Worth it? NEW Fender American Ultra Stratocaster! 

DUDe cant u afford locking tuners?!

Congrats! Great choice. Did you need a setup or was it good to go out of the box?

Have you played the American professional? I have one and am thinking about buying the Ultra. I'm curious how the Ultra's feels and plays regarding the modern D shape neck, compound radius fingerboard and medium jumbo frets. I can't test it in a nearby store so I'm hoping if I buy it there won't be a steep learning regarding the new feel.

I just bought one. I concur with Mr. Crowley

Thoughts on needing a setup out of box? Anything need adjusting?

@@dimitrikezis No

good point

Same here, I want to buy a Tele but I'm sick of refrets. No more nickel frets here!

Cutting corners

Fender don't offer stainless steel frets at any level because of the damage they do to their tools.

​@@matthewgordon2655 I'm pretty sure they can lend the tools from EVH, Charvel, Jackson or any other company they own which use SS Frets. Also some of them (EVH for example) are made in the same factory in Corona, California. :-)

the neck is great. rolled to perfection. you get what you pay for. Unless youre on tour playing guitar for hours every night you dont NEED Stainless frets. its just a thing now. For over 60 years many greats played with regular frets, not SS. Jimi, Eric, Jeff - they dont need them.

@@brooklynboy1000 mainly because stainless wasn’t thought of at the time and machinery wasn’t able to keep up. Innovation is nice and at THAT PRICE all guitars should come with stainless. This strat is aimed that the serious player and as such makes sense to have stainless.

@@TheJMan1K SS frets will destroy guitar strings depending on your style. the more pressing you do. the more frequently you will need to restring.

of course!

Did you need a setup after getting it? I assume you bought new.

@@dimitrikezis well it was setup as they intended, which was very low fast action. Too low IMO, but I can fix that myself. With the crappy noiseless pickups and extremely low action, I see they are targeting this guitar at the home recording artist and not the live lead player. I finally put in Custom Shop Texas Specials and now the guitar is awesome.

I had same experience as you only i went in debt for half of it. 😬 paid $900 owe $900. An gonna pay off asap so i dont feel guilty or stress about it. I am loving it. I have the Cobalt blue sss maple neck

haha, yes! It's a common thing with some brands. We get a release date and time.

@@LivingroomGearDemos I guess it ;), the timing was too perfect to not think that. Great review as always btw.

Depends what sound you want. I would say the tele is a little more versatile.

2-300 for MIM's is a great deal any day of the week. Buddy spent around 800 recently for a new one which I think was a mistake considering what u can shop for in the American used.

@@clarksvilletnlandscapingse6985 I agree ! Hope you have a great new year !!😁👍

Yes not for everyone 😉

thanks!

Thanks! Oslo, Norway:)

I agree. You're a pretty damn good player too!

Paid Shill Blues in G minor 👌🏻

nah, we're talking Schumacher era

@@LivingroomGearDemos oh yeah baby!

😎

Do they send cease and desists if you play metal on them?

Why?

@@LivingroomGearDemos I find them quite dull compared to "real" single coils... I don't think the way a noiseless is made could ever allow them to sound like proper single coils AND be noiseless. They're great on stage though...

Paul Ross You don't have a video of this guitar on your channel, show it to us!

I have an HM Strat Ultra in blue frost from 1990, very rare and was a special order from Fender. I’ve put a video clip on RU-vid as there’s no other video on here or anywhere, will have to do another one demoing the guitar.

Can’t tell what guitar sounds like with all the effects.

Thanks! I haven't tried the Helix to be honest!

BS - Stainless steel frets change the tone - it is not an "upgrade" just different and more expensive; they have always had locking tuners; my Strats and Tele have absolutely no issue staying in tune; the only change John made to the trem was to drill out the mounting holes a bit larger.

Did u tried the Elite ? Any difference ??

Awesome, Paul! Thanks!

Different radius, different wiring, different contour, different pickups, different neck heel. That’s it, mostly

I did when I filmed, but I ended up not using it because I recorded it wrong. My bad!

Hi! Have you played one?

Living Room Gear Demos Not yet. Unlikely to any time soon. What makes them worth the money is what I want to know?

It's expensive for sure, but from all of the guitars I've tried ("normal" guitars, custom shops, boutique etc) I personally feel that it's worth the price. Are you basing it on the specs only?

Living Room Gear Demos the specs yes. The radius on the neck seems a little unusual. I get the pickups are noiseless too but I don’t know if that could justify a price hike. Also, and I know this is personal taste, but the colours that Fender have been coming out with lately have either been lovely or disgusting (but mostly disgusting for my taste). I go on feel of the guitar to be honest, so maybe I need to pick one up.

This does get a little aggravating but it's big money trickling down to pressure the marketing.....can anybody say Iphone? Nobody is forced to buy one however. Thank God the guitar doesn't come with some software that needs updating.

Well, a custom shop or any boutique brand is even more expensive. It's not cheap though, that's for sure. But I think it's worth it.

The end removed this finish, but it will be back at some point I’ve heard.

Wow, thanks a lot! Finally some more positive comments on this video 😃

@@LivingroomGearDemos Sure man. And well... yeah, people gonna nag lol. Guitar looks cool though, but i'm perfectly fine with my 2006 Standard. About the price, it's high but nothing too crazy like Gibson pulls off all the time.

Hope that's a good thing!

Plasma Red. They've stopped making this model unfortunately. Or this color.

​@@LivingroomGearDemos ok, i read about the woods problems...they reduce the ash ....

@@LucaCo wood problems, reduce ash?

Owned a Cutlass. I prefered my Ultra, to be honest.

