Fender Duosonic
This is a 1993 Made-in-Mexico (MIM) reissue of the Fender Duosonic. I traded a couple of effects pedals for it. The green markings on it were from a previous owner and they also cracked the pickguard at some point and removed the pickup covers.
This is an interesting guitar to play because it has a 22.5" scale length. This allows me to play some arpeggios and chord shapes that I can't quite do on a 25 1/2" scale guitar. It's also fun as a rhythm guitar since it's so easy play.
The tone is kind of trashy. The pickups, which are Tex-Mex or some variant of them, are fairly hot and brash sounding. With the right amp/effects settings you can get a nice and trashy punk rhythm. With other settings you can get some decent blues and rock tones.
The intonation isn't very good on this guitar, probably due to the short scale length and the 3 bridge string guides, sort of like a non-string-thru vintage Tele bridge.
Modifications
After I had this guitar a few years
I finally got around to fixing it up. Here's the after picture.
I ordered a new pickguard from WD Music with a White/Black/White color scheme instead of the plain, thin, white like the original. I salvaged a Seymour Duncan QuarterPound staggered and a Carvin AP11 (RWRP) from an unused Strat pickguard assembly along with the black knobs.
I kept the other original electronics and shielded the new pickguard and cavity with foil. The only hitch with this work was that the pickguard didn't fit exactly. A little bit of gentle tweaking got it into place. I'll bet the original got broken when the previous owner tried to force it back into position.
Soundwise, I like it. Nice bridge crunchy sound from the QuarterPound with a smooth sound from the Carvin neck. Together they really work well. This is my favorite sound so far with it and with the RWRP neck I get a humbucking effect as well. You can hear this version of the pickups in the Nu Duo recording.
Sounds
Get the Flash Player to see this player.
The sound clip for this guitar features two short sample clips of about 15 seconds each. These clips are from the original pickups, not the new ones. The first clip is a rock power chord example using the bridge pickup. This part was done with my Korg AX1000G's "Big Fuzz" setting. The second clip is a jazz/blues run made using the neck pickup with the Korg's "Classic Comp" setting.
My Performances on SoundClick that Feature This Guitar
