would definitely stand the test of time.
It also comes with the standard, sealed die-cast tuners, these don’t unfortunately have the Fender logo embossed into them though, but are lifetime-lubricated for years of trouble-free service and tuning stability (apparently).
It also has the BIG 70′s style headstock, personally I prefer the standard smaller HS, but my brother Col prefers the larger HS. I have heard that the larger headstock can improve the overall tone of the instrument, I couldn’t say if it did or it didn’t, I spose it has some credibility, the logic behind it is more wood, better tonal capabilities.
All in all, the Fender Squire standard series is a nice guitar for less than $500.