It's 🔥

🙈

Hey! Sorry you don’t like it. I’ve had similar experiences myself, so I can’t really argue on everything you say. But. More expensive guitars tends to be way more consistent in quality from the factory. I have a cheap tele which is close to custom shop quality. But I’ve also tried several similar models that weren’t that good at all. So that’s my take on the whole thing.

@@LivingroomGearDemos That's true. The less expensive models can definitely be hit-or-miss. But if you try enough you'll het a hit, and then it's so worth the extra shopping around.

I own a Mexican made Stratocaster which is actually the guitar that I play the most just because it's my only guitar that's always out on the guitar stand. All my Americans are always cased when not being played. I have upgraded the tuners to American Standards, changed the pickups to Custom Shop '54's and completely rewired to with vintage push back wire. Replaced the awful pots with CTS's and output jack with Switchcraft. I replaced the horrendous stock bridge (it made it have dead spots all over the fretboard) to a Callaham bridge ( that really woke the guitar up! I highly recommend that upgrade!). The guitar sounds and plays really well. Bought it for $500 and put about $350 in to it. The only thing that I can say that I don't love about it is the neck. I have long hands and fingers and my left hand start to cramp after playing chords on it for a while. The neck is just too small & thin. The American necks are just more substantial, fuller. More finished, polished. They feel smoother and completed. The rounded fretboard edges are like butter and feel so well played. I could play it all day/night long. No matter what I could do to the MIM Strat neck, I could never get it to be as comfortable. I'd be apprehensive to do a night of gigs with it as my main guitar for fear of my hand cramping.

They do not.

Yea

Don’t know...

Fuzzrocious 420 Fuzz!

@@LivingroomGearDemos Thanks. Looks complicated, but really does sound yummy in your clip. I may need to investigate further.

It's awesome! And not too complicated

Hey! Thanks and thank you for the comment. Well, I respectfully disagree, even though it was Fender that presented the term "Ferrari" to me. I think it's a luxury instrument, it's a huge step up from most of the Strats I've played. And the color is kind of similar etc.

@@LivingroomGearDemos I can see that coming from them. But they are still factory instruments that you can buy on Amazon. If you want a brand new Ferrari you have to order it, wait 1 to 2 years, etc...They are made in small batches (I think) not thousands at a time like those guitars. And even if they are a step up from the previous factory Fender, a nice custom shop/boutique guitar will still be superior (most of the time) and unique. I would compare them to the Audi/Mercedes of guitars. ;)

My guitar bud has a newer MIM and it feels nothing like my American Pro. Its night and day better feel than the MIM.

Yeah that's just something cheap people say. The differences are clear in the hardware, playability and sound.

@@shawn4189 Cheap people??? I own a couple of the MIM Vintera series Fenders that cost $1,000....I don't think that's "cheap", and they play and sound excellent. Throw Squire Affinity in the cheap section, not MIM. The cheapest MIM Strat is $700

Same scenario with me. Buddy's MIM felt like what it is, a knock off.

Jepp

🙏🏻

It's depends whether you want to just play the guitar, or whether you want to spend your time finding all the upgrades for a mim, find a tech that's actually up for the task, wait for them to make the upgrades and set up the guitar, all while praying that something didn't go wrong in this process and that the tech is actually good at what they do I've played a few good MIM's, but they were all heavily modified and have been through the hands of several techs to get where they are. I've never played a stock MIM that didn't have fret buzz, notes choking out during bends, or an action that you'd think is set up for slide. And when I think how much time and money goes into these mods that could of been spent practicing and performing, the price difference doesn't really seem that significant. Time is money too. But as you said, to each their own.

I just got a mim player's stratocaster and it plays better out the box .no fret buzz pick ups are fine if you got a decent amp sounds great not like the American original 50s stratocaster I got factory set up was terrible straight from corona and I never bonded with it it was a 1000 dearer than the mim strat so sold it got a mm and couldn't be happier you are just paying for american labour I have two Japanese fender telecasters great guitars less than half the price of these ultras the noisless pick ups don't do it for me sound to thin to my ears

It is alder, fender does not use ash amymore.

@@Torus1Knot1 The plasma burst in this video has an ash body. The stopped making this finish since, because, as you say, Fender stopped using ash.

CraigSteps is that the “modern” we hear? It should chime! It did not. Or at least not like a vintage Strat.

@@Steven_SK Totally!

Always fun with nice comments when you've worked on a video for a week and you're kind of happy with it.

@@LivingroomGearDemos Im here because I'm a fan, though. You do amazing work and youre a great guitarist, too. If the joke is old, I apologise.

Oh, I didn't get the joke. I'm always up for being joked with! Maybe you can explain?

@@LivingroomGearDemos It was a nudge regarding your somewhat staccato-like pronunciation.

🤖

What do you don't like about them?

@@LivingroomGearDemos In answer to your question, difficult to put in words. To my ear they lack character. They are bland sounding. I have several Strats and Teles with the noiseless pickups and I'm tired of them.

Teachering yeah i love the feedback though on any non noiseless single pickup

Noiseless pickups have a place in any kit. The Gen4 are excellent [I have a Strat with Fat50 and one with Gen4 noiseless] They are very comparable in tone, with the noiseless having more output and bottom end. The new noiseless seem to be a bit brighter and more open sounding. I put the Fishman noiseless in my Tele - to my ear, they sound better than the stock Fender pickups.

@@northof50now A musician friend gave me a scolding about my criticism of the new Fender noiseless. He feels that this generation of pickup has come a long way and that they are very good pickups. I've decided to have a listen to the new Fender Ultra to test my complaint. Thank you for your response, northof50now.

Norwegian!

Living Room Gear Demos hahaha 😂your country is beautiful!! I’ve just discovered your channel, so good!! Keep it up, bro!!

that is a good play on words, that's for Suhr...

Ok